My mom was a great cook. Anybody that sat at her dinner table did not leave hungry. If someone didn’t eat all their meal, she would say, “Don’t be crying after while ’cause you’re hungry.”
She was also a simple cook. She often said she didn’t do anything hard. Her recipe books were strictly for reference. If she didn’t like how much vanilla the recipe called for, she would simply add what she thought it should have. She didn’t use a lot of exotic spices or hard-to-find ingredients. She could take what was in her pantry and create magic.
For many years mom made Thanksgiving dinner for whoever wanted to come. Some family members made other plans but always managed to come by and sample her world class stuffing or a homemade pie or her matchless sweet potato casserole.
As we all got older and watched mom slow down a bit (although not much!) we would offer to make a dish to lighten her load. I could almost duplicate her sweet potato casserole and I would offer to make it and she always said, “I’ve already got it.”
One reason she didn’t get overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of the work involved in making the Thanksgiving meal, was that she would make the more labor-intensive dishes – like stuffing – ahead of time. She would also cook and slice the turkey breast earlier in the week and store it in broth to keep it moist. So basically, the morning of Thanksgiving, she would pull the dishes out of the refrigerator and put them in the oven because she had already done the work. Green beans, potatoes and gravy were cooked on the stovetop. If she found she had extra time, she was known to “whip up” a batch of homemade rolls. This recipe was one of the few she actually wrote down.
QUICK ROLLS
- 1 cup plus 2 Tbs. warm water
- 1/3 cup oil
- 2 Tbs. yeast
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1/2 tsp. salt
- 1 egg
- 3 1/2 cup flour
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Combine water and oil, yeast and sugar. Let rest 15 min. Mix 2 cups of flour, egg and salt and mix. Add remaining 1/2 cup flour. Let dough rest for 15 min. Turn out on floured surface, knead slightly, coating the dough with flour and gently roll out till it’s about 1/2 inch. Cut out with a biscuit cutter and place in buttered pan. Butter the tops and cook till the rolls are golden brown.
French Coconut pie is one of the easiest pies to make ahead. And although mom could make a mean pie crust in her heyday, she chose to buy them for convenience. This recipe makes two pies.
FRENCH COCONUT PIE
- 3 eggs
- 2 cups sugar
- 1/4 butter, melted
- 1 tsp. vanilla
- 3 Tbs. flour
- Pinch of salt
- 1 cup half & half
- 2 cups coconut
Mix together. Pour into two pie crusts (not deep dish). Bake in 350 oven for 40 minutes. Serve with a dollop of whipped cream after cooling.
Searching through my recipes for inspiration, I found a recipe that my sister wrote down for Sweet Potato Casserole, likely through the prompting of mom for specifics.
SWEET POTATO CASSEROLE
- 3 cups mashed, cooked sweet potatoes (canned or fresh)
- 1 cup of sugar
- 1/2 cup melted butter
- 2 eggs well beaten
- 1 tsp. vanilla
- 1/3 c. milk
Topping:
- 1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
- 1/4 all purpose flour
- 2 1/2 Tbs. butter, softened not melted
- 1/2 cup chopped pecans or walnuts
Combine sweet potatoes, 1 cup of sugar, 1/2 cup of butter, eggs, vanilla and milk. Mix well and pour into baking dish sprayed with cooking spray. Mix up topping and sprinkle on top. The topping ingredients can be doubled for a more impressive presentation.
Thanksgiving will never be the same for our family, so embrace the ones you love and savor every moment.
Pictured above: Kathyrn Solesbee and her granddaughter, Lydia Dills.