Wednesday, December 24, 2008

That's 2 cups of flour...


Let the cooking begin...my daughter is having Christmas dinner at her house this year, but I always bake the pies and the rolls and odds and ends. We've had a funny thing going on through the years, when I bake the pumpkin pies, I always have to bring the can label with, because one year I baked sweet potato pie and she thought it was pumpkin...and was totally grossed out when the truth was told...even after eating 3 pieces...hmmm...

But I'm one of those good ol' cooks, from scratch kinda cookin', whole wheat, fresh eggs all natural products, that fresh right outta the cow kinda stuff...and she just hates it, she is a totally outta the box kinda gal. Now how on earth did that happen when she was not raised that way.

Christmas with my 'X', was always a trial for my daughter, as my husband, you know, the Robert Redford, Jeremiah Johnson type...would always go out the day before and shoot us a turkey. If you've never had a wild turkey before, you have NEVER tasted turkey, nuthin' like it! Eggs fresh from the henhouse, veggies from the summer before's bounty, it was a feast for most modern pilgrims.

My Granny one year before she passed, taught me her minced meat pie recipe, though we altered it with deer meat...of course some of Jeremiah's booty...anyone that tasted it could not tell it was deer. We processed our own deer (should you doubt) so the taste was totally game-taint free, it totally tasted like beef. But Granny's pies were the best, never used lard, always Crisco, for that light, flaky, buttery taste and I have to brag a bit, my pies taste exactly like Grams'.

So as the snows come down in this wintery season of holiday, my oven is warming the house, the smells would draw in any man out of the field and the silence of the new fallen snow spreads a magic all around...it's CHRISTMAS...