Scrappy Pie

Newfoundland Blue Ensign. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Remembrance Day falls this year in Canada on November 11th.  Some provinces and territories celebrate it, also, on November 12th.  My Dad hails from Newfoundland, and at times he made what he called scrappy pie to celebrate it.  It is on Remembrance Day there that Canadians  remember  all of the fallen soldiers from past wars.

My great-uncle Charles was killed in Belgium in the first World War and is buried  where he was killed defending his fallen comrades.  His name is called out and his memory is saluted by a contingent of military members at Parliament every year on this day.  For this I simply give you my father’s Americanized version of Scrappy Pie (or Newfoundland Seafood Pie):

Potato topping ingredients:   1 cup all purpose flour,  1/2 cup fresh mashed potato, 4 ounces butter, 1 tablespoon milk, 2  Tablespoons dried breadcrumbs.

Filling:  16 ounces whitefish (cod, haddock, whiting or your choice), large cooked shrimp (8 ounces), 1 small onion- chopped fine, 1 cup frozen peas, 2 tablespoons fresh parsley – chopped fine, zest of a lemon – grated, 1/4 cup cornstarch, 2 cups milk.

Sift flour into a large bowl.  Using a pastry blender or fork, mix this with the mashed potato until thoroughly blended.  Blend in the  butter,  then draw into a dough, adding a bit of water until dough sticks together.  Wrap dough in pastic and chill in the refrigerator for 1/2 hour.

Prepare filling by cutting fish into chucks and putting them into a 10 inch pie pan or baking dish.   Mix in the seafood, onions, peas, parsley and zest.  Blend the cornstarch with a bit of milk in a bowl.  Heat the remaining milk almost to boiling and stir it into the cornstarch mixture.  Return mixture to pan and stir until the mixture thickens.  Add seasoning and pour over fish filling.  Cool for 20 minutes.  Bring oven to 400F (200C).

Roll out the dough between sheets of wax paper to overlap to of pie plate.  Remove the top of the waxed paper and use the bottom sheet to help position dough on top of seafood mixture.

Press dough around edges of pan and clean up the edges.  Slash center of pie with small knife to vent steam.  Brush the crust with milk and sprinkle liberally with plain breadcrumbs.

Put pie on a baking sheet  Bake for 10 minutes – then drop temperature to 350F (180C).   Bake for 30 minutes or until golden brown.

My father cooked this for us when we were very young and it’s the closest I can come to the original recipe.  I sought out Scrappy Pie recipes everywhere to no avail, so if someone could forward me more from the great nation of Canada, I would greatly appreciate it.

May you stay safe and sound on Remembrance Day.  And to my remaining Newfoundland cousins, may the sea treat you right and the cod keep running.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

stiff egg whites (Photo credit: She Paused 4 Thought).

Today brings a normalization of the weather here in New England after the monster hurriane, Sandy, hit our shores.  We give thanks to God that we were spared, in my hometown, the devastation that struck the coast farther south of here, especially in the states of New York and New Jersey.  Our prayers go out to those whose lives were disastrously affected by the hurricane everywhere along the eastern seaboard.

Today, for everyone who is able to celebrate this Halloween holiday with some resemblance of normalcy, I simply give you an recipe from an old church bulletin.  I’m unsure where it originated from, but it was being used and copied somewhere around the 1960’s and has been made in my family to celebrate different holidays since that time. It is very good to use at children’s costume parties.

RASPBERRY KISSES

3 egg whites

3  1/2 Tablespoons raspberry gelatin

3/4 cups sugar

1/8 teaspoon salt

1 Tablespoon white vinegar

1 cup mini chocolate chips

Line and grease large baking sheet with parchment or brown paper and preheat oven to 250 degrees Fahrenheit.

Beat egg whites and salt on high speed with electric mixer until light and foamy.  Gradually add gelatin and sugar and continue beating to stiff peaks.  Mix until sugar is totally dissolved or kisses will be sticky.  Add the vinegar.  Fold in the chocolate chips.  Drop by teaspoon onto lined, greased baking sheet.  Bake kisses at 250 degrees for 25 minutes and then turn off the oven, leaving them in oven for additional 20 minutes.  Remove baking sheet from oven and remove immediately to wire baking rack to cool.

Makes 6 dozen.

I hope you find these simple to make, and please have a safe, happy Halloween night.

Thanksgiving Will Soon Be Here (with diabetic recipe)

English: “The First Thanksgiving at Plymouth” (1914) By Jennie A. Brownscombe (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The holiday of American Thanksgiving soon approaches, this year falling on Thursday, November 22nd.  This is the time to start thinking about buying your turkey.  The turkey sales at your local supermarket will be coming up soon and, if that is your choice of a entree this year, it would be a good time to consider what type it will be, whether it be a frozen, fresh, Kosher or pre-basted.  The choices in many markets are endless.  I’ll bring you more information on choosing and preparing a turkey at a later date.  In the meantime, here is a little quote and a recipe which can be used interchangeably for a variety of holidays,  be it Halloween, Thanksgiving, Rosh Hashannah, Christmas or New Year or any other special occasion.  Feel free to give the sugar-free, diabetic recipe a try.  I like it a lot and use it on a weekday basis.

Ah! On Thanksgiving day, when from East and from West,

From North and from South come the pilgrim and guest,

When the gray-haired New Englander sees round his board

The old broken links of affection restored,

When the care-wearied man seeks his mother once more,

And the worn matron smiles where the girl smiled before,

What moistens the lip and what brightens the eye?

What calls back the past, like the rich pumpkin pie?

_________________________________________________________________________________________

CRANBERRY NUT CRUNCH BRITTLE

1 cup dry sugar substitute (cup for cup measure)

3/4 cup salted nuts (such as peanuts, cashews, almonds, or macadamia), chopped coursely

1/2 dried cranberries

1/2 cup sugar-free maple syrup

1 teaspoon margarine or butter

1 teaspoon baking soda

teaspoon vanilla extract (not imitation)

Spray a large rimmed baking sheet with cooking spray or butter it.  Taking a very large, heat-proof glass measuring bowl, mix the maple syrup and the dry sugar substitute and microwave on High Power for 4 1/2 minutes.  Add the margarine or butter and the vanilla extract, mixing well to combine.  Continue to microwave for 1  1/2 minutes.  Mix in the baking soda.  Stir thoroughly until the mixture becomes light and airy.  It should foam a bit.  Pour the hot mixture onto the baking sheet.  Place the baking sheet on a heat-proof kitchen surface such as a wire baking rack.  Cool for 1 hour.  Break into pieces and store in tins or other sealed container.  Makes 8 servings.

140 calories

7 grams Fat

5 grams Carbohydrate

170 grams Sodium

3 grams Protein

8 mg. Calcium

1 gram Fiber

Happy Holidays to all!

Auntie Annie’s Halloween Chocolate Turtle Candy

English: A Pearson’s Bun Bar shown whole. One of three flavors (caramel specifically) but all of the Bun Bars have the same outward appearance. Candy was provided from the Pearson’s Candy Company to Evan-Amos for the direct purpose of adding pictures to the Wikipedia articles. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

My Auntie Annie’s busiest times of the year were most major holidays.  Not only was she busy during American holidays, but during most of the major international ones, as well.  You see, she was a worker at one of the larger U.S. candy factories that made famous brand novelty and boxed fancy assortments.  She had been working at the factory as a line worker and then a fancy chocolates dipper since the turn of the 20th century.  She would trek off to the chocolate factory every morning for over fifty years, having started her job, in those very emancipated days, at a young and tender age.   Her salary was well received by her struggling family, who also enjoyed the fruits of her labors – having access to chocolate bars, candy wafers, turtle clusters, caramel, and a full product line of tooth decaying, fattening goodies.

During the holidays , before Halloween, Auntie Annie would have us for a visit and when she was making candy gifts for Halloween, Thanksgiving, New Years, Hanukkah and Christmas, she would often teach me how to make one of the famous candies that she worked to turn out on a daily basis at the factory.  She would have huge pans of bubbling, boiling caramel.  Chocolate would be melting at the front of the stove.  Her idea of a double boiler was a spaghetti cooking pan with a very large bowl sitting on top.  There were several of these crowding her old fashioned stove.  She taught me how to make her famous Chocolate turtle clusters when I was about fifteen years old.  During that visit, she also tried to teach me how to put the swirls on those fancy chocolates with creme centers, but I was a dismal failure and my attempts looked more like puckery little blobs.  Those were fun and unique Autumn days and we, as little children (and all of our young friends, too),  looked forward to our holiday boxes and tins of these delicious, sinful, ultimately perfect treats. I hope you like them as much as my family does.

ANNIE’S CHOCOLATE TURTLE CANDY

Equipment needed – large baking sheets, metal spoons, wooden spoons, measuring spoons, waxed paper, large metal bowls, double boiler, candy tins and boxes.

Cover baking sheets with waxed paper and grease lightly grease waxed paper with margarine.

INGREDIENTS

42 candy caramel squares

3 Tablespoons butter

2 teaspoons shortening

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 cups dry roasted peanuts, unsalted (may use toasted walnuts, unsalted almonds, macadamia nuts or hazelnuts)

1 cup milk chocolate morsels or chopped milk chocolate bars

Arrange several nuts, in cluster, on baking sheet.  You may use the amount you would like.  Place nuts one inch apart or more from each other.  Put caramel squares in the double boiler with butter and put over boiling water until completely melted, stirring constantly.  When caramels are melted, remove from stove and stir in vanilla.  Drop melted caramel in spoonfuls onto nuts until they are thoroughly covered.   Let nut clusters cool to a firm, cool stage.  Melt the chocolate and butter in double boiler over low heat, stirring constantly, until smooth.  Pour melted chocolate over nut clusters and cool them on the tray until they are firm.  Do not chill in refrigerator as this may discolor the candy clusters.  Put in metal tins between squares of wax paper and store in a cool, dry place.

We always loved making these with my Aunt Annie and no holiday was complete without them.  I plan to get started on mine in a few days for future gift giving.  I wonder if my aunt haunts the old site of the candy factory these days, wandering the halls, checking on equipment, chocolate mixtures, and trekking into the factory to check on the efficiency of present day laborers.

If they hear the sound of her shoes tapping around the chocolate vats, then they know that she’s on the lookout  this Halloween season.

Happy Halloween.

Related articles

• Properly Preparing and Melting Chocolate (berries.com)