Rhubarb Cherry Tart

Rhubarb Cherry Tart

Dorcas Annette Walker

My father loved rhubarb, but my mother didn’t have a green thumb and was too busy working full time to bother with a garden or flowers outside. So I can remember as a girl riding around in the car with my father during the summer as he spied out rhubarb patches around the farm areas where we lived. Rhubarb is a fast growing plant that rapidly spreads and seeing a handicapped father with young children the women were always happy to give a bagful of rhubarb away. I enjoyed cutting up the reddish green stalks, but wasn’t that crazy over the tart taste until I grew older. My husband on the other hand had never seen nor heard of rhubarb until we were married. Since then he has become an avid fan of eating rhubarb from the patch that I grow in my herb garden.

Rhubarb dates back to China in 2700 BC where it was first noted that rhubarb was given to the Wu emperor to cure his fever. It was transported to the throne from the southern parts of China during the Tang dynasty, in 960 rhubarb was taken to cure the plague, a Christian was pardoned from hard labor after using rhubarb to heal some soldiers, during the Ming dynasty a general tried to commit suicide by eating rhubarb, and in 1828 the Daoguang emperor sent out an edict that no more tea or rhubarb would be sold to the “barbarians”. Rhubarb was first recorded in 17th century England after sugar became affordable to the common people and was first used for medical purposes. An unnamed Maine gardener in 1790 is given credit for introducing rhubarb to growers in Massachusetts where it soon became popular and was sold in produce markets. Rhubarb or “pie plant” spread rapidly westward with the settlers.

Rhubarb is classified as a vegetable grown from thick short rhizomes of a perennial plant with large triangular shaped green leaves that are toxic. The flower of rhubarb is greenish-white to rose-red. It is the deep red, pink, or green stalks that are used for consumption. Rhubarb is now grown in greenhouses in many areas and is available throughout much of the year. The rhubarb commonly grown today here in America is actually a nineteenth century hybrid of China. Rhubarb can be cooked in many ways such as: stewed to yield a tart sauce, filling for pies, tarts, desserts, jams, and for wine. I’ve even known some folk who enjoy eating the raw stalk like celery. Talk about a mouth puckering snack!

Most commonly rhubarb is combined with fruit such as strawberries, apples, or cherries. My Rhubarb Cherry Tart camouflages the rhubarb with a cherry pie filling until only the cook will know that rhubarb is the secret ingredient. In return the rhubarb gives the cherry filling a pleasing tasty zing. The Rhubarb Cherry Tart takes only thirty minutes to prepare and this recipe serves six.

Rhubarb Cherry Tart

1 baked pie crust in a 9 inch tart pan
Cook 2 cups of rhubarb in a small amount of water until tender.

While hot add:
1 (3 oz) pkg of strawberry jello
½ c sugar
1 tsp almond extract
Stir together until dissolved and then fold in:
1 (21 oz) can of cherry pie filling
Pour into the baked tart crust and chill for a couple of hours until firm. You can garnish your Rhubarb Cherry Tart by sprinkling powdered sugar on top or serve with a dollop of cool whip!

Weekly tip: To make a fancy dessert plate for a special dessert heat red jelly or a colorful clear sauce and pour a thin layer onto a white dessert plate. Then pipe dots of cool whip to shape a heart or round circle in the middle. With the tip of a knife or toothpick you can either connect the dots or swirl the dots to form a comma!

Dorcas Annette Walker is a published author, columnist, speaker, freelance magazine writer, and photographer from Jamestown, Tennessee. Contact her at: dorcaswalker@twlakes.net. For more recipes check out her Creative Mountain Cookin page and blog at: www.dorcasannettewalker.com

Valentine Barbecue Biscuits

Valentine Barbecue Biscuits

Dorcas Annette Walker

I’m the type of cook that thinks a little bit more is better. My daughter on the other hand will count out a potato for each person and add one to the pot. I count the people, grab an extra large size pan, and fill it up. So invariably I end up with leftovers. While I don’t go as far as my grandmother did- she’d grab a bowl of food and keep filling up your plate every time you emptied it during a meal at her house- I tend to rate the success of my meal by how well a person can walk after eating at my table. If they groan complaining about being too stuffed and stagger when they try to walk, I figure that my food was good. As a precaution for preventing heart attacks or sudden seizures we sit around and talk for awhile after everyone is finished eating. I was raised that mealtime should not only be a time for enjoying food, but also a time for fellowship. To me the table should be a haven from the fast paced society that we live in. I always made it a rule for our family to gather around the table at least one time a day no matter if I had to juggle the hour back or forth in order to accomplish my goal. Now that my children are grown I cherish our mealtimes together even more when they come back home for a visit.

Nighttime snacks can also be an opportunity of fellowship whether it is with the family, a youth group, or an adult get-to-gether. Leftovers are an ideal chance of using food in different creative ways. One Sunday afternoon as I was scrambling around trying to figure out what to have for our Sunday night open house at the parsonage, I decided to experiment with the leftover roast and came up with my Valentine Barbecue Biscuits.

Any leftover meat such as pork, hamburger, and beef can be used in making the Valentine Barbecue Biscuits. Also in place of biscuits you can substitute soft tacos, pita bread or a slice of regular bread. These Valentine Barbecue Biscuits are quick and easy to make- I’ve even made them up beforehand ready to pop into the oven at the last minute. So use your imagination and don’t be afraid to personalize your Valentine Barbecue Biscuits to pamper the taste buds of your sweetheart this Valentine’s Day.

Valentine Barbecue Biscuits

1 (16oz) can of jumbo-size buttermilk biscuits
1 c cooked meat (chopped or shredded into bite-size pieces)
½ c barbecue sauce (any flavor)
1 c shredded mozzarella cheese

Flatten out each biscuit making a slightly raised edge on a greased baking tray. Mix the meat and barbecue sauce together then place a heaping tablespoon of the meat mixture on top of each biscuit. Sprinkle on shredded cheese and bake in the oven at 350º for fifteen minutes until slightly browned. Serve hot right from the oven! This recipe makes eight Valentine Barbecue Biscuits.

Weekly tip: Refrigerated canned biscuits make ideal crusts when flattened out and can be used in a pinch for about any recipe. I always like to keep a couple of cans of biscuits in my refrigerator for any unexpected company.

Dorcas Annette Walker is a published author, columnist, speaker, freelance magazine writer, and photographer from Jamestown, Tennessee. Contact her at: dorcaswalker@twlakes.net. For more recipes check out her Creative Mountain Cookin page and blog at: www.dorcasannettewalker.com

Grandma's Cherry Cheese Pie

Grandma’s Cherry Cheese Pie

Dorcas Annette Walker

My first taste of cherry cheese pie was at my grandmother’s house. I fell instantly in love with the smooth creamy cheese texture topped by red cherries. In fact everyone who tasted my Grandma’s Cherry Cheese Pie was swept under its culinary spell. It quickly became a tradition for every family reunion that my grandmother made several of her cherry cheese pies. Even my daughter, who didn’t like cherries, loved my Grandma’s Cherry Cheese Pie.

We have a family story about Dawn and her cherries that we still laugh about today. Our daughter wouldn’t eat the cherries, but would suck the juice off and then spit her cherries out. My husband on the other hand didn’t believe in letting any food go to waste. The first time Dana noticed Dawn’s cherries sitting in a row along the edge of her plate my husband paused between bites of his pie to ask her if she wanted them. When my daughter said, “no”, Dana told me to give them to him. I began to ask him if he really wanted her spit out cherries, but my husband interrupted me and told me to pass her cherries to him. So like a good wife I did as he asked. This went on for years. Every time we’d have my Grandma’s Cherry Cheese Pie I’d scoop up Dawn’s spit out cherries and give them to Dana as he devoured his piece of pie. So it was quite a shock to our entire family when suddenly one day as we were all enjoying a piece of my Grandma’s Cherry Cheese Pie and I was in the process of passing along Dawn’s cherries, Dana suddenly stopped me to question, “Is she spitting out her cherries?” When I affirmed so, Dana gave me a look of utter disgust and demanded, “Then why are you passing them to me. I don’t want her cherries after she’s spit them out!” It wasn’t until my kids backed me up that my husband realized that for years he had been consuming our daughter’s spit out cherries. So even if you don’t like cherries you’ll still love my Grandma’s Cherry Cheese Pie. Her pie takes only five minutes to whip up and will make a perfect Valentine dessert.

Grandma’s Cherry Cheese Pie

Beat until smooth:
1 pkg (8oz) cream cheese
1 can of sweetened condensed milk

Then add:
1/3 c concentrated lemon juice
Mix on high a couple of minutes until firm. Pour cheese mixture into one baked pie shell. Chill for a couple of hours then layer 1 can of cherry pie filling on top and serve!

Weekly tip: You can always substitute strawberries or blueberries whenever a recipe calls for cherry pie filling or instead of using condensed milk and lemon juice substitute 1 c of powdered sugar and one 8 oz container of cool whip!

Dorcas Annette Walker is a published author, columnist, speaker, freelance magazine writer, and photographer from Jamestown, Tennessee. Contact her at: dorcaswalker@twlakes.net. For more recipes check out her Creative Mountain Cookin page and blog at: www.dorcasannettewalker.com

Homemade Heart Rolls

Homemade Heart Rolls

Dorcas Annette Walker

To me there is something tantalizing about the aroma of baking rolls or bread. I confess that I am unable to pass up a freshly baked roll or slice of homemade bread. Thankfully I am not the only one who suffers from this culinary weakness. All I have to do is follow the bread basket as it is being passed around the table. It is a good thing or else I’d find myself eating the entire contents. I didn’t get into making bread and rolls until after I was married as producing homemade bread was a day long procedure. Today there are oodles of recipes how to make homemade rolls and bread ranging from the traditional double rising of the bread dough, using bread machines for quicker results, and readymade packaged frozen rolls available at your local supermarket.

The Bible refers to bread as the “staff of life” with good reason as bread making techniques date back as far as 3000 BC. Bread making was considered an important skill in ancient Egypt, but it was the Romans who were the first to perfect milling the grain and invented the brick oven. In the eighteenth century the birth of the shaped loaf made it easier to slice. Then the industrial revolution with steam powered mills helped meet the demands of the growing population. In the nineteen century steel rollers produced finer flour making better quality bread and gas ovens replaced wood and coal burning brick ovens.

For bread or rolls to rise correctly you need a hot oven, the dough must be kneaded enough, and then allowed to rise properly. If the crust cracks on top it means there was too much flour used when kneading and shaping. Bread that collapses signals that during the rising period the dough was over-risen. A tough or too thick crust signifies that the wrong flour was used or baking and kneading problems. Large holes within a loaf indicate not enough kneading. For a soft crust the shaped dough needs to have shortening or butter applied to the top, covered while rising, and then covered immediately after baking.

My Homemade Heart Rolls are a quick and easy version of the old fashion recipe with the same homey yeast taste. The dough can be made up and baked instantly or stored in the refrigerator overnight or left for a couple of days before using. Using three small balls of dough creates the heart shape. These Homemade Heart Rolls are a perfect addition to any meal. Preparation time for my Homemade Heart Rolls is fifteen minutes and this recipe makes one dozen rolls.

Homemade Heart Rolls

Dissolve 1 pkg of yeast in ½ c warm water with 1 tsp of sugar and set aside.

In a large mixing bowl combine:
2 c self rising flour
½ c shortening
¼ c sugar
½ tsp baking soda

Add:
Yeast mixture
1 c milk
Mix well then roll out on a floured surface and knead adding another cup of flour as needed. Pinch off one inch balls of dough and place three balls in each greased muffin/cupcake tin. Apply a thin layer of shortening to the top of each roll. Bake at 350º for fifteen minutes until lightly browned. Serve hot with butter and homemade jam!

Weekly tip: Freezing flour and yeast increases the shelf life of both!

Dorcas Annette Walker is a published author, columnist, speaker, freelance magazine writer, and photographer from Jamestown, Tennessee. Contact her at: dorcaswalker@twlakes.net. For more recipes check out her Creative Mountain Cookin page and blog at: www.dorcasannettewalker.com