Apple Crisp--Naoma Ahlden Recipe

               In the past six months, Grams and I have made a great dent in baking our way through the Ahlden Family Cookbook.  We currently have eleven recipes remaining in the “Desserts, Pies, Cakes, and Cookies” section of the book.  To wrap up winter break baking, we chose to make Aunt Naoma’s recipe for Apple Crisp.  Ideally, we would have picked fresh apples from Twin Oaks Farm, but since it is January we settled for store bought Fuji apples.  Like all of our fresh fruit recipes, peeling, coring, and slicing took the majority of the time.  Once Grams and I got into a system, it went pretty fast.  I used a potato peeler to get the skin off then passed it on to Grandma for slicing.  What’s good about this type of task is that it allows us to talk during our work.  I re-heard one of Gram’s favorite stories about how she used to can apple sauce.  Whenever we work with fresh fruit, we talk about the old days of canning.

               It’s hard for me to explain it, but Grams is just a different person when it is only me and her together.  I think that since she still sees me as a child, she feels safe to make mistakes and say wrong things.  When there is another person around, she doesn’t talk as much and won’t try to help me out.  When I picked her up today, I wasn’t sure if she would even want to come to my house to bake with me.  The last week has been difficult for Grandma Ahlden, and she hasn’t been in the best spirits.  I was so pleased that she agreed to come and spend time baking with me.  Although some of Grandma’s memories and skills have diminished, she still holds much of her baking and cooking knowledge.  I think she gains confidence form the help she gives me and the insight she can provide.  For those few hours we are together, she is a competent adult again. 

               After the Apple Crisp had baked for about thirty minutes, Grams and I decided that we should stir it around a little bit so that the juices from the apples could distribute more.  It seemed that the apples on the top were beginning to dry out a little.  This seemed to be a good idea because at about forty-five minutes, we took it out with soft flavorful apples.  After looking at the Apple Crisp for a bit, we decided that this was something to be served over vanilla ice cream.  I love the taste of something hot over something cold!  Going to Gilman for ice cream also gave us the perfect excuse to do a little browsing at The Gathering.  We didn’t buy anything, but we did find lots of things that we would like to buy someday.  I got an extra smile at the item that Grams was most impressed with at the store.  There was a small CD player playing music on the table.  She gasped and said, “Wow! I have never seen such a thing to play music like that before!”  She has a CD/Cassette player on her kitchen counter. 

               I have always tried to be fairly honest about my evaluation of our baked goods.  The truth is that Aunt Naoma’s Apple Crisp tasted even better than I had imagined.   I am guilty of thinking fruit can’t be considered dessert.  I had doubts about Apple Crisp since it did not have any chocolate involved.  This recipe put me in my place!  This is actually one of my favorite things we have made.  It was a nice change from the typical cookie or cake.  I give you permission to consider Apple Crisp a “healthy fruit” serving too! :)

Apple Crisp—Naoma Ahlden Recipe

1 cup sugar

1 t. cinnamon

½ cup water

2 t. lemon juice

Apples of your choice

Mix together sugar, cinnamon, water and juice, and pour into bottom of 9 x 12 pan.  Cut 8-12 apples and pat over that.

Topping:              ½ cup flour

                              1 cup oatmeal

                              12 T. butter softened

                              ½ t. salt

Mix together and crumble over apples.  Sprinkle top with more cinnamon.  Bake at 375 for 40 minutes.  Watch closely last 10 minutes, depending on type of apples and quantity.  Some apples have a lot more juice in them. 

Note from Naoma:  My mom always said that any really good crisp had oatmeal in it and I agree.  It really adds a lot of flavor.

               

Dirt Pudding--Connie Ahlden Recipe

Dirt Pudding is delicious, but I am beyond tired of seeing pudding, yogurt, ice cream, mashed potatoes, and soup!  This week, my boyfriend had his wisdom teeth taken out, and I had a lesson in showing sympathy towards others.  My family always jokes that the world should be thankful I did not choose a career as a doctor or a nurse.  I am terrible with people who are sick or in pain.  If I can’t physically feel their pain or injury, I have a hard time sharing in their hurt.  This week, as “girlfriend nurse”, I had to suck it up and learn to be patient and sympathetic. 

The day before the wisdom teeth removal, I recruited my number one woman, Grandma Ahlden.  Since she raised six children and worked in hospitals and nursing homes, I thought she could give me some good tips on how to be a helpful “home nurse”.  Grams told me that when she worked in the hospital, she found that what patients needed most was simply to know that someone cared and was there with them.  She said how people she didn’t know would just want her to sit with them and maybe hold their hand for a while.  While we crushed Oreo cookies using a marble rolling pin, Grams and I talked about the ladies she used to do “home care” with.  I can remember when Grandma Ahlden took care of an elderly lady in town.  Occasionally, I would stop by to visit Grams and the lady.  Usually I would see Grandma and the woman just talking in the living room or Grandma reading from a book.  It was the sincere company and compassion of Grandma Ahlden that helped this elderly woman to feel better.

Since I can admit that I am a bad nurse, I decided to start of strong by preparing this post-wisdom tooth Dirt Pudding Dessert.  This is really a good treat, and shouldn’t be reserved just for mouth injuries.  What I like most is that the Oreo cookies turn into a soft cookie texture after the layers blend.  Like the Oreo cookies, throughout the week, I started turning a bit more “soft at heart” towards my healing boyfriend.  As Grams and I finished layering the Dirt Pudding, I thought back to the times I was sick as a child.  Having two working parents, it was often Grandma Ahlden who spent the day with me on the couch when I was too sick to go to school.  She wasn’t a doctor and didn’t make the cough go away, but she did make me feel better snuggling under a warm blanket and bringing me hot chocolate.  Even today, Grams can make me feel better by just being near her.  Highlighted again on the list of things I hope to learn from Grams—PATIENCE AND SYMPATHY!

DIRT PUDDING—CONNIE AHLDEN RECIPE

1 large vanilla instant pudding

2 cups milk

1 large cream cheese

1 10 oz container cool whip

Mix all and pour over crushed Oreo cookies in 9 x 13 pan.  Top with crushed Oreos.

**add gummy worms for a fun kids’ treat!

Creme Puffs---Connie Ahlden Recipe

               Lesson learned:  a recipe that contains common kitchen ingredients does not necessarily mean that the recipe will be easy.  I found this out the hard way with Crème Puffs.  I did a quick read through of the recipe and saw that everything I needed was part of a baker’s necessities:  eggs, sugar, butter, flour, milk, etc.  Naively, I thought this would translate into an easy baked good.  I was wrong.  Crème Puffs are a truly beautiful dessert.  Their luxurious look makes them perfect to serve to company.  This lavish appeal isn’t just part of the appearance.  The truth is, Crème Puffs are a tedious and delicate process.

               Looking back now, I would recommend making the crème filling before baking the dough.  When Grams and I began, we didn’t consider that the pudding would need to chill several hours before being put into the puffs. In fact, when making this recipe, you may want to consider making the pudding in the evening and letting it chill overnight.  The dough for Crème Puffs is different than any kind of dough we have prepared before.  Its flakey look comes from the four eggs that are put into the dough mixture.  Grams and I were shocked to see how many eggs it called for.  By the end, the dough was a sunshine yellow color.  The dough balls we placed on the baking sheet were about an inch and half in diameter.  We weren’t sure how big to make them since this was our first time with Crème Puffs.  We also discovered that this dough rises up more than out. 

               Even though the recipe called for only common ingredients, I still wasn’t fully prepared for the recipe.  After putting four eggs into the dough batter, I realized that we needed two more eggs for the pudding filling.  We were going to be short by one egg.  Grams said she had eggs at her house, and I could run down and get them while she folded laundry.  I opened Grandma Ahlden’s refrigerator to discover that she did, in fact, have eggs at her house.  She didn’t just have one carton of eggs, she had four.  The problem was printed on the dates.  Today is January 5^th.  One of the cartons dated November 28, another was to be used by November 30^th, and one more to have been consumed by December 21^st. Luckily there was one carton that was still fresh enough to be eaten.  It worries me that one of the cartons was nearly forty days old!  That could have made Grams very sick if she would have accidently eaten them.  Beyond that, why had she not realized that those eggs were old, and thrown them in the trash?

               For the vanilla pudding, Grams and I decided to add ½ teaspoon of almond extract for additional flavor.  Since my family feels the need to add chocolate to everything, we also made a chocolate glaze to drizzle over the finished crème puffs.  We melted ½ cup semi-sweet chocolate chips with 1 tablespoon of shortening.  This not only tasted good, but made them look even fancier.  Although Grams said several statements today that made absolutely no sense, she seemed in a very positive mood.  These days, a good day can be marked by her smile and high spirits.  I’m just glad she didn’t have forty day old scrambled eggs for breakfast.

Crème Puffs—Connie Ahlden Recipe

Heat to rolling boil point in pan:  1 cup water and ½ cup butter

Stir in all at once: 1 cup flour

Stir vigorously over low heat until mixture leaves the pan and forms a ball.  Remove from heat.

Beat in 1 at a time: 4 eggs.  Beat until mixture is smooth and velvety.

Drop from spoon on ungreased baking sheet.

Bake at 400 degrees for 40-45 minutes.

Fill with vanilla pudding.

Vanilla Pudding:

¾ cup sugar                                       1/3 cup flour

1/8 t. salt                                           2 cups scalded milk

½ T. butter                                        2 eggs beaten

Combine butter, sugar, salt, flour and eggs.

Add milk slowly, stirring constantly.

Cook until thick and smooth.  Add vanilla.