Happy Friday! I’m enjoying my morning coffee and having fun reading through all of your blog comments yesterday. So many of you are carrying on family legacies in your knitting/quilting/sewing/crocheting. I know future generations will be the lucky recipients of some of your beautiful work. The winner of yesterday’s blog contest is Melanie in Utah who wins this mega bundle of Wonderland Yarns Messenger Hat Kit! (The pattern is on the inside of the label, and this bundles makes two hats. It’s a sport weight yarn and there are 516 yards in the bundle.) Melanie, we’ll get this shipped out to you today, and I hope you enjoy it! Remember, we’re celebrating our Eighth Anniversary with eight blog contests over the next week and a half. See the end of today’s post for the details on Contest #3 and get entered.
Today’s recipe is one that our Office Manager Lynn shared with us. Her family makes this every year at Thanksgiving. We tried it this summer and it was delicious. It has a great caramel/maple taste, and we used maple syrup from the Arnold Family Farm (cousins!). I’ll bet it would be awesome on pecan pie, or with a few pecans sprinkled on top.
Lynn’s Maple Ice Cream
6 large egg yolks
1 cup pure maple syrup (the darker the syrup, the stronger the taste)
2 tsp. all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1 cup half and half
1 1/2 cups light cream
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
Beat the egg yolks with the maple syrup, flour and salt. Set aside.
Bring the half and half to a simmer in a heavy saucepan. Then slowly beat the hot half and half into the eggs and maple syrup. Pour the entire mixture back into the pan and place over low heat. Stir constantly with a whisk or wooden spoon until the custard begins to thicken slightly. (Be careful not to let the mixture boil or the eggs will scramble.)
Remove from heat and pour the hot maple custard through a strainer into a large, clean bowl. Allow to cool slightly, then stir in the cream and vanilla. Cover and refrigerate until cold or overnight.
Stir the chilled custard, then pour it into your ice cream maker according to manufacturer’s instructions. When finished, the ice cream will be soft serve, or transfer to a freezer-safe container and freeze for 2 hours or more for firmer ice cream.
Today’s Contest Question: Do you have a favorite family recipe that you make at just certain times of the year? (And if so, why not make it more often? Or would it be less special that way?) Leave a comment below and we’ll randomly draw a winner to receive our next great prize. Watch for the prize and winner on Monday’s blog post, along with Contest #4. Thanks for helping us celebrate eight years of fun!
Sheri whoneedstomotorthroughCampLoopyProjectThreethisweekend
My family makes pumpkin cheesecake every year at Thanksgiving and everyone looks forward to it all year long.
Dutch heritage shining through…stroop waffles (syrup cookies) and ollie bollen (dutch doughnuts). Ollie Bollen are for News Years Day, and the stroop waffles for special occasions…I think the stroop waffles have a gazillion calories in them! Butter, butter, and more butter!
We always make the green bean casserole at either Thanksgiving or Christmas or both. We also do a great creamed spinach that used whipping cream instead of cheese. I can’t handle too much cheese.
Do you have a favorite family recipe that you make at just certain times of the year? (And if so, why not make it more often? Or would it be less special that way?)
A special spinach dish – spinach and artichoke hearts and cream cheese. a family holiday would not be complete with out this dish!
Frosted cut out cookies are a Christmas treat. However, yesterday I purchased a cookie cutter shaped like a piece of Halloween candy corn…..hopefully I will make more cookies this year!
Motoring through my project as well. I LOVE the recipes. Thanks!
Well I typically only make baked beans for summer holidays like Memorial Day, July 4th and I will probably make,them for Labor Day. Why?? I don’t know just a summer thing to do I guess, thanks,for the giveaway opp.
We only seem to make my Mom’s Lemon Bars at Christmas. No particular reason that they are made just at that time of the year, but I make Lemon Cheesecake, Lemon Sour Cream Pound Cake, Lemon Shortbread, and Lemon Curd often throughout the year…I love the flavor of lemon…second to dark chocolate. 🙂
We are not big cooks in my family. One of my favorite recipe that started as a way to use leftover turkey, is to use chicken that has been (allergic to turkey), add it to a can of cream of mushroom soup, frozen peas, heat and serve over rice. Super easy and yummy. I make it just because these days.
Cranberry Chutney – we make it anytime we have Turkey which for us is Christmas and Thanksgiving.
As for making it more often I really don’t need the calories in the full Turkey meal that accompanies the Chutney.
We have sour cream coffee cake every Christmas morning along with peaches frozen in orange juice and sausage souffle. I guess we could do this other times as well, but it sure would be missed on Christmas Day!
At Christmas time we make a cookie recipe that my family calls “tarts”. I a pretty sure there is another name for them but I don’t know what it is. They are a yeasted dough rolled out in sugar rather than flour, cut in diamond shapes with a little jam I the center. Two edges get folded into the center then they get baked. They are delicious! Why don’t we make them at other times? I don’t know. I guess we like having them to look forward to each year!
Pickled eggs, we always make around easter!
Dilly bread for Thanksgiving. It’s the only time there are enough people around to make the making worth it (there being quite a bit of effort involved).
We make Pastichio for Christmas Eve. And only for Christmas Eve. With a dozen eggs, a pound of cheese, butter, and ground sirloin, how could you make it more than once a year? A cardiologist’s dream, it would definitely be what I would want for my last meal, not only for its flavor, but for the rush of childhood memories that come rushing back every time I smell it cooking.
Schwatten Brodel, a German almond cookie brushed with egg yolk. My grandmother made them every Christmas and she taught me to make them. They could be made more often, but they remind me of my grandmother at Christmas. I enjoy making them with my family for that special occasion.
Chicken and Dumplings that really started as Peas and Dumplings but I do not care for peas so my Mom started using chicken broth and then adding in some real meat so it transformed into Chicken and Dumplings. Home made dumplings too: one cup flour, one egg, using egg shell and fill with water then mix to form a dough. May need to add a little more water to get the ball of dough to form. Use a spoon or tear off bite size pieces and put into simmering broth. Made only when it is cold outside as this is a very hardy meal.
Apple pie. My great grandmother taught my sister and I how to make it when we were really young, and now that she’s passed it’s one of our favorite ways to remember her. I will only use Macintosh apples, because that’s the kind she used. Basic crust (only on the bottom and folded in on the top around the edge), cinnamon and sugar in the apples, and for some reason there was always a little tab of butter put in the center top opening of the pie before it baked. So I do it in memory of her.
We make candied yams (ala Mother) only on thanksgiving. These delicious sweet potatoes are so rich and full of calories one can only afford to eat them once a year.
I have my own special recipe for Cranberry Curry Chutney which was given to me by an intern/volunteer at least 30+ years ago. The magic in the recipe was that she made a mistake, but gave me the chutney anyway. I loved the ‘mistake’ and made that recipe my own. I only made it at Thanksgiving time for turkey and at Christmas for gifts and with whatever protein we were having–whether turkey or prime rib. It’s amazing, refreshing, colorful, and not so hard to make. Best made with fresh cranberries during the winter holidays.
The first holiday-only recipe that comes to mind for our family would have to be pecan pie. So delicious! I bake ours in a deep dish pie plate ( 9 1/2-10″ diameter), so find it turns out best when I make a recipe and a half of the filling with 1 1/2 cups of pecans. Decadent-yes. Fat, calorie, and sugar laden- yes. But so fabulous, that we only have it on Thanksgiving, then spend the rest of the year thinking of it!
There are ethnic traditional dishes only for holidays, because it’s too much work to make them on a regular basis!
I make Corn Pudding for Thanksgiving and Christmas. My family really enjoys it and looks forward to it each year.
Turnips at Thanksgiving — my favorite part of the meal!!
I make Pumpkin Pie for my family each year at Thanksgiving time and Christmas. When my oldest son moved to Melbourne, he asked for the recipe and made a dozen pies, taking them all to his workplace. Pumpkin Pie was once unheard of here in Oz, and met with great scepticism by most Oztralians… Pumpkin is mainly served as a vegetable, like you would serve squash, so using it as a dessert was very foreign to the Ozzies. A female colleague asked him for the recipe and he replied that it was a family secret and the only way he could divulge it was if she were to marry him!!! I guess she did not want the recipe that badly… But it makes a fun story! Being from the USA, but living in Oz all my adult life, I tried to keep a few American traditions alive in my little family, like Thanksgiving and the 4th of July. Both occasions turned into a dinner party scenario for many years, gaining such popularity that I have had nearly 30 guests for Thansgiving certain years. That became too unwieldy, so I have had to “retire” from that practice and pass the torch to my kids, who are keeping it a family only occasion now.
Yes, my Mom’s Pumpkin Pie. It wouldn’t be the same if made before October or after Thanksgiving. 🙂
I make chocolate covered peanut butter balls for Christmas.
My mom taught me how to make her mom’s Mole (imagine an accento over the “e”). I love it and, although it’s heavy, I could eat it all the time. However, I only make it a few times a year because it’s so time-comsuming. It does keep it special 🙂
I make Italian Ricotta Easter Pizza just at Easter. It is an old recipe my Mom used to make. It takes two days and is a lot of work, so once a year it is.
I make Cream Cheese Chocolate Mousse only at Christmas. I make a double batch. There is only two of us to eat it. Husband wants me to make it more often. I don’t think so. OK, maybe I will make some for the Fourth of July.
Some of my grandmother’s cookie recipes used to only get made at holidays but the past few years have started coming out when they are requested. My father makes some German recipes only around Thanksgiving to Christmas and right after for relatives coming and a church fair around that time.
Fresh apple cake every fall, pecan pie at Thanksgiving and rum cake at Christmas. Why not more often? Too many calories.
From scratch angel food cake on the birthday of a sibling (as our Mom did for us growing up), and date nut cookies (grandma’s recipe) for my brother Bill on his birthday.
I make a breakfast casserole with eggs, cheese, thawed frozen hash browns, bacon, milk for brunch on Christmas morning. We call the dish MOB casserole because my Mom made it the morning my husband and I were married. When we were picking out Mom’s dress, the saleslady referred to her as the MOB – mother of the bride. Ever after she called the casserole, MOB. Every now and then the casserole is served for another brunch.
Both of my “family” recipes are summer only since both require fresh veggies. One is Refrigerator Sweet Pickles that uses fresh pickling cukes and the other is Tomato Salad on Toast which can only be made with garden fresh tomatoes.
My mom had an awesome fruit cake that she made for Christmas. It took a lot of work, and was kind of pricey, so that’s probably why it didn’t get made more often. Even though she’s been gone many years, I still have a small piece in the the freezer that I take a little slice off to eat every Christmas.
Special Recipe? Yes I have a bundle of them for all the seasons. The most special is my mother’s fruitcake recipe which I only make for Christmas! It is expensive to gather the ingredients and soak the fruit in brandy for a few weeks before making the cake which then has to soad for a few more weeks. I usually start soaking the fruit in October as soon as the fruits hit the stores and then the weekend before Thanksgiving I make the cakes. I mail them to all corners of the States because the family has spread out so much over the years.
We always had “Aunt Jan’s Potatoes” at every big family gathering (holidays & birthdays). Now that I live away from all my extended family I make this dish for holiday celebrations with friends, it’s always a big hit!
We usually make at least one rhubarb pie during the summer. My family used to grow rhubarb, and freeze it so that we could make pies during the other seasons, too, but well, let’s say that our rhubarb did not thrive. So now we just make rhubarb pies when it is in season and in the grocery stores.
I always make peppernuts and peanut patties at Christmas. My grandmother always made peppernuts, and I started the peanut patty tradition.
At Easter I’ve always had pineapple casserole. As far as I know it has never been made by my family at any other time. It wouldn’t be special if we did.
The family recipe is Austrian Beef Goulash, and it is first served for fall birthdays (usually mine!) then once or twice during the cold winter months.
Our family makes a chocolate cannoli cake for Christmas and special occasions.
I make pecan pie for every church potluck as there are a couple people who look forward to it.
My family recipe is for homemade Gingerbread Caramel candies. These go in my holiday gift baskets every winter. I would make these more often except wrapping all the pieces is kind of a chore!
My dad is Norwegian, and at Christmas-time we make a special potato flatbread called “lefse” (pronounced “lef-suh”). It’s a lot of work, but it wouldn’t be Christmas without it!
Cabbage rolls – for Christmas only. Far too time consuming to make on a regular basis.
Whole cranberry sauce. Nothing too original about it- Mom followed the recipe on the bag (Ocean Spray), but only used 1/2 the sugar- nice and tart! I make it between thanksgiving and christmas and embellish it sometimes with orange peel, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice. Sometimes I make it out of season. I should do that- there’s an extra bag or two in the freezer!
Cranberry Sauce– made for Thanksgiving and Christmas mainly. When you can get the good cranberries in the store
We always make Horseradish Salad at Thanksgiving. The recipe was from my husband’s mother.
It’s a basic jello salad with cottage cheese, lime jello, mayo, crushed pineapple , pecans, Eagle Brand milk and horseradish. We all love it!