Fat Frog Diary

 Cherries are coming available at this time of year, so this is seasonal. However, there's no shame in cheating and using the Cherry Glaze I posted on 04/10/2018.  This is the easy way to cherry glaze a ham. If you want to serve the previously-posted sauce to pour over the ham when you serve, that works too. 

I'm a lazy old hag. I will, upon occasion, break out my KitchenAid mixer and the dough hook, but I prefer to dump the ingredients in my bread machine, punch a few buttons, and walk away until the scent draws me back into the kitchen. By that time, I'm usually facing a "begging look" from Da Roomie, whose nose is even more keen than mine.  Hint: Don't have a Cajun spice blend? You can find mixes all over Pinterest. 

  Thank you Scott Cunningham. (RIP) This is another Credit Where Credit is Due recipe. I talk about how to dry herbs and such in the Pagan Gardening Series coming up later this month. Yes, you can dry herbs at home. Really.  I shopped at EarthGifts.com   but if you have your own purveyor of incenses, oils, herbs, etc. please feel free to use them. Gosh knows, the interwebs are just full of possibilities. I have been known to grind my own and I keep a mortar and pestle for just my incenses. No mixing with food, please!  Scott Cunningham's Book, The Complete Book of Incense, Oils, and Brews is my go-to book for recipes of this nature. I have provided the link to Amazon, but you can purchase this book anywhere you can find it.  I prefer to make up this incense and keep it in a well-labeled Ziploc baggie. Storage is at a premium around here, and a baggie is just easier to manage.  I also prefer to keep the special charcoal incense burners to burn it upon...

 Imbolg is also a fire festival, so that means you can balance out all those creamy things with spicy things to make you think warm thoughts. I mean, who doesn't love chili in the depth of winter?  This recipe is one for the working person who doesn't have time for stirring a big batch of chili all day. (Seriously?) This is a dependable do-ahead and shelf-special combo. Get the ingredients assembled ahead of time for a fast throw-together before work.  Hint: Use your food processor to save time and money. Buy a bag of yellow onions. Label at least 5 one-quart Ziplock freezer bags with a Sharpie to say, "ONION."  Get out a big bowl of cold water. Remove the skin and dump the onions in the cold water. When all the onions (yes, ALL!) are in the water, open all the bags and get them ready. A kitchen helper is good for this. Shred the onions in your food processor to the shape you like. I like mine fairly chopped, but the slicer is good if you like that cut. Do what you w...

 Yes, this is a little early, but they deserve a showcase, and they go with the Fruit Sauce I posted yesterday. Yes, I changed the title from what Better Homes and Gardens called it. (Credit Where Credit is Due!)  You can use ANY mold, and that includes those glass custard cups you keep in the back of the cupboard and wonder what to do with them. That makes this dessert great for any time of year, and no special molds needed to clutter up the cabinet.  Hint: Skip the whipping cream and just use Cool Whip. Hint: Instead of the vanilla, almond, or lemon extract, there are lots of flavors of extracts. Torani.com makes large bottles of flavors, both sugar-free and sugary good. Think outside the box. Peach flavor and peach fruit sauce, for instance. Go with the seasonal flavors, and you'll never be without a quick and easy dessert to surprise guests.  You can even not bother with unmolding and skip the cheesecloth. Spoon the deliciousness into a custard cup or fancy dess...

 This is one of my kitchen basics, right along with a classic White Sauce. Learning to make this elevates a plain old cheesecake or ice cream to divine. Think how a raspberry sauce would go over plain old pear halves, for instance. This makes keeping a can or two of fruit cocktail in the pantry and a few single-serve cans of orange juice hidden away well worth the trouble. Or better yet, how to elevate plain Greek yogurt to something even Aphrodite might enjoy. Since cheesecake and yogurt qualify as creamy, I am sharing it now. You'll thank me for giving it to you early in the year.  Please note this sauce is more than just sugar, water, and fruit. It has cornstarch to thicken it and you get to decide how much sugar to use. I personally use a tablespoon of sugar, and sometimes a tablespoon of Splenda, because I have a diabetic in the house.  Hiding the orange juice is the trickiest part. Single serve bottles and cans do best. Sneak thieves find the stash and drink it all!...

 Frittelle is the typical Fat Tuesday sweet. In the States they are called fritter. During Carnevale in Italy everybody eats them at least once. You can find many variation to this recipe. Things You'll Need: * 1 1/3 Cup of flour * 2 eggs * 3 tbsp sugar * Lemon zest * 4 tbsp of brandy * ½ Cup of lukewarm milk * 1 tsp of powder yeast * 2 oz of raisin * Confectioners' sugar * Oil to fry * Salt Soak the raisin in lukewarm water with two tbsp of brandy. Take a bowl and mix the eggs with the sugar, the lemon zest, the rest of the brandy, the milk and a pinch of salt. Add the flour mixed to the yeast a bit at the time. Drain and squeeze the liquid off the raisins and add them to the mixture, then cover the dough with a cloth for the time necessary to heat the oil. Place the dough a spoonful at the time in the boiling oil, paying attention not to splatter and get burned. Once they have a golden look drain them with a slotted spoon and place them on paper towels to dry. Sprinkle them w...

I'm sure you've noticed I post the recipe first. That's deliberate. I get so annoyed when a blogger goes on and on with more personal information than I care to know, interspersed with ads for stuff I don't want to buy. If you want to read why I chose a recipe, or the reasons I think it fits, read on.  St. Patrick's Day is coming. Corned Beef and Cabbage is traditional. However, there's another reason to enjoy this classic. It's full of root vegetables. That too is tradition. At this season of the year, our ancestors depended on the contents of the root cellar to provide necessary vitamins and minerals only found in vegetables. Now, of course, we can all waltz into the local grocery store and find greenhouse grown vegetables right alongside whatever is seasonal. But what is traditional gives you a taste -literally!- of what our ancestors enjoyed and appreciated as the seasons turn.  Food can be not only nutrition, but fun! It's not only how much you eat,...

  A. History Imbolg is the Celtic name for the first sabbat of the wiccan faith, as well as some others who fall under the generic name of "witches". Imbolg is often known by other names, such as Candlemas, Brigid's day, and a host of others. "Imbolg (pronounced `immol'g', with a slight un-stressed vowel between the `l' and the `g') which means `in the belly'. it is the quickening of the year, the first fetal stirrings of spring in the womb of mother earth. like all the Celtic greater sabbats, it is a fire festival-but here the emphasis is on light rather than heat, the strengthening spark of light beginning to pierce the gloom of winter." (The Witches Bible complete, hereafter abbreviated to WBC, pg.61-62) Brigid is a classic example of a pagan deity Christianized with little attempt to hide the fact- or, as Frazer put in the golden bough (p.177, approx.), she is "an old heathen goddess of fertility, disguised in a threadbare Christ...

 Buttermilk Pie  The easiest recipe that I have for buttermilk pie is:   3 eggs 3 tbsp flour 2 1/2 cups sugar 1 tbsp vanilla extract 1 stick butter, melted 1 cup buttermilk 2 unbaked pie shells   Beat eggs and sugar well.  Add flour, vanilla, butter and buttermilk.  Mix well.  Pour into pie shells.  Bake at 350 for 50 minutes. Serve warm or cold.

  Imbolg has two main "flavors" that I love to enjoy in the middle of winter, after to overindulgence of the holidays. I'm over heavy sweets, especially chocolate. Here comes Imbolg, and the time of first lambing when milks and creams become common. But who has a farm? Not me! Thank goodness for grocery stores.  Even better, the recipe above has the sharp buttermilk or sour cream flavor. It's in a simple square pan, like a snack cake, making it easy to make and clean up. Best of all, it's served WARM. Yum! Just what you need on a cold evening.  Hint: There's such a thing as powdered buttermilk I found mine in the baking section of my grocery, but making sour milk is as easy as a spoonful of lemon juice or vinegar in regular old milk.