Spinach Souffle, Pg. 183

A trip down memory lane also inspired my recipe selection this week. One of my favorite side dishes growing up (one of Trish's specialities) was Stouffer's spinach souffle - straight from the grocer's freezer. Mrs. David Maybank (Marion Taber) offered up her own homemade receipt in Charleston Receipts and as the instructions didn't require any obscure ingredients or a ring mold, I thought "Why not?"

The makings of spinach souffle

This picture was taken outside my oven door about halfway through the cooking process.

Ah! The anticipation! Will is rise or won't it?

It won't. It didn't. This is as high as it got.

Now before you think I bit off more than I could chew, I have made a cheese souffle before. And it rose. This one, though, not so much.

I separated the eggs. I whipped the whites. I cooled the spinach before folding the ingredients together. I greased my souffle dish and even transformed my massive Thanksgiving roaster into a water bath per Mrs. Maybank's instructions. Then, I set it in a "moderate oven." (Again, what does this mean? 350 degrees? I assumed so - incorrectly, perhaps.)

Is there something I missed in between the lines? I guess I'll have to chalk it up to the fact that the souffle gods weren't on my side this week. That said, it didn't taste too bad. Sort of like creamed spinach. Sort of.

-Lauren

Wild Rice and a History Lesson on Rice- Wild Rice Casserole, pg. 163

About once a week growing up we seemed to have the combo of pork and brown rice. However, I was at the ripe old age of 26 before I realized we weren't eating what others called brown rice. Ha, nothing that healthy in the Fritz household. Instead we were eating white rice with a can of consomme and a stick of butter on top. And let me tell you, it sure does beat the real version of brown rice! So when looking through our cookbook, I found a recipe very similar entitled Wild Rice Casserole (though healthier because it only contains a tablespoon of butter, and wild rice, so I think my mother's is still better!).
    In NYC (and not sure about SC), wild rice only comes in packets already seasoned. So my options were limited. Also, I have no idea what she meant by removing the chaff from the rice. Do people do that anymore? I know that slaves weaved sweetgrass baskets (like the one you see at the market and on highway 17) for the purpose of fanning the rice through the basket to separate the chaff. So is this receipt super old? Anyway, I forgot to pack my specialty sweetgrass basket so that didn't happen. Also, pretty positive modern rice production took that step away. But love seeing these details in receipts that remind us that cooking use to be really quite an ordeal.
  Another comment: I do not know what condense consomme is, and I forgot to soak it for 3 hours. But this rice already had seasoning and I know my mom never does that. The directions were a bit confusing as to when she meant to add the mushrooms because usually baked rice remains undisturbed until than end (I think). So I added the mushrooms and butter before baking. My mom puts the stick of butter at the beginning of her rice and consomme so it made the most sense. Also, my oven runs very hot, so the later step of 300 was not necessary.

And below are quotes from a Yale Website. Sorry, it is the history dork in me!
" Throughout the 1700s the economy of South Carolina was based overwhelmingly on the cultivation of rice. This product brought consistently high prices in England, and the colony prospered and expanded. Rice agriculture has been called "the best opportunity for industrial profit which 18th century America afforded." South Carolina became one of the richest of the North American Colonies; and Charlestown (now Charleston), its capital and principal port, one of the wealthiest and most fashionable cities in early America."


"the South Carolina and Georgia colonists ultimately adopted a system of rice cultivation that drew heavily on the labor patterns and technical knowledge of their African slaves. During the growing season the slaves on the rice plantations moved through the fields in a line, hoeing rhythmically and singing work songs to keep in unison. At harvest time the women processed the rice by pounding it in large wooden mortars and pestles, virtually identical to those used in West Africa, and then "fanning" the rice in large round winnowing baskets to separate the grain and chaff. The slaves may also have contributed to the system of sluices, banks, and ditches used on the South Carolina and Georgia rice plantations


-christine

Food Thought for the Day, Martha Stewart hates boiled peanuts, and is also quite rude!

This post isn't a receipt tryout, but a post about southern food which I plan to throw into the mix since this blog is about southern cuisine.  So one of the few perks of unemployment is daytime t.v. Today I was watching the Martha Stewart Show and some of my favorite food guys were on, Charleston's own, the Lee Brothers. Everywhere I turn around I see those guys. And I swear I saw one of them walking down 7th avenue (I am pretty sure they live in NYC, and I am also pretty sure I am the only person who was starstruck and thought, wow, it is a Lee Brother!!).
  Anyway, Martha asked her guests on the show what their favorite food was. And one of the brother's said boiled peanuts and brought out some for the guests to eat. They have a company that sells them. The other twin said buttermilk, not a bad choice either. Martha was pretty rude about it.She didn't even try it. She simply held it in her hand and said, ew, its grey and wet and slimy. The typical reaction you see from Yankees. She doesn't know what she is missing! This makes me want to see if I can get any raw peanuts from Chinatown to boil up! Or head down to the UGA game in a couple of weeks :)
 

Welcome to Our Blog!

Lauren and I have started a cooking project!The first time Lauren and I started out on a cooking adventure it didn't go so well. We were in junior high and determined to make a caramel cake. I think the cake collapsed before we could frost it, and I know Lauren ended up with a burnt finger!

   We were sitting around before Lauren moved away from NYC and Lauren said wouldn't a Charleston Receipts cookbook blog be even better than the Julia Child Project. I am sure many of ya'll have seen the movie about this blog.  I don't think we have any set crazy timeline as seen in the Julia Child Project. And I hope we don't put our relationships to the test like Julie Powell did.  And some of these receipts (yes, these are called receipts not recipes), are going to be a bit hard (impossible) to pull off. If someone wants to find me a yellow belly cooter for Cooter Soup or some nice possum in Manhattan, I might take up that challenge. But there are plenty of other receipts that will be entertaining enough!* Hope ya'll enjoy our adventure!

xoxo

christine and lauren

* And my lack of cooking experience might be entertaining in its own right. I love to cook but I almost always have to resort to calling my mom. And I love to bake, but I often  forget an ingredient, or double it, like say that sorta important thing called baking powder. Don't worry, I won't leave out those adventures as well. 

First Attempt- Tradd Street Cucumber Soup

the finished product, not so appetizing, but not so bad either

It is quite hot up here in NYC (though Columbia, SC still wins the award for hottest place ever, it's like the subway platform in August, everyday). So I thought for my first recipe out of Charleston Receipts I would try a cold soup. I am having Andrew's brother and his girlfriend over for dinner tonight and we are going to start with Tradd Street Cucumber soup chilled, followed by basil and goat cheese chicken and pasta with truffled butter, really healthy stuff. (and I know Lauren will recognize my go to cookbook here).

   So how did the first experiment go..... It was interesting. I remember Lauren mentioned how vague the cookbook sometimes was when she was reading through it. It didn't really register with me what she meant, but I  quickly realized it today. I really like cookbooks that describe all steps, especially time and temperatures. The recipe never says what temperature you should be working with like medium or low, and it simply says cook until fairly thick. Well, I was never sure how thick fairly thick meant. And I cooked that soup for quite a long time. So I hope it is as Mrs. Robertson wanted it to be!

  So on to my evaluation of the finished product.  I ate it hot for lunch, and saving the rest cold for dinner.I preferred it cold. I needed to add a lot more salt at first because I found it a little bland. And at first I thought the consomme overwhelmed. (another note, the receipt simply says consomme, I only know beef so that went in, I hope it was right!). The cucumbers sorta reminded me of the texture of okra. But than I decided I liked it. It is nothing like other cucumber soups I have had, which are usually blended and often with dill. The receipt titled below-Cold Cucumber Soup- appears to be the more traditional cucumber soup. But I am trying to choose the more unique recipes, and Tradd Street Cucumber Soup fit that bill. Not sure if I will make it again, actually positive I won't because I like my mother's much better. But it tastes pretty good and other than the vagaries as to how long I am suppose to laboring over a hot stove (and a hot apartment, the window unit is way away in the bedroom, gotta love NYC cooking). Let's see what the guest say tonight! **

Recipe: Tradd Street Cucumber Soup

2 cucumbers

Salted water

1/4 tablespoons flour

1quart milk (I assume whole, I don't think the housewives of the 50s messed around with the watered down skim milk, I see a lot of whole milk and butter in my future these days!)

1 can consomme

salt and pepper to taste

paprika or chives

Trying to get transparent cucumber, the biggest challenge of the receipt

Peel and dice cucumbers*. Boil until clear in sufficient salted water to cover, then drain. Melt butter and cook cucumbers in this for ten minutes. Add flour and stir well. Add milk slowly. Cook until fairly thick., than add consomme, salt and pepper. Serve hot with paprika or cold with chopped chives. Serves 6.

This had me wondering the whole time, I never eat soup that looks like this!

* as usually happens when I am cooking I had to ask my mother a questions about seeds. The recipe didn't mention removing the seeds, but I knew I never saw those in soup. Mom said to remove. She also use to say when I lived at home I take recipes too literally, so this cookbook could really be challenging for a baby cook like me. And I am quite the novice.

** The guests liked it. Also several people I spoke to had never had cucumber soup, which I found odd, since my mom loves making it. Not sure if it is a more southern thing or not?

*** I actually made this 2 weeks ago, and the post before we had it all ready. so anyone in nyc reading this and thinking, it's cool today, what is she talking about, that is why.

Ice Box Cheese Wafers, Pg. 34

I must tip my hat to Mrs. W. H. Barnwell (Mary Royall) for being as vague as possible in handing over her family recipe for Ice Box Cheese Wafers to the Charleston Receipts book committee back in 1950. I'd be surprised if anyone since has managed to decipher her true intent behind "...bake in moderate oven."

What temperature? For how long? A recipe for Cheese Straws listed above the Ice Box Cheese Wafers on the same page advises 350 degrees for 25 minutes - that's roughly what I went with.

I made the dough last Thursday night, rolled them into a cling-wrap tube and chilled them in the ice box, which, my mother told me, meant the refrigerator, not the freezer. I pulled the dough out a few hours later and in slicing it into wafers, found it was too crumbly and kept falling apart. I had this vision of the super-thin crackers with one pecan on top of each and it wasn't working. I made about two dozen thick wafers with 3/4s of the dough. Ehh. Whatev.

On left, too thick. On right, too thin.

To my great surprise, I pulled out the little knob of dough from the fridge 24 hours later with the intent of chucking it and it was rock solid. I could slice the crackers as thin as I needed. In fact, I cut them too thin. After I baked them, several crumbled en route to the cooling rack.

Next time, I'm going to use sharper cheddar and more than a "heavy pinch" of cayenne, as Mrs. Barnwell suggested.

This first recipe was a process of trial and error - perhaps a little more error in this case.