Tag Archives: peppers

Breads and Muffins

September means back to school, grilled stuffed peppers, and another wedding

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School doors opened yesterday, September 6, throughout the county. It seems quiet around here with Joseph, 14, Lovina, 12, and Kevin, 11, all back to school. The bus is here around 7:00 a.m. We are so glad the pickup time is later this term. Joseph milks our cow Bessie in the morning, and then showers and gets ready for the bus.

It was a nice day last Friday for Mose’s brother Joe and Mary’s wedding. It was nice and cool in the morning, which made it bettter for the cooks.

My job was to help with mashed potatoes. For the noon meal we made twelve eight-quart kettles of mashed potatoes. For the evening meal we had three twenty-quart kettles of mashed potatoes. They had a larger group of people in the evening. After everyone had eaten we had a ten-quart kettle left over. The potatoes were easy to mash using the Bosch mixers that the wedding cook wagon has.

On the menu were mashed potatoes, gravy, dressing, barbequed chicken, corn, lettuce salad, butterhorns, butter, and strawberry jam. Dessert was apple crumb, pecan, and peanut butter pies, date pudding, and lime fruit salad. Ice cream was served with the evening meal as well.

Kevin’s eleventh birthday was the day of the wedding (September 2). Since we were there we waited to celebrate his birthday until Labor Day. We had cupcakes instead of a cake. We gave him a youth bowKevinsCompoundBow for his birthday. He is glad to be able to target practice with Mose and his brothers. Daughter Lovina is really interested in their bows. It looks like we will have another hunter in the family. She wants to take the hunter’s safety course sometime. She is an outdoors girl like Susan. If we can’t find her she is usually out in the field petting the horses and ponies.

Joe put in eleven hours at the RV factory yesterday. Since they were off work on Monday for Labor Day they will have to put in longer hours this week. With this hot humid weather Joe is ready to call it a day when he gets home from work.

Joseph and Lovina picked the jalapeño, serrano, Hungarian wax, and sweet banana peppers from the garden. I have to get those canned. We like to stuff and grill the sweet banana and Hungarian wax peppers. We stuff them with cream cheese mixed with shredded Colby cheese, and wrap them with bacon. Our family just loves them.

One night Joe made a chili soup outside in the kettle while Mose grilled chicken. We are glad when we don’t have to get supper in the house on these hot evenings.

Mose and Susan took Joe and me out for supper in town one evening just as an appreciation for us letting them live here. We enjoy having them here and when Tim and Elizabeth come home to join us for a meal, it makes everything seem complete.

Loretta spent Labor Day at her special friend Dustin’s house with his family.

I’ll share the recipe for butterhorns I received from a friend. Enjoy! God bless!

Butterhorns RollsButterhornsSept2016

1 tablespoon yeast
1 cup warm water
1/2 cup sugar
3 eggs, beaten
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup margarine or butter, melted
4 1/2 to 5 cups flour

Blend yeast with water and 1 tablespoon sugar. Add eggs, rest of sugar, salt, and margarine. Add flour and mix well. Put in greased bowl and refrigerate overnight. Roll out like pie dough, cut
in pie-shaped pieces and roll up. Dip in melted margarine or brush lightly with margarine. Let rise 3 hours. Bake at 325 degrees for 15 to 20 minutes. If you leave in refrigerator several days, punch down each day.

 

Lovina Eicher is an Old Order Amish writer, cook, wife and mother of eight. Formerly writing as The Amish Cook, Eicher inherited that column from her mother, Elizabeth Coblentz, who wrote from 1991 to 2002. Readers can contact Eicher at PO Box 1689, South Holland, IL 60473 (please include a self-addressed stamped envelope for a reply) or at LovinasAmishKitchen@MennoMedia.org.

 

Side Dishes, Snacks

Whew! No time to catch breath after wedding when you host church the next week

Another week has passed, and it is time to write another column.

The Eichers set up benches for church services in their new pole barn.
The Eichers set up benches for church services in their new pole barn.

Church services were held here Sunday in our new pole barn. Made a lot more room than when we had it in the basement. Benches were all filled, even though some of our church families were attending baptismal services in another church district. We had quite a few visitors from northern Indiana.

Our menu for lunch consisted of homemade wheat and white bread (out of 50 loaves, we had only a few left), smoked sausage links (which we heated up in the oven before serving), cheese spread, peanut butter spread, dill pickles, freezer pickles, red beets, hot peppers, butter, strawberry jam, coffee, iced tea and cookies. We had butterscotch, chocolate chip, sugar and ranger cookies.

We served seven tables at one time and four of them were reset, so we had eleven tables to serve altogether. I didn’t have anyone back for the evening meal like we usually do. We were all worn out from having Elizabeth’s wedding here a week before!

This week we are busy canning. Yesterday we canned 34 pints of salsa. We still have more tomatoes that need to be canned into something. I would like to make pizza and spaghetti sauce, and I also want to can some salsa for daughter Elizabeth, who just got married. She went back to work and is working ten-hour days. It wears her out to get much done in the evenings.

Our cabbage heads are ready to be harvested. We made coleslaw and chili soup for our supper last night. Sons Benjamin, 16, and Joseph, 13, took some garden goodies over to Timothy and Elizabeth. They don’t have a garden, so we want to share with them. We have green beans and hot peppers waiting here to be put into jars. I might freeze the green beans. Also have peaches coming next week.

I did take a half-day break and went to neighbor Barbara’s for a Tupperware party one day. It was a Tupperware shower for neighbor Susie, who was married on June 4. They served lunch to us before we left. Sometimes getting away from home for a while boosts your energy.

Tomorrow we plan to attend the wedding of Leander and Karen. The wedding will be about six miles from our house. Leander is a son of Joe’s cousin Leander and his wife Rosina. Son Leander recently moved to our community.

School doors will open on September 8. Our three youngest are ready for that day. Joseph will be in seventh grade, Lovina in fifth (and in middle school), and Kevin will be in fourth grade (his last year in elementary). The years keep going by way too fast!

This week Lovina shares a recipe for homemade salsa. Her recipe makes 15 pints of canned salsa.
This week Lovina shares a recipe for homemade salsa. Her recipe makes 15 pints of canned salsa.

This week I’ll share my salsa recipe with you readers. God’s blessings to all!

Salsa

14 pounds tomatoes, scalded, peeled, and diced
5 cups onions, chopped
10 green peppers, chopped
4–6 jalapeño peppers, chopped
1 cup vinegar
1/2 cup brown sugar
4 garlic cloves, minced (or 1 teaspoon garlic powder)
1/4 cup salt
2 teaspoons oregano flakes
3 teaspoons chili powder
10–12 tablespoons Clear Jel (not instant)

Mix all of the ingredients except Clear Jel in a big pot. After the mixture boils, cook for 45 minutes, stirring occasionally. Then mix Clear Jel with 1–2 cups of water before adding to the rest of the ingredients to thicken. More jalepeño peppers can be added to desired taste, and more Clear Jel can be added for a thicker salsa. Cold pack according to your canner’s instructions. Makes about 15 pints.

Lovina Eicher is an Old Order Amish writer, cook, wife and mother of eight. Formerly writing as The Amish Cook, Eicher inherited that column from her mother, Elizabeth Coblentz, who wrote from 1991 to 2002. Readers can contact Eicher at PO Box 1689, South Holland, IL 60473 (please include a self-addressed stamped envelope for a reply) or at LovinasAmishKitchen@MennoMedia.org.