Ingredients

• 3 1/2 teaspoons white sugar
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 1 tablespoon active dry yeast
• 4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup margarine
• 1 cup milk
• 1 egg
• 1 egg yolk
• 2 pounds Muenster cheese, shredded
• 1 egg white, beaten
• 2 tablespoons whole blanched almonds

Preparation

Heat milk and butter or margarine over low heat until very warm.

Combine sugar, salt, yeast, and 1 cup of flour in a large bowl. Stir in hot milk mixture, and beat with mixer on medium speed for 2 minutes. Beat in 1 more cup of flour, and continue beating for 2 more minutes. With a wooden spoon, stir in enough flour (about 2 cups) to make a soft dough.

Knead the dough on a lightly floured surface for about 10 minutes, adding more flour as necessary. Cover dough with bowl, and let rest for 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, shred muenster cheese. Combine with 1 egg and 1 egg yolk.

On a lightly floured surface and with a floured rolling pin, roll dough into a 24 x 6 inch rectangle. Spoon the cheese mixture into a log shape lengthwise along the dough. Fold the dough over the cheese making a 1 inch overlap, and pinch seam to seal. In a greased 9 inch round cake pan, place roll, seam side down, to make a ring. Overlap the ends, and pinch to seal. Cover with a towel. Let rest 10 minutes.

Brush loaf with egg white, and garnish with blanched almonds, if desired. Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 1 hour, until loaf sounds hollow when tapped. Remove bread from pan immediately. Cool for 15 minutes before slicing into wedges.

Ingredients

Crust:

• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 1/2 cup powdered sugar
• 6 oz. cold unsalted butter, cut in 1/2-inch pieces

Filling:

• 6 large eggs
• 3 cups sugar
• 1 cup plus 2 tbsp. fresh lemon juice
• 1/2 cup flour

Preparation

Crust: Preheat oven to 325. Mix flour and powdered sugar. Cut in butter until pea-sized. Mixture will be very dry. Gently press in bottom of 13-by-9 inch pan. Bake until golden brown, 20 to 25 minutes. Let cool to room temperature and reduce oven to 300.

Filling: Whisk together eggs and sugar until smooth. Stir in lemon juice and then flour. Pour filling on crust and bake until set, about 40 minutes. Cool completely. Cut into 21/4 inch squares. Dust with powdered sugar. Makes 24.

Ingredients

• olive oil
• 4 chicken thighs
• 1 lb. fresh sausage links (Italian or Bratwust)
• 1 onion, halved and thinly sliced
• 1 garlic clove, thinly sliced
• 1 each red, orange, and yellow bell peppers, sliced
• 1 small container brown mushroom caps
• 1/4 c. Worcestershire sauce
• 1/4 c. soy sauce brown rice

Preparation

Salt & pepper the chicken thighs. Heat a little olive oil in your largest skillet, add thighs skin-side down, cover, and cook until lightly browned. Cut sausage links into thirds. Flip chicken, add sausage, cover, and cook until sausage starts to brown, turning once to cook evenly. Add onion and garlic. Cook (without lid) and stir until onion begins to wilt. Add peppers and mushrooms. Stir occasionally while veggies cook.

When peppers and mushrooms are done to your liking, add sauces and stir until the pan juices thicken and glaze the meats and veggies.

Serve with brown rice.

Ingredients

• 1 lb. cooked shrimp
• 1/2 lb. frozen peas
• 1 cup chopped celery [or 1 green apple, julienned]
• 1 small onion, diced
• 1 cup mayonnaise
• 1 1/2 tbsp. lemon
• 1/8 tsp. curry powder
• 1 tsp. soy sauce
• 1/8 tsp. garlic powder
• 3 oz. chow mein noodles
• 1/2 cup slivered almonds

Preparation

Combine shrimp, peas, celery, and onion and chill.

Mix next five ingredients and chill.

Combine shrimp, sauce, noodles and almonds and let stand about 5 minutes before serving.

Ingredients

• 8 TBSP butter
• 8 oz. sliced mushrooms
• 1 med. onion, chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, ditto
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1/2 tsp. pepper
• 4 C. chopped green chile
• 8 slices (calls for Swiss) queso quesadilla
• 4 NY strip steaks

Preparation

Heat oven to 350. Saute onion, mushrooms and garlic in butter. Add chile and S&P. Simmer 10-15 minutes. Broil, grill or pan fry seasoned steaks. Top with chile mixture and cheese and bake until cheese melts.

Ingredients

• 3-5 red bell peppers, roasted and peeled
• 2-4 cloves garlic
• vinegar (sherry or balsamic work well)
• olive oil

Preparation

Seed the peppers and slice into strips, roughly 2"x4". Spread in an even layer on a plate or low baking dish. Mince garlic and sprinkle over the top. Sprinkle with a healthy amount of vinegar and olive oil.

Ingredients

• chicken (breasts, thighs, or whole) or 3/4-1 lb. frozen cocktail shrimp
• salt
• pepper
• 1 bay leaf
• water
• 1 1/2 lb. grated monterrey jack
• 1 onion
• 1 doz. green chiles, chopped, or 3 small cans green chile
• 1 lb. container sour cream
• 2 doz. corn tortillas

Preparation

Boil chicken breasts, thighs, or a whole chicken (however much you want) with salt, pepper, and a bay leaf until fully cooked. Remove from liquid, cool, and shred. Place the chicken in a large bowl. Add all but 1 cup of the cheese to the bowl, reserving for the top. Add onion, green chiles, half to 3/4 of the container of sour cream, and salt and pepper. Mix together until it forms a filling. Roll (or layer) corn tortillas filled with filling, softened in oil. If you have extra filling, spread it thinly over the top. Cover with tin foil and bake for 45 minutes at 350. Take the foil off, top with the reserved cheese, and bake for another 15 minutes or so until the cheese bubbles.

Can substitute 3/4-1 lb. of frozen baby cocktail shrimp for the chicken, if you want.

Ingredients

• 2 envelopes (4 1/2 tsp.) active dry yeast
• 1/2 c. very warm water
• 1/3 c. sugar
• 3/4 c. cold milk
• 2 eggs
• 4 1/4 c. sifted all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 lb. (4 sticks) butter
• flour

Preparation

1. Sprinkle yeast into very warm water in a 1-cup measure. (Very warm water should feel comfortably warm when dropped on wrist.) Stir in 1/2 teaspoon of the sugar. Stir until yeast dissolves. Let stand until bubbly and double in volume, about 10 minutes.

2. Combine remaining sugar, milk, eggs, 3 cups of the flour, salt and yeast mixture in large bowl. Beat, with electric mixer at medium speed, for 3 minutes (or beat 300 vigorous strokes by hand). Beat in remaining flour with a wooden spoon until dough is shiny and elastic. Dough will be soft. Scrape down sides of bowl. Cover with plastic wrap. Refrigerate dough 3o minutes.

3. Place the sticks of butter 1 inch apart, between 2 sheets of waxed paper; roll out to a 12-inch square. Chill on a cooky sheet until ready to use.

4. Sprinkle working surface heavily with flour, about 1/3 cup; turn dough out onto flour; sprinkle flour on top of dough. Roll out to an 18x12-inch rectangle. Brush off the excess flour with a soft pastry brush.

5. Peel off top sheet of waxed paper from butter; place butter paper-side up, on one end of dough to cover two-thirds of dough; peel off the remaining sheet of waxed paper. For easy folding, carefully score butter lengthwise down center. without cutting into dough. Fold uncovered third of dough over middle third of dough and butter; brush off excess flour; then fold remaining third of dough and butter over middle third to enclose butter completely. Turn the dough clockwise so open side is away from you.

6. Roll out to 24x12-inch rectangle using enough flour to keep the dough from sticking. Fold ends in to meet in center; then fold in half to make 4 layers. Turn again so open side is away from you. Repeat rolling and folding 2 more times. Keep the dough to a perfect rectangle by rolling straight up and down and from side to side. (When it is necessary, chill the dough between rollings. Clean off the working surface each time and dust lightly with flour.)

7. Refrigerate dough 1 hour or longer (or even overnight, if you wish, to relax dough and firm up the butter layers). When you are ready to fill and bake the pastry, cut dough in half and work with only half the recipe at a time. Keep the other half refrigerated until ready to use. Makes 2 large pastries, or about 24 individual pastries, or 1 large pastry and 12 individual pastries.

Tips

1. It is important to keep butter enclosed in dough. If it oozes out, immediately sprinkle with flour. If dough becomes too sticky to handle, butter has probably softened. Just chill 30 minutes before continuing rolling and folding.

2. Use more flour than you normally would to roll out pastries; brush off excess with soft brush before folding or filling; this way flour will not build up in pastry.

3. Since dough is very rich, it is best to let pastries rise at room temperature. Do not try to hasten the rising by using heat; doing so would melt the butter and spoil the texture of the pastry.

4. Have ready a rolling pin, a soft pastry brush, ruler and a working surface large enough to roll dough to 30 inches.

For freezing: Place shaped Danish on cooky sheets. Don’t glaze or decorate until ready to bake. Cover with foil or plastic wrap, freeze. Use within 4 weeks.

To bake: Remove the Danish from the freezer the night before and place in refrigerator. Next morning, let rise at room temperature, away from draft, until double in volume, about 1 1/2 hours. Brush with egg; sprinkle with topping; bake following individual recipes.

For refrigerating: Place the shaped Danish on cooky sheets; cover; refrigerate. Bake within 48 hours. To bake: Remove Danish from refrigerator; let rise; bake as above.

Family Circle Cookbook

Ingredients

• 2 lb pork, cut in 1-inch cubes
• 2 tbsp. butter
• 1 lg. onion, chopped (1 cup)
• 1 tbsp. paprika
• 2 c. chicken broth
• 1 c. water
• 1 tsp. caraway seeds
• 2 tsp. salt
• dash pepper
• 1 can (1 lb., 11 fl. oz.) sauerkraut
• 2 tbsp. flour
• 1/4 c. water
• 1 carton (8 oz.) sour cream
• parsley

Preparation

1. Brown pork, part at a time (removing pieces to a bowl as a brown), in butter in a heavy kettle or Dutch oven. Sauté oven until golden, about 5 minutes, in same pan, adding more butter if needed. Stir in paprika; cook 1 minute longer. Return all meat.

2. Stir in chicken broth, the 1 cup of water, caraway seeds, salt and pepper. Bring to boiling; lower the heat and cover. Simmer for 1 hour and 15 minutes.

3. Drain and rinse sauerkraut; stir into the stew. Simmer 30 minutes longer, or until meat is tender.

4. Blend flour and the 1/4 cup water in a small cup; stir into simmering stew. Cook and stir until the gravy thickens and bubbles 3 minutes.

5. Lower heat; stir 1 cup hot sauce into sour cream in a small bowl until well blended; stir back into the kettle. Heat just until heated through. Do not boil. Sprinkle with parsley. Makes 6 servings.

Family Circle Cookbook

Ingredients

• 1 box okra
• 1 onion, sliced
• 1 lg. can tomatoes or 1-2 lg. fresh tomatoes
• dried basil or oregano (optional)

Preparation

Cut the stem tips off the okra (but don’t cut off the top of the pod)

Saute sliced onion in olive oil or butter until translucent.

Add chopped fresh or canned tomatoes.

Add okra, salt and pepper.

Add enough water to keep it from sticking.

Simmer until it looks like it’s supposed to. (Taste before done and if the tomatoes are too tart, add a pinch of sugar.)

If you want, you can and an herb of your choice. Oregano is good. Basil, too.