Yogurt Bread
This easy bread resembles biscuits in a coffee cake format—moist, tender, and slightly sweet with whatever flavor of yogurt you choose. I like lemon or pineapple best!
1¾ cups flour
½ cup dried cranberries (or raisins)
1½ tsp. baking powder
¼ tsp. baking soda
1 6-oz. container of fruit yogurt
2 T. oil
½ cup milk
Preheat the oven to 375° and spray or grease a 9-inch glass pie pan. In a medium bowl, mix the flour, cranberries, baking powder, and baking soda. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour in the yogurt, oil, and milk. Stir just until all dry ingredients are blended in, and spread the dough in the prepared pan using the back of the spoon. Bake 20 minutes or just until a toothpick comes out of the center clean. Cool about 10 minutes before cutting into wedges, and lift out with a pancake spatula. Makes 8 wedges.
Sloppy Joes
This versatile meat mixture is a real crowd-pleaser. You can make it ahead, and you can freeze it in small batches to reheat later. Makes great sandwiches, but it’s also yummy served on baked potatoes and topped with cheese, or as a topper for nachos or homemade pizza!
2 lbs. lean ground beef
1 lb. pork or turkey sausage
1 large onion, diced
1½ cups diced celery
Salt and pepper
2 T. garlic powder
14-oz. bottle of catsup
1 cup barbeque sauce
Place the ground beef, sausage, onion, and celery in a Dutch oven or large, deep skillet. Salt and pepper liberally and cook until the meat is done and the vegetables are soft, stirring often to break the meat into smaller chunks. Remove from heat and spoon the mixture onto paper towel–lined plates to drain; dispose of grease in the pan. Run the mixture briefly through a food processor or grinder and return to the pan. Add the garlic powder, catsup, and barbeque sauce and cook over medium heat for 15–20 minutes, stirring often. Makes about 6 cups—enough to fill 12 sandwich buns.
Creamed Chicken
This is the ultimate comfort supper! Amish cooks would most likely start with a whole chicken cut into pieces, but for convenience I buy packages of boned, skinless chicken thighs (you can use breasts, but thighs/dark meat give the mixture a richer flavor). Serve this over biscuits, toast, baked potatoes, mashed potatoes—or corn bread!
2–3 T. oil or butter
1½ pounds boneless, skinless chicken thighs
Salt and pepper
Garlic powder
2 cups chicken stock
1 carrot, diced
1 stalk celery, diced
1 medium onion, diced
3 T. flour
3 T. butter
1 T. chopped dill weed
2 cans condensed cream of chicken or cheese soup
1 cup frozen peas
In a large skillet, heat the oil or butter over medium high heat. Arrange the chicken pieces and season liberally with salt, pepper, and garlic powder. Cook a few minutes until browned, flip the pieces, and brown on the other side. Lower the heat, add 1 cup of the chicken stock, and simmer about 15 minutes or until chicken is cooked through and tender. Remove the chicken to a plate and add the carrot, celery, and onion to the liquid in the skillet. Simmer.
When the chicken’s cool enough to handle, cut it into bite-size chunks. When the vegetables are tender, remove them from the skillet. Measure the remaining liquid and add enough additional chicken stock to make 1½ cups. Melt the butter in the skillet, remove from heat, and stir in the flour to make a paste. Add the liquid and stir constantly over medium heat until thickened, then stir in the dill weed, creamed soups, and the peas. When the sauce is blended, add the chicken and vegetables and cook over low heat until mixture is hot and bubbly, stirring often. Makes 6–8 servings.
Cornmeal Bulk Mix
If you have a container of this mix in your pantry, you’ll never again settle for the boxed corn bread mixes in the store! You can go either sweet or savory with this versatile blend, and if you have recipes that call for commercial mixes (such as Jiffy or Bisquick) you can substitute the same amount of this mix to make muffins, pancakes, corn bread, etc. A couple of my favorite corn bread recipes follow this one!
4 cups yellow cornmeal
4 cups all-purpose flour
⅔ cup sugar
3½ T. baking powder
2 tsp. salt
Combine the ingredients with a big spoon and store in a large container with a tight-fitting lid. Makes 9 cups. Will keep at room temperature for 3 months.
Kitchen Hint: I store my mix in a plastic ice cream container, labeled and dated.
Sweet Banana Corn Bread
This makes enough batter for an 8” x 8” pan or about 10 large muffins. Moist and tender! Yummy! Double the recipe to make a 9” x 13” pan.
2½ cups of Cornmeal Bulk Mix
⅓ cup sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
2 tsp. cinnamon
2 T. vanilla
¾ cup mashed banana
½ cup milk
½ cup oil
2 eggs
Spray or butter an 8” x 8” pan or a 12-cup muffin tin. Preheat oven to 350°. In a large mixing bowl, combine the Cornmeal Bulk Mix, sugar, baking powder, and cinnamon, making a well in the center. In a large glass measuring cup or deep bowl, whisk the vanilla, mashed banana, milk, oil, and eggs until well blended. Pour the liquid mixture into the well of dry ingredients, stirring only until the batter is blended. Pour the batter into the prepared pan. Bake an 8” x 8” pan for about 20 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean from the center. Bake muffins 12–15 minutes, or until tops are domed and firm. Don’t overbake! Serve warm, or cool on a wire rack. After about 5 minutes, lift the muffins out of the tin.
Kitchen Hint: For a 9” x 13” pan of corn bread, double the recipe. Freezes well (use wax paper between layers).
Dilly Cheese Corn Bread
Adding dill relish to this savory corn bread takes it to a whole different level! Great with chili—or split a square of it and spoon Creamed Chicken on top for a filling meal.
2½ cups Cornmeal Bulk Mix
1 tsp. salt
½ tsp. black pepper
1 T. dried minced onion
1 T. dill weed
½ cup grated Parmesan cheese
½ cup buttermilk or plain yogurt
½ cup cottage cheese
2 eggs
½ cup oil
1 cup drained dill relish
1 T. juice from the relish
Spray or butter an 8” x 8” pan. Preheat oven to 350°. In a large bowl, combine corn bread mix, spices, and Parmesan cheese until well blended, leaving a well in the center. In a deep bowl, combine the buttermilk or yogurt, cottage cheese, eggs, oil, the drained relish (see Hint) and the pickle juice—this mixture will be lumpy. Pour the liquids into the well of dry ingredients and stir until the batter is lumpy but all dry ingredients are incorporated. Pour into prepared pan and bake for about 20 minutes, or until the edges are lightly browned and a toothpick comes out clean from the center.
Kitchen Hint: To drain the relish, press it against a mesh sieve until most of the juice is out, reserving 1 T. of the juice.
Kitchen Hint: For more cheese, add about ¾ cup of shredded cheese of your choice, about 5 minutes before the corn bread is done baking.
Jelly Doughnut Cake
This cake makes an easy dessert—you can use any jam or preserves you have on hand—but there’s no rule saying you can’t also eat it for breakfast!
¾ cup milk
1 cup unsalted butter, melted, divided
2 large eggs
1 T. vanilla extract
2½ cups flour
1¼ cups sugar
1½ tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
2 tsp. cinnamon
¾ cup jam or preserves
Preheat oven to 350°. Spray a tube pan wit
h cooking spray, then place the pan on a sheet of wax paper and draw around it. Cut out the paper “doughnut” and place in the bottom of the pan; spray the paper. In a large bowl, mix the milk, ¾ cup of the melted butter, the eggs, and the vanilla. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon and then gradually add these dry ingredients to the milk mixture until just combined.
Spoon half of the batter into the prepared pan. With the back of a spoon, press a shallow well into the batter so it goes partway up the sides and center of the pan. Spoon the jam into the well, then spread the remaining batter on top. Bake about 40 minutes, or until a pick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in the pan for 15 minutes. Run a sharp knife around the outer and center edges of the cake to loosen it before turning it out of the pan onto a plate. Invert the cake on another plate so the rounded side is up and let it cool completely. Brush the top and sides with the remainder of the melted butter. Sprinkle liberally with a mixture of ¼ cup sugar blended with 2 tsp. cinnamon, pressing some of the sugar mixture onto the sides. 8–10 servings.
Kitchen Hint: Feeling indulgent? Make a glaze of ½ cup powdered sugar, 1 tsp. vanilla, dash of salt, and 2 T. milk—or enough to make it pourable. Drizzle over top of cake so it runs down the sides.
Read on for an excerpt from
Charlotte Hubbard’s next Amish romance,
Light Shines on Promise Lodge
As Annabelle Beachey gazed at the happy couple standing before Bishop Monroe Burkholder, ready to exchange their wedding vows, she fought back tears. During the four months she’d spent in an apartment at Promise Lodge, she’d become good friends with the bride, Frances Lehman, and she’d acquired a lot of respect for the groom, Preacher Marlin Kurtz. The love light on their faces shone as a testament to the devotion that had grown between them during their summertime and September courtship—a brilliant example of how God worked out His purpose through the lives of those who kept His faith.
Annabelle sighed with the rightness of it all. The women around her were dabbing at their eyes as Preacher Marlin repeated his vows after the bishop in an endearingly confident voice, gazing at Frances as though she were the only woman in the world. Folks here were still in awe of Marlin’s buying back all the furnishings Frances had consigned to an auction in May, thinking she had to sell everything to get by because her first husband hadn’t left her with much.
My husband didn’t leave me with much, either, Annabelle thought ruefully. He just left me.
Annabelle sat straighter on the wooden pew bench, trying not to let her troubles overshadow the joy of the wedding. God had surely guided her to Promise Lodge last May, where the friends gathered in this room had taken her in—had provided her an apartment and their unconditional encouragement after they’d heard about the way Phineas had abandoned her and the Old Order faith.
“I, Marlin, take you, Frances, to be my lawfully wedded wife,” the handsome preacher repeated after Bishop Monroe. He went through the familiar litany of sickness and health, richer or poorer, and ended with the ringing declaration, “Till death do us part.”
Annabelle pressed her lips together to keep them from trembling. She and Phineas had taken the same vows more than twenty years ago. It had wounded her deeply when her husband had said—without any warning or apparent remorse—that he’d grown tired of the constraints of marriage and the Amish faith, which weighed him down like a heavy yoke. It seemed Phineas had intended to leave without even telling her—except she’d caught him rifling through the pantry looking for her egg money.
She had no idea where he’d gone. And because Amish couples weren’t allowed to divorce, her only chance at finding another man to love would come after Phineas passed away. How would she know when that happened? And meanwhile, how was she supposed to get by? Living as her brother-in-law’s dependent, beholden to him for every morsel she ate, hadn’t seemed like much of an option, so she’d taken a huge chance and found her way from Pennsylvania to Promise Lodge. She’d read in The Budget about this progressive Plain settlement in Missouri, where single women could live in comfortable apartments and make a fresh start among families who also desired brighter futures.
Best decision you ever made, too, Annabelle reminded herself. She’d found her niche here along with a small income, sewing clothes for Frances’s widowed brother-in-law and three young men who hadn’t yet married. Living among Plain women who managed a cheese factory, a dairy, a produce stand, a pie business, and the lodge apartments had given her the perfect incentive for figuring out how to support herself, and she planned to expand her sewing business by advertising it in town.
And once this painfully romantic wedding is behind you, Annabelle thought, you can get on with the contentment and purpose you’ve settled into here.
She put a smile on her face, determined not to let on about her personal problems while everyone around her was so caught up in sharing the joy that Marlin and Frances exuded.
“Friends,” Bishop Monroe proclaimed with a wide smile, “it’s my honor and privilege to present Mr. and Mrs. Marlin Kurtz.”
As applause filled the lodge’s big meeting room, Annabelle rose eagerly with the women around her. The best cure for her blues was making herself useful, helping Beulah and Ruby Kuhn set out the wedding feast they’d prepared. The maidel Mennonite sisters, who’d come to Promise Lodge last year about this time, were the queens of the kitchen when it came to cooking for large gatherings on special occasions—and as Annabelle passed quickly through the dining room, she couldn’t help inhaling deeply to soothe her frazzled soul.
“Your baked ham and brisket smell so gut, it was all I could do to keep my seat during the wedding,” she teased as she entered the kitchen behind the sisters. “I was trying to think up an excuse to slip back here to sample some of it—to be sure it was fit for serving to our guests, of course.”
Ruby and Beulah laughed as they made their way toward the ovens. Their bright floral-print dresses fluttered with their quick, efficient movements as Beulah slipped her hands into mitts while Ruby lowered the oven doors. The hair tucked up under their small, round Mennonite kapps was silvery, but nobody could call them old.
“I was pleased that Marlin asked for ham,” Beulah remarked, deftly lifting the blue graniteware roasters onto the nearest butcher-block countertops. “It’s a tasty way to feed a lot of folks with a minimum of fuss—”
“And the pineapple rings and maraschino cherries make it look like party food from the get-go,” Ruby put in without missing a beat. “Chicken and stuffing might be the traditional wedding dish, but it looks pretty bland. And who says you have to have that for your second wedding just because you served it the first time?”
“Tickles me pink that Frances and Marlin have finally tied the knot—even if Frances cut the usual mourning period a little short,” Beulah said. “Seems to me that pining for her Floyd on and on might be a slap in the face to God anyway, if we believe Floyd has gone to his reward with Jesus. We should be joyful about that, even as we realize how much Frances missed him.”
Annabelle considered this new slant on mourning as she sliced the ham and placed it into a metal steam table pan. Did she have it all wrong, feeling sorry for herself because Phineas had abandoned her? After all, she’d done nothing to provoke his departure—his escape—so surely God didn’t hold her accountable for her husband’s misdeeds. Maybe He’d offered her a chance at a whole new life by allowing Phineas to go his own way, even if her options for remarriage and happiness with another man were severely limited.
God’s ways are not our ways, and they’re often mysterious to us, she reminded herself. I’ve felt humiliated and depressed about being left behind, but maybe I should look at it from another angle. None of these other women have allowed their troubles to take them down.
Annabelle felt as though a wet, heavy cloak of sadness was being lifted from her shoulders. As she began slicing a second large ham, a genuine smile lit up her face. She had frien
ds back in Bird-in-Hand who would secretly love the freedom of living without the overbearing men they’d married.
Freedom. Mattie, Christine, and Rosetta Bender, the original founders of Promise Lodge, had pooled their resources to buy an abandoned church camp so they’d be free from an oppressive bishop—and they’d been able to do that because they were widowed or unmarried at the time. All three of them had gotten married this past year, to wonderful men who allowed them to make their own choices, so maybe there’d be another chance for Annabelle to find that same sort of happiness someday. At Promise Lodge, the bright blue sky was the limit.
photo: Tom Piper
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Charlotte Hubbard is the acclaimed author of Amish romance and fiction that evokes simpler times and draws upon her experiences in Jamesport, the largest Old Order Amish community west of the Mississippi. Faith and family, farming, and food preservation are hallmarks of her lifestyle—and the foundation of all her novels. A deacon, dedicated church musician, and choir member, she loves to travel, read, try new recipes, and crochet. A longtime Missourian, Charlotte now lives in St. Paul, Minnesota, with her husband and their border collie. Please visit Charlotte online at www.CharlotteHubbard.com.
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