Savings for Sisters: October 2014

As with most holidays, every family has its Halloween traditions. The most consistent of these for us is making homemade Donuts. We only have them once a year, which is probably a good thing, because of all treats, a warm, fresh Donut is the most irresistible to me. I thought about sharing my recipe, but I didn't have any photos of the whole process. My mom and I have always made them together (it isn't exactly a kid-friendly activity) and of course everyone is happy to help devour them. Because they are best eaten before the day is over, some of us (I won't name names) have been known to over-indulge a bit! When we make our Donuts this Halloween, I will try to remember to take a few pictures so that I can share them with you next year. For this week, I hope you will be content with another yummy fall treat--Grandma's Apple Cobbler.

Over the years I have made hundreds of jars of home canned Apple Pie Filling. Of course it great for pie, but my favorite way to use it is in my Grandma's Apple Cobbler recipe, which is the easiest dessert in the world to make. It uses just six ingredients you always have on hand--flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, egg, and butter. That's it. Using a quart of the pie filling, it takes about five minutes--no kidding--and it's ready for the oven. It's a perfect dessert to whip up when you are taking dinner to someone, warm out of the oven with a carton of vanilla ice cream. The canned filling will keep well for at least two to three years in storage, so I usually make it only every other year. I have included instructions this week for making both.

For another fun family Halloween tradition, see my Tip of the Week to learn how my third grade teacher taught me, oh so many years ago, to make the most delicious Roasted Pumpkin Seeds you have ever tasted.

Canned Apple Pie Filling

To make 7 Quarts of Filling:

4 1/2 cups sugar

1 teas. salt

1 cup cornstarch

2 teas. cinnamon

¼ teas. nutmeg

10 cups water
3 Tablespoons bottled lemon juice

Heat all ingredients except lemon in heavy pot over medium heat, stirring constantly until thick and bubbly. Remove from heat, add lemon juice, and set aside.

Wash apples. It takes about 8 to 10 medium apples per quart. We always use Jonathan apples, but you can use other varieties as well.

Peel and core the apples. You can do them by hand, but it takes quite awhile. We always use our handy-dandy peeler-corer-slicer. These are available in most kitchen supply stores and are not terribly expensive.

Add some lemon juice to a bowl of cold water to keep them from going brown while you're working. Notice that these are already peeled, cored, and sliced!

Some remnants of peelings will remain, and the cores may not be completely removed, so you still have to work with them a bit more. Quarter them and inspect to be sure all the core is gone, trimming as needed as well as removing any peelings pieces you see. This is how they should look:

Keep filling the jars as you go and covering with the filling so they won't brown while you work on the rest of the jars. The sauce will be thick, so use a butter knife to hold the apples away from the sides of the jars so the sauce can run down and cover all the apple slices.

Clean the rims of the jars well to make sure no sticky syrup remains that will keep them from sealing. Use paper towels and warm water to do this.

Seal and Process for 30 minutes in a boiling water bath that completely covers the tops of the jars.

Remove bands, rinse off jars, and store in a cool, dark place.

Grandma’s Apple Cobbler

This can be used to top any kind of prepared (canned or bottled) pie filling OR fresh fruit.

1 cup flour

¾ cup sugar

¾ teas. salt

1 teas. baking powder

1 large unbeaten egg
1/2 to 3/4 stick butter, melted

In this picture it shows raw apples that I have covered with some leftover sauce I had in the fridge from canning my pie filling the other day. When you use a bottle (or commercial can) of filling, the apples will start out looking softer than this. Either way is fine, but if you use uncooked apples, increase your cooking time by at least 15 minutes.

Mix together the dry ingredients evenly with a fork, then throw in a large, whole, unbeaten egg and mix vigorously with the fork until crumbly and evening mixed. If your eggs are small, throw in an extra yolk.

Sprinkle over pie filling in square glass casserole dish and drizzle a half stick of melted butter or so on top.

Bake at 350 for 45 min or more. If you start with raw apples that have not been processed into pie filling, it will take at least an hour. I like to get it quite browned and crispy. (As long as it isn't burning, you really can't get it too crispy). Serve warm with vanilla ice cream.

By the way, this makes quite a bit of topping for covering just 1 jar of apple filling in a square pan (serving 6), so I usually end up throwing away about 1/4 of it. If you want to use two jars, one and a half batches does a 9 x 11 pan that makes 10 to 12 servings.

Tip of the Week

Roasted Pumpkin Seeds

When I was a little girl in third grade, our teacher brought pumpkin seeds to school and showed us how to cook them. She brought a little electric fry pan and I watched very carefully to see how she did it. I had never tasted pumpkin seeds before, and was so intrigued! She roasted them slowly in butter, adding salt as they cooked, until they were browned and crispy. They smelled so delicious! When they were done, she passed out napkins and we each got a dozen or so to taste. I thought it was the best treat ever. I went home and told my mother, who let me try doing it with seeds from our Halloween pumpkin for the family. They also turned out great, and all of us have been making them this way ever since. I know a lot of recipes call for baking them and adding fancy seasonings, but this is the way we like them, and I hope you will too.

-Remove seeds from pumpkin and clean well. It is better if they are not too large, so a medium sized pumpkin works best.

-Cover them with cold water and scrub with your hands.

-You have to keep changing the water and picking out the bits of pumpkin from the seeds.

. . . Until they are nice and clean!

Drain them in a colander. . .

And lay them out on a paper towel to absorb the rest of the moisture.

-Using a heavy bottomed pan or skillet, melt butter. It’s hard to say how much, because it depends on how many seeds you’re making. But for a medium sized pumpkin’s worth of seeds, use at least two or three tablespoons.

-Keeping the heat very low, pour in seeds and salt well. If you have sea salt or kosher salt, that would be great, but regular salt is fine too. Add some at the beginning, and more part way through the cooking process.

-Simmer the seeds in the butter on low heat for at least 30 to 40 minutes. You have to keep the heat very low, or the butter will burn and the seeds will taste burned. Stir them frequently. It takes a little patience!