Tuesday, August 24, 2010

One Last Summer Hurrah

On the list of our favorite recipes, brisket and the accompanying sides are right there at the top. When we have special occasions any time during the year, it seems someone wants brisket. We've discovered the jalapeno corn is excellent served with Thanksgiving turkey and Christmas ham, too.
Your family probably couldn't eat these recipes alone. This is for a special weekend when you've got the time to wake up early, put the brisket in the oven, and get ready for some fun company. An end-of-summer swim party would be the perfect time to serve these recipes. Labor Day is coming up, you know!
Add some fruit salad and lemon cheesecake and you've got an evening your friends will remember fondly for a long time.
Grape Kool-aid and ice go well with this meal!

Barbecued Brisket

8 lbs. Beef brisket, or a boned pork loin roast
Onion salt
Garlic salt
Celery salt
2 tsp. Sugar
Worcestershire sauce
A few drops liquid smoke

Cover both sides of meat with seasoned salts, sugar, Worcestershire sauce, and liquid smoke. Rub seasonings into both sides of meat with fingers. Refrigerate overnight in foil-lined roasting pan, covered tightly with more aluminum foil.

The next morning . . .
Onion salt
Garlic salt
Celery salt
Worcestershire sauce
A few drops of liquid smoke

Season meat again before baking and wrap in aluminum foil. Bake at 250 degrees for 8 hours (or one-hour per pound). Remove pan from oven. Open foil and drain off grease.

1 1 lb., 2 oz. bottle barbecue sauce (we use KC Masterpiece)
1 sm. can tomato sauce
½ to ¾ c. brown sugar


Mix above ingredients and heat. Pour over meat. Save some for serving. Return brisket to oven, covered with foil, for 1 hour at 350 degrees. Cool and slice with grain of meat.

Potatoes Supreme

Marybeth Bohn

8 med. Potatoes (or make instant mashed potatoes for 8-10 servings)
8 oz. Cream cheese, softened
½ med. Onion, minced
1 c. Sour cream
Grated Cheddar cheese

Mash potatoes with milk, butter, and salt. Mashed potatoes should be stiff, not runny. Add cream cheese, onion, and sour cream. Put in a 9x13 casserole. Top with Cheddar cheese. Bake at 350 degrees for 45-60 minutes.
Jalapeno Corn
Marybeth Bohn

12 ounces of cream cheese
½ c. milk
4 T. butter or margarine
1 tsp. salt
3 or 4 fresh jalapeno peppers, seeded and chopped (make sure to get rid of all the seeds so the recipe won't be too hot)
4 11-oz. cans Green Giant shoepeg corn

Mix cream cheese, milk, butter, and salt until cheese is melted. Add corn and jalapenos and put into casserole dish. Bake at 375 degrees about 30 minutes--until bubbling.
Bootlegger Beans
Shanna Maylett

5 strips bacon, chopped into bite-size pieces and fried until almost done
1 small onion, chopped
½ green pepper, chopped

Saute bacon, onion, and pepper, until bacon is crisp then drain off grease. Add . . .

1 32-oz. can pork-and-beans
3 T. brown sugar
2 T. red wine vinegar
2T. ketchup

Simmer ½ hour, stirring often. Beans will thicken as they simmer.
Serves 8-10 people.
Lemon Icebox Cheesecake
Recipe from America’s Test Kitchen
Icebox cheesecakes are a delicious paradox: delicate and light yet rich and creamy. We thought simply adding lemon juice would turn a standard icebox cheesecake into a fresh lemon-flavored one. But test after test yielded bad results: The lemon flavor was alternately fleeting or harsh. We wanted an icebox cheesecake with bright lemon flavor front and center—not just as an afterthought. Here’s what we discovered:

Test Kitchen Discoveries
· In a baked cheesecake, tart lemon juice is mellowed by the heat of the oven. For our icebox version, we needed to dial back the lemon juice to compensate.
· Lemon curd, a rich, tangy spread made from eggs, butter, cream, sugar, and lemon juice, added crisp lemon flavor without the undesirable “chew” of zest or the processed flavor of lemon extract.
· Using lemon cookies instead of graham crackers for the crust created an additional layer of lemon flavor.
· Lemon Icebox Cheesecake

· Serves 12 to 16
· Let the dissolved gelatin mixture cool down for a few minutes, or the gelatin will seize when combined with the filling. We tested our cheesecake with several store brands of lemon sandwich cookies; all worked well.

CRUST
10 lemon sandwich cookies, broken into pieces (about 1 1/4 cups)
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
CURD
1 large egg plus 1 egg yolk
1/4 cup sugar
Pinch salt
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 tablespoon heavy cream
FILLING
1/4 cup lemon juice from 2 lemons
1 envelope (2 3/4 teaspoons) unflavored gelatin
1 1/2 pounds cream cheese, cut into 1-inch pieces and softened
3/4 cup sugar
Pinch salt
1 1/4 cups heavy cream, room temperature
1/4 cup of the lemon curd

· 1. MAKE CRUST Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Process cookies in food processor until finely ground. Add butter and zest and pulse until combined. Press mixture into bottom of 9-inch springform pan. Bake until lightly browned and set, about 10 minutes (Marybeth will bake it only 5 or 6 minutes next time). Cool completely on wire rack, at least 30 minutes.
· 2. MAKE CURD While crust is cooling, whisk egg, egg yolk, sugar, and salt together in small saucepan. Add lemon juice and cook over medium-low heat, stirring constantly, until thick and puddinglike, about 3 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in butter and cream. Press through fine-mesh strainer into small bowl and refrigerate until needed.
· 3. SOFTEN GELATIN Combine lemon juice and gelatin in small bowl and let stand until gelatin softens, about 5 minutes. Microwave until mixture is bubbling around edges and gelatin dissolves, about 30 seconds. Set aside.
· 4. MAKE FILLING With electric mixer on medium speed, beat cream cheese, sugar, and salt until smooth and creamy, scraping down sides of bowl, about 2 minutes. Slowly add cream and beat until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add gelatin mixture and ¼ cup curd, increase speed to medium-high, and beat until smooth and airy, about 3 minutes.
· 5. CHILL CHEESECAKE Pour filling into cooled crust and smooth top. Following photos, pour thin lines of remaining curd on top of cake and lightly drag paring knife or skewer through lines to create marbled appearance. Refrigerate until set, at least 6 hours. Remove sides of pan. Serve. (Cheesecake can be covered in plastic wrap and refrigerated for up to 3 days.
STEP BY STEP
Layers of Lemon Flavor
An extraordinary icebox lemon cheesecake requires more than a squeeze of lemon.
LEMON SANDWICH COOKIES Instead of the standard graham cracker crumbs, we used crushed lemon sandwich cookies for our crust.
LEMON JUICE AND ZEST Divide and conquer—we added 1/4 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice to the filling and 1 tablespoon lemon zest to the crust.
LEMON CURD We mixed tangy, homemade lemon curd into the batter and swirled extra on top of the cheesecake.

STEP BY STEP
Cheater's Cheesecake
Homemade lemon curd can’t be beat. don’t have the 15 minutes it takes to make it, though? You can find jarred curd in the jam section of the supermarket. But be forewarned: all brands are not created equal. The only one we can recommend is Wilkin and Sons, which captures the taste of real lemons and is creamy enough to use in our lemon icebox cheesecake (you will need 1/2 cup). Just so you know: it costs about $9.


STEP BY STEP
Swirl Showstopper
Remember what Grandma said? Pretty is as pretty does. At Cook's Country we generally agree with Grandma. Just this once, however, we don't think she'd mind a fancy effect. Making a swirl with the lemon curd on top of the cheesecake is absurdly easy and awfully impressive.
1. Use a measuring cup to pour the curd in four thin lines on top of the cheesecake.
2. Drag a paring knife or skewer perpendicularly through the lines to create a marbled design.

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