Wednesday, November 26, 2008

tasty thanksgiving treats

Making pies for tomorrow? If you have any leftover pie crust dough, here's a surprise for your kids that is flaky and sweet, so they aren't quite as sad that they have to wait for tomorrow for that pie. My mom used to make these for me & my sister, it's a Pennsylvania Dutch recipe.



Milk Flitch

Divide the leftover crust into oven-proof custard cups, flatten along the bottom & up the sides a bit with your fingers. Dump in each crust 1 Tbsp. brown sugar, 1 tsp. flour, 1/2 tsp. milk, and dot it with butter. Bake with the pie for 20 minutes or so, until bubbly and the crust is golden.

They're best when they're cooled just enough so that they don't burn your tongue! Yum!





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Every Thanksgiving for several years, I've made sure we check out Cranberry Thanksgiving by Wende & Harry Devlin from the library. It's about a grandmother (who has a famous and very secret cranberry bread recipe) and her granddaughter, who each invite a special guest to Thanksgiving dinner. Grandmother's special guest is well-mannered and well-dressed, while granddaughter's guest, who is her long-time friend, smells like clams and is not very refined. Can you guess which one turns out to be the cad who steals Grandmother's recipe? It's a great story reminding us we shouldn't judge by what we see on the outside.




Oh joy, Grandmother's (quite easy) recipe is included in the book! We made some for tomorrow, and you can too (most of the ingredients are easily on hand this time of year)...

Grandmother's Famous Cranberry Bread

2 c. flour
1 c. sugar
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 c. butter
1 egg
1 tsp. grated orange peel (if desired)
3/4 c. orange juice
1 1/2 c. fresh or frozen cranberries (we used 1/2 c. dried Craisins instead, since that's what we had!)
1 1/2 c. light raisins (we leave these out, since we use Craisins)

In a large bowl, cut butter into the dry ingredients until mixture is crumbly. Add egg, peel & juice all at once, stir just until mixture is evenly moist. Fold in cranberries & raisins.

Spoon into greased loaf pan. Bake at 350° for 1 hour, or until tooth pick inserted in center comes out clean. Remove from pan to wire rack to cool.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

OMG!!!!! We've had this book since I was 5, and we've made the bread every year since.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for sharing these with us! The Milk Flitch looks especially great for little hands! :)

nic said...

those flitches look incredible, and what a cool book...i'm gonna go see if i can find a copy on ebay...

Joanne said...

Ohhh, you have carried on a tradition. :) Cool. I must make them for me now. Next time I make a pie, I will.
Mom