Easy orange marmalade

4 lbs oranges*
5.5 cups granulated sugar
5.5 cups brown sugar
juice of 2 lemons
1 tsp vanilla extract

1. Boil oranges, in enough water to allow them to float away from the bottom in pan, for two hours.
2. Remove from the water, wipe off, and allow to cool until they can be safely handled.
3. Cut each orange in half, remove seeds, and squeeze the juice into a saucepan. (This is simply to keep the juice from squirting all over your cutting board! If the flesh is still firm, you can just chop it.)
4. Finely slice the rind and roughly chop the pulp.
5. Add orange solids, sugars, lemon juice and vanilla to the orange juice.
6. Bring to a boil.
7. Run about half the mixture through a blender at this point if you want fewer peel shreds, and return to the saucepan.
8. Bring back to a boil and simmer for 15-20 minutes.
9. The jam is ready to can. Process in a hot water bath for 15 minutes.

* I've tried this recipe with grapefruit and orange, and I suspect that lime would work equally well. To cut the bitterness of the grapefruit, I added a teaspoon of baking soda with the sugar. Another way to decrease the bitterness is to separate the membranes from the citrus fruit before chopping, tie them in cheesecloth (for the pectin) and remove the pouch from the marmalade before canning. I'm looking forward to combining orange and lime for a combo marmalade.

If-Shepherds-Had-Sweet-Potatoes Pie

1 frozen pie crust
1 large sweet potato
2 tbsp butter
1/2 tsp salt
1 lb ground beef
2 carrots, peeled and diced
1 parsnip, peeled and diced
1 small onion, diced
3 slices bacon, chopped
2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
1 can (8 oz) low-sodium tomato sauce

1. Bake pie crust according to package directions.
2. Prick the sweet potato several times with a fork.
3. Bake the sweet potato at 350° for 45-55 minutes.
   
4. When the potato is cool enough to handle, peel.
5. Add butter and salt, and mash.
6. Spread half the mashed sweet potatoes in the pie crust, and set aside.
7. Brown beef and remove from pan.
8. Add carrots and parsnips to the pan and saute for 5 minutes.
9. Add bacon and onions. Saute until onions are translucent.
10. Add beef and Worcestershire sauce and bring up to heat.
11. Add tomato sauce, and bring up to heat.
12. Place meat mixture on top of the sweet potato layer.
13. Top with the remaining sweet potatoes.
14. Bake at 350° for 40 minutes, or until the potatoes are browned.

This was a hit at a recent pie potluck.

Dangerously easy baked apple dumplings

2 small apples (Macintosh works well)
1 package crescent rolls
4 tbsp butter
6 tsp brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
2 pinches nutmeg
1/4 cup apple juice
1/4 tsp vanilla

1. Preheat the oven to 350 and butter an 8x8 baking dish.
2. Peel and core the apples.
3. Open up the crescent rolls into four rectangles. Pinch the seams together with wet fingers to seal. Pinch two sets of rectangles together. You should end up with two pastry squares, each made from four triangles, as in the diagram.
4. Place a cored apple in the center of each pastry square.
5. Fill each hollow core with 1 tbsp butter, 2 tsp brown sugar, 1/2 tsp cinnamon, and a pinch of nutmeg. Don't worry if anything spills onto the pastry.
6. Sprinkle 1 tsp brown sugar on the pastry at the base of each apple.
7. Pull the pastry corners up and seal the apple in.
8. Place the dumplings in the prepared dish. Add the butter, apple juice, vanilla, and remaining 2 tsp sugar to the dish.
9. Bake at 350 for 20 minutes.

This recipe is portioned for two, simply because my little ones don't care for cooked fruit. It scales easily though, and makes for a huge portion! You should probably halve the servings. I invented this on Thanksgiving, when I was craving pie, but couldn't rationalize baking a full-size for just me while my husband was overseas.

Cranberry sauce

12 oz cranberries
1 cinnamon stick
6 whole cloves
1 cardamom pod
1 cup orange juice
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar

1. Wash the cranberries and discard any spoiled ones.
2. Tie the cinnamon, cloves and cardamom in a cheesecloth pouch. This makes it much easier to fish them out of the sauce!
3. Bring spices, orange juice and sugar to a boil. The longer you simmer, the stronger the spice flavour will be, so use your own judgment.
4. Add cranberries and boil until they pop, which takes about 10 minutes.
5. Discard the spices.
6. Allow to cool one hour, and serve. The sauce will thicken.

This is a fantastic recipe for holiday canning, and makes a unique, affordable Christmas gift. Process for 15 minutes if you're using the hot water method. Note that this recipe leaves you with a pretty strong cinnamon flavour, so you could use half a stick if you'd like a more balanced spice flavour.

Mint syrup

1 bunch fresh mint (4-5 tbsp leaves)
1 cup water
1 cup granulated sugar

1. Mix all three ingredients in a saucepan.
2. Simmer over medium heat until sugar is completely dissolved.
3. Set aside for 1-2 hours.
4. Strain out the leaves.
5. Store the syrup in the refrigerator

This is divine added to fresh lemonade or club soda in the hot summer months.

Dustin's meat cookies

1 lb breakfast sausage*
1 package crescent rolls

1. Brown the sausage, breaking it into small pieces.
2. Unroll the crescent roll dough. Separate into two squares at the center seam.
3. Pinch together all the seams thoroughly.
4. Divide the meat in half and spread evenly on each square of dough.
5. Starting at one edge, roll the dough into a log, with meat inside.
6. Slice each roll into 1/2-inch pieces and place each cookie flat on a greased cookie sheet.
7. Bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes.

This is my friend Dustin's recipe, and a huge Fathers' Day hit at our house!
* I use store-brand maple sausage.

Chicken tater tot casserole

10 oz - 1 lb cooked (or canned) chicken
1/2 onion, chopped
1 tbsp oil
1 can (10 3/4 oz) low sodium cream of mushroom soup
1/2 cup ketchup
Small bag frozen peas and carrots
2 cup grated Colby jack cheese
2 lb package frozen tater tots

1. Cook the onions in the oil until translucent.
2. Mix the soup and ketchup in a small bowl.
3. Layer the ingredients in a greased 9 x 13 oven-proof dish, in this order: chicken, onion, soup-ketchup mixture, peas and carrots, cheese.
4. Arrange the tater tots across the top. (This is an excellent project for pre-schoolers!)
5. Bake in preheated 325 degree oven for 1 hour.

This can be assembled a day ahead and baked later.

Bottomless sore throat tea

1/2 inch piece of ginger, peeled
1/4 cup honey
water

1. Slice or dice the ginger. If you're feeling really lousy, just leave it whole.
2. Put the ginger and honey in a small slow cooker, and fill with water.
3. Set to high until the mixture comes to a boil, then reduce to low or warm.
4. Every time you serve yourself some tea, add a dollop of honey to the slow cooker and top it up with water.

My husband and I have been under the weather, and have kept our small slow cooker full of this sore throat remedy. It does wonders and tastes delicious. This recipe is for my 1 1/2 quart slow cooker. If the kids were sick too, I'd probably double the recipe and use my 4 quart model. I've considered throwing half a (washed) lemon into the mix, but I didn't have one on hand.

Miniature gingerbread houses

Printout of Miniature Gingerbread House Template
Cereal box or other stiff easy-to-cut paper for templates
6 3/4 cups all purpose flour
5 tsp ground ginger
1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
3/4 tsp ground cardamom
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp cloves
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups vegetable shortening
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
3 large eggs
3/4 cup molasses

3 tbsp meringue powder
4 cups confectioner's sugar
7 tbsp water

Day 1: Prepare dough

1. Sift flour, spices, baking soda and salt into a large bowl.
2. Beat the shortening until fluffy, scraping down the sides.
3. Add the sugar and beat to blend. Scrape the sides of the bowl and beat again.
   
4. Add eggs one at a time and beat to mix, scraping the sides after each additio.
5. Add molasses and beat on high speed until well blended.
6. My mixer is not big enough for the entire batch of dough, so at this point I pour out half the liquid into a small bowl for later.
   
7. Switch to a flat mixer attachment and add half the dry ingredients in 3 additions, beating at low speed until dough forms.
8. Pour the dough into a bowl, and repeat step 7 with the remaining ingredients.
9. Return both sections of dough to the mixer and combine the halves on slow for a minute.
10. Divide the dough into 8 equal pieces, wrap individually in plastic and refrigerate overnight.
    

Day 2: Roll and bake

1. Tape the printed template onto a piece of cereal box or other stiff paper, and cut out the four pieces. (Consider making multiple templates of each in case you need backups.)
   
2. Preheat oven to 350°F.
3. Roll out 1 dough piece at a time between sheets of parchment paper to 1/8 to 1/4-inch thickness. If parchment wrinkles, peel it off, smooth the wrinkle, and reposition parchment over the dough.
4. Leave the parchment paper on the rolled dough.
5. Place a template on the parchment paper. Using a sharp knife, cut the dough in the shape of the template, slicing through the parchment paper. Leave at least 1/2 inch between the pieces. Be sure that you have two front/back walls, two sides, and two roof pieces for every base. If you're willing to sacrifice some dough, use a sharp knife or pizza cutter to cut squares of dough large enough to place a template inside instead. You'll cut out the shapes after baking.
   
6. Peel off the parchment paper outline and remove the extra dough. You can combine the extras to re-roll.
7. Place a cookie sheet, upside down, over the pieces on the bottom sheet of parchment paper, and flip the whole thing over. Remove the whole sheet of parchment paper, and spread the pieces out, leaving at least 1/2 inch between them. To make step 9 easier, consider baking small batches of about 12 pieces.
   
8. Bake the pieces for 9-11 minutes, until dry looking, firm to touch in center and just beginning to darken around edges.
9. While the pieces are still warm, place the templates back on them, and use a sharp knife to trim them to size. You'll need to work fast. There's no need to trim the circular bases.
10. Transfer to a cooling rack.
11. Once completely cooled, store in airtight containers, using parchment paper to separate layers and minimize cracking. (You may want to consider making some extra pieces as insurance against accidents.)
12. Any leftover dough can be refrigerated and used with cookie cutters. This dough makes perfect gingerbread men!
    

Day 3: Assemble houses

1. Prepare royal icing. Mix meringue powder, confectioner's sugar and water in a stand mixer on medium for 5 minutes. Add water if the icing is too thick or not sticky. Keep the icing covered with Saran wrap when not in use, with the Saran wrap touching its surface. This stuff hardens in contact with air.
2. Spoon royal icing into a disposable piping bag, shake down, and snip the tip.
3. For each house, assemble one base, two side walls, two front/back walls, and two roof pieces.
4. Apply a thin thread of icing to the bottom of a wall, and press into place.
5. Using the icing as glue, secure the other wall pieces to each other and the base.
6. Pipe icing around three edges on one side and secure a roof piece in place.
7. Pipe icing along all four remaining edges and attach the last roof piece.
8. Go back over the joints with lines of icing. You can use a wet finger to smooth away any messes, although if you'd got kids decorating these, they won't care in the least.
   

Day 4: Decorate

I decorate these houses with my kids, so I want them to be well set before I start decorating. However, you'll probably get a much neater result by doing some initial decorating on the flat pieces before you assemble the houses.

Use royal icing as glue, and attach raisins, currants and candies of all sorts. You can also brush on corn syrup to get sprinkles, nonpareils or shredded coconut to stick. Use your imagination! These houses are the perfect size for gummy bear resident. If you want Christmas trees, consider rolling super easy mints into cone shapes and dotting with coloured royal icing.

The dough recipe is shamelessly borrowed from Epicurious.com (although I added some spices). I use Wilton's royal icing recipe. The template and assembly instructions are mine.

If you decide to design your own template, take into account the additional 1/8 to 1/4 inch width of the gingerbread pieces. My initial attempt at these houses left me with roof pieces that weren't quite wide enough!

Cheesy rice

4 cups water
1 cup basmati rice
1/2 medium onion, chopped
3 tbsp butter
1 tbsp lemon juice
1/2 cup grated cheddar and/or parmesan cheese
salt
pepper

1. Bring water to boil over high heat.
2. Add rice and onion and boil for 16 minutes.
3. While the rice is cooking, cut the butter into small pieces and mix in a medium bowl with the lemon juice.
   
4. When the rice is done, drain it, but reserve 1/4 cup of the cooking liquid.
5. Add the hot rice mixture and reserved liquid to the butter mixture. Stir to melt the butter.
6. Add the cheese and stir.
7. Season with salt and pepper.