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My friend refers to those times in life where things just don’t go as planned as “plot twists”. Life just takes an upper hand and in my experience, it’s usually for the best. Being flexible and able to turn on a dime is the way to handle these uncomfortable moments with grace. Go with the flow.

I was looking forward to making ice cream in two flavors, Oreo and peppermint candy. The machine we have is the old-fashioned kind that uses electricity, salt and ice and it sits outside on the back porch. When the ice cream has frozen, the machine automatically turns off.

I opened the freezer only to see that the bag of ice that I needed was half gone. Well ok. Maybe I can use ice cubes from the trays to supplement. After I poured the creamy mixture into the metal insert and packed ice and salt around it, I could not for the life of me get the lid to fit in place. When I finally did get the lid to shut, the machine made a growling noise because the mixing blade inside was stuck. I fiddled with it and finally the blade started to turn. The machine usually takes about twenty minutes to finish, so I left. When I returned, the machine was still vigorously running. What’s wrong!!? It should be done by now. The ice had melted so the mixture was not frozen. To the store I go to get a bag of ice and when I got back, I started over.

Twenty minutes later I return to the porch. The machine sounded like it was in labor; it’s stuck again. I lifted the lid in order to properly diagnose the problem and saw that an inch and a half of ice cream had frozen hard like ice on the sides but the middle was still liquid. By now I wonder why I did not just buy &*# $%@ ice cream while I was at the store?

I pondered. What are my options? Make it into eggnog or vanilla custard? Hmmm. I chiseled the mixture off the sides, let it thaw and put it into Pyrex dishes then into the freezer for the night. The next morning, I pulled the containers out only to see that they were solid like a block of ice.  Now what? I let it soften for about twenty minutes and the consistency was beyond perfect. Rich and creamy and packed with little tiny crunchy ice crystals, it felt like I was eating sparkles!

How wonderful to discover that I did not need an ice cream maker to make fabulous ice cream. What a happy accident.

A few years ago, I had dinner with my friend Jenny. She is a vegetarian and is also a fabulous cook. She can even make tofu taste good! Whenever I go to visit, I usually come away with a wonderful recipe or two.

That evening, she made a simple black bean and brown rice dish, topped with roasted vegetables, sharp cheddar cheese and a splash of salsa. The first bite produced an OMG! moment, the kind that could jolt you off your chair if you weren’t sitting squarely. The flavor exploded over my entire mouth, including under my tongue. The taste lingered with a rich savory flavor and even sent a shiver down my spine.  What was in this, I asked? I absolutely had to know. After all, wasn’t I just eating beans and rice, which of course can be delicious, but tend to be ho-hum?

Jenny went to her recipe box and pulled out the recipe for her magical sauce. It’s packed with ingredients that have the umami flavor. Umami is the fifth flavor – the others are salt, sweet, bitter and sour. In 2002, scientists discovered umami receptors on the tongue so then it became a recognized flavor. But the Japanese have known about umami for over 200 years. Umami adds the savory flavor; some call it the essence of deliciousness. The flavor is very intense and food goes from ordinary to extraordinary when the umami flavor is present.

This sauce takes only a few minutes to prepare and it keeps in the fridge for a couple of months. I store it in a recycled bourbon bottle. Bottles that once contained liquor are often quite beautiful and have tops that provide a good seal. I’ve always preferred glass over plastic for storing food.

Jenny’s Sauce

½ cup nutritional yeast flakes
⅓ cup tamari
⅓ cup soy sauce
⅓ cup apple cider vinegar
2 tbsp tahini (sesame seed butter)
2 cloves garlic
1½ cups vegetable oil
⅓ cup water or more if it’s too thick

Put the first six ingredients in a blender. Blend until the garlic is pulverized. Add the oil, blend again. Pour into a bottle. That’s it!

I like to use grapeseed oil. The flavor is clean and neutral and is healthier than soy, canola, or corn oils.  Both grapeseed oil and nutritional yeast are available at Three Boys in Condon.

Having a bottle of Jenny’s Sauce always on hand is like having an insurance policy in the fridge. You can always whip up something tasty to eat even if you are short of time or your fridge is somewhat empty. Jenny’s Sauce is good on pasta, rice, beans and vegetables. Add some cheese for a mouthwatering dinner, pronto.

A while back, I was rummaging around in the pantry and saw sleeping in a dusty corner a long-forgotten ice cream maker, the old-fashioned kind made out of wood but with an electric motor instead of a crank handle. I perched it atop a small table, plugged it in and heard a very robust and determined sound, as if the machine was coming out of its long slumber wide awake without the preamble of yawning.

Every time I went into the pantry I’d see it sitting there and it seemed to say “Hello, it’s me!” and then I wondered, is this machine really an adult toy disguised as an appliance? Is making ice cream easy, or one of those trial and error thangs that takes a few tries to get it right along with a dose or two of frustration? And then back into the pantry the machine would go to be forgotten all over again?

The perfect excuse to overcome my inertia about using it came in the form of a birthday party and I wanted to do a trial run just in case something went awry. I chose a recipe for vanilla ice cream, thinking I could add peppermint candy to one batch and cookies to another. I wanted to use the best ingredients available, so I bought some organic cream, milk, and eggs of the kind made by chickens that live outside and scratch around for bugs, slugs and grubs and the other morsels that chickens like to eat. The yolks were a rich orange color.

Making the ice cream was easy, much like cooking a cream sauce with a lot of vanilla added at the end. After it cooled, I poured the mixture into the insert, packed the bucket with ice layered with salt and turned the machine on. While waiting, I ground up a whole box of candy canes leftover from Christmas and pulverized some Oreo cookies (did you know that every year 40 billion Oreo cookies are made in 18 countries?)

Twenty minutes later, the machine stopped and I lifted the lid. Wow, velvety soft ice cream like Dairy Queen’s, but a beautiful pale yellow! I had a lovely chill of goosebumps, feeling excitement like a little kid. I divided it in half, stirred in the candy canes and then the cookies, and left it to cure in the freezer overnight.

Who said you can’t eat ice cream for breakfast, especially if it’s beyond delicious? We even ate some before dinner. If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun (Katherine Hepburn). Back into the pantry went the machine. I thanked it and said see you next time and that will be soon.

A few years ago, I bought a brand new Cuisine Art bread maker at Goodwill. I brought it home, used it a few times, but never got into the habit of using it. Then one day, I gave it to my friend Sunny. She was thrilled.

When I went to visit her, I’d often smell the aroma of freshly baked bread as I approached the house and I would want to run in. We’d do a ritual – slice off a piece, toast it, smear it with butter and enjoy one of those “just right” times where the conversation stops in order to savor the moment in silence. Sunny got really creative with her bread recipes. She made bread with spices, dried fruits and nuts, herbs and aged cheeses, seeds and sourdough. Sometimes I felt a twang of regret for having given it away thinking that’s mine! Then in the next breath I was happy she was the one who had it and not me.

One day, I was back at Goodwill and on a bottom shelf was a brand new Hitachi bread maker. So I bought it and there again it sat mostly unused. Recently, Sunny came to visit for a weekend and I seized the opportunity to have her show me how to use the machine her way with simplicity and ease. She uses this basic recipe:

E-Z Bread

3 cups flour
1 cup warm water
1 tbsp sweetener
3 tbsp oil or butter
1 tablespoon yeast
1 tsp salt

She encouraged me to switch the recipe up a bit, to try different kinds of flours, sweeteners and oils because bread making is not an exact science. Don’t be afraid, the bread maker does not bite. What is the worst thing that could happen? The bread might turn out like a dog biscuit? Well then, happy dog. I began to think of the bread machine as an adult toy – something that I could play with, be entertained by and experiment with. Oh what joy!

I bought several different brands and types of flour: King Arthur, Bob’s Red Mill, Navajo Pride, Stafford County Mills, Gold Medal. All-purpose, bread, whole wheat, rye, artisan bread flour, unbleached white. I used different sweeteners too – honey, raw sugar and date syrup. I mixed and matched the flours, acquired a sourdough starter. I’d shake the loaf out of the pan in anticipation of the first slice. How is the texture? Light or spongy? Chewy and dense, is the crust crunchy?

I put all the ingredients in one location so in four minutes I can put the ingredients together. Now I’m definitely in the habit of bread making.

One time when I was house-sitting, my friend gave me permission to look in the kitchen cupboards and help myself to the food there. So I did that. A clear, crispy cellophane bag of dried garbanzo beans with a pretty label that said “Rancho Gordo, Napa, California,” caught my eye. They were larger and a deeper color than the garbanzo beans I usually bought at the grocery store.

I pressure cooked them for twenty-two minutes in my Instant Pot and to my surprise, they had a much richer flavor and a firmer texture than the store bought garbanzo beans. I then made my all-time favorite hummus recipe named “Easy Hummus – Better than Store Bought”, created by Inspired Cooking; you can look it up on the internet. It was more flavorful than ever before. Then I had one of those “ah-ha” moments where life was just . . . good. I felt like a prospector who had just found gold. I felt excited, joyful and nourished.

Now I was curious. Who is this Rancho Gordo? I darted to their website and learned they specialize in growing heirloom beans. I read the description: “Heirloom beans tend to have a lower yield and can be much more difficult to grow but the payoff is in the unique flavors that you won’t find with bland commodity beans.” Ah-ha! That’s it! Even a humble garbanzo bean can explode with flavor. This made me starkly aware about how much of food’s essence has been sacrificed in the name of large scale farming. Over the years, I have heard folks who are in their 80’s or 90’s express in dismay how bland the food is nowadays as compared to what they remembered when they were younger.

I moseyed around on the website and viewed the colorful pictures and vivid descriptions with delight. Most of the beans I had never seen in a grocery store, like King City Pink, Santa Maria Pinquito, Eye of the Goat, Good Mother Stallard, Whipple. I was amazed, there are forty in all, some so popular there is a waiting list. A bean with a subtle chocolate and coffee flavor named Rio Zape – wow! A humble dish like refried beans could become a festive, special occasion treat when made with those. The recipe is on their website – www.ranchogordo.com. There’s also a waiting list for the “Bean of the Month Club”. Yes, you read that right and I put my name on that list. When you join, you get rare beans that are limited in production.

Even a humble staple ingredient like a garbanzo bean can go from ordinary to extraordinary in just one quick click on their website.

Recently, the world witnessed the mother of all parties – the royal fanfare of Queen Elizabeth’s platinum celebration. She has been on the throne for seventy years – such a spectacular display of pomp and circumstance! This led me to wonder which products, especially food, have received the Queen’s “Royal Warrant of Appointment” over time. This is a highly coveted award given to companies who regularly supply goods to HRM the Queen and her households. A company can then proudly display this prestigious appointment on their products with the Queen’s logo of the British Royal Coat of Arms. This award has been ongoing since the 15^th century. Here are some of the foods that have been granted the Queen’s Royal Warrant of Appointment:

Twinings of London: Of course, the Queen would grant a royal warrant to a tea company. Her favorites are English Breakfast and Earl Grey. Queen Victoria stamped her seal of approval on Twinings in 1837.

Cadbury: This company is known for their infamous chocolate Easter eggs and Dairy Milk bars. Rumor has it that they produce a unique line of dark chocolates for the royal family every Christmas. They were granted this award in 1955

Heinz: They received the HRM approval in 1951, most likely due their Lea & Perrins Worcestershire Sauce.

McIlhenny: The family-owned company makes the world famous hot pepper sauce. Tabasco arrived in the UK in 1874 and the Queen granted the honor in 2009.

Schweppes: Founded in the UK in 1792, it was granted a Royal Warrant of Appointment in 1836. They are well known for their tonic water and their lemon and lime natural mineral water.

Maldon: I wrote about this sea salt in a recent column titled “The Queen’s Salt”. The 130 year old company received the warrant in 2012, two years after the Queen visited their salt works in Essex.

Walkers: The Scottish company received the stamp of approval for their shortbread cookies in 2017. Pair them with Twinings Tea for a delicious afternoon pick-me-up.

Carrs: This manufacturer is well known for their Table Water Crackers (what the heck is table water anyway???) They are perfect with cheese because they don’t compete with the flavor. The company received the award in 1841.

Aside from food products, I was surprised to see Yardley London soap on the royal’s list because I’ve seen it at the Dollar Store. When I mentioned this to my friend Linda, she exclaimed “I wonder if the Queen knows it’s only a dollar! This just goes to show that you can live like royalty no matter how much money you have. Curious to know which other products have received the Royal Warrant? Check out www.royalwarrant.org/directory.

I’m always thinking of ways to simplify a recipe, but not change it so much that it becomes an alien to its original character. It’s usually easy to eliminate or consolidate steps and dial back the number of ingredients and still have it turn out much the same. It may take me a few tries to get it right, but that’s half the fun! I also try to minimize the number of dishes to wash. Most of the time my revised creation is as good, or almost as good, as the original version.

I usually share this fun discovery with my friend Anna. She has a four year old daughter who loves to bake with her mother. One day I had extra bananas so I was inspired to create something that Anna and her daughter could bake together. I modified a banana bread recipe by substituting unsweetened applesauce for the refined sugar and tweaking a few other things. You only use one mixing bowl, some measuring cups and spoons, a spatula or wooden spoon to mix.

Banana Bread
2½ cups all-purpose flour
1 tbsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
½ cup unsweetened applesauce
1 egg
⅓ cup melted butter or oil (I use grapeseed or rice bran oil when I can find it)
1 tbsp vanilla extract

Mash the bananas with a fork until most of the lumps have disappeared. Add the applesauce, egg, oil or butter and vanilla, mix well. Add the flour, and then sprinkle the baking soda and salt evenly over the top. Mix well and put into an oiled loaf pan or a muffin tin. The deeper the loaf pan, the longer it will take to bake. Bake at 350⁰ for 30-40 minutes until a knife inserted comes out clean.

If you use frozen bananas, they will soften when thawed and become much easier to mash. Be sure to peel them before freezing. The price of pure vanilla extract has escalated recently, but some of the imitation vanillas are surprisingly good. Vanillin – the name for imitation vanilla – while synthetic, is identical on the molecular level to real vanilla, and so tastes the same. In a recent vanilla tasting contest conducted by Cook’s Illustrated, Baker’s Imitation Vanilla Flavor won at about ⅓ the cost of real vanilla and actually has a bolder vanilla flavor.

If you have a sweet tooth like Anna’s daughter, add raisins or diced figs or prunes or even chocolate chips or chunks and nuts. Make it tasty and yummy to your liking. Taking the time to modify a recipe is FUN! Play a little, mix and match ingredients, and develop a unique to you creation. I like to call this joyful and creative approach to baking and cooking “un-recipes”!

Occasionally time gets away, and you just don’t know what to eat in such a limited amount of time. Consider creating a repertoire of recipes that you can whip up on a moment’s notice on those hectic days. I have a recipe box called “SOS Recipes” that contains recipes written on index cards (I guess I’m old fashioned). I can make a meal on the fly in less than thirty minutes, including the cleanup time. These are not gourmet meals but have a nourishing and comfort food feel. It’s okay to dial back expectations about what dinner is.

I keep a list of all the ingredients necessary to make the SOS Recipes on hand, referred to as a “Master Ingredients List”. My pantry is always filled with these items. Most of these recipes don’t have specific measurements; they are just combinations of ingredients. I call these “un-recipes”, a recipe used as a guide rather than a formula. Relying on your senses versus measuring cups and spoons saves a lot of time and is amazingly accurate.

These recipes come to your rescue whether you are home or on your way home and trying to figure out what’s for dinner.  They come in handy when unexpected events arise and you don’t have the time or energy to assemble what you already had planned for dinner. Knowing you can make a quick, warm meal will deter you from wolfing down freezer food or standing in front of the fridge eating ice cream or cheese whiz on a cracker! You can master these recipes so that preparing them becomes second nature, almost automatic because you have memorized most of them.

A favorite recipe in my “SOS Recipe Box” is Ramen Egg Drop Soup:

Ramen noodles
Sesame oil
Braggs amino acids or soy sauce
Broth powder or concentrate
Egg
Green onions

Cook the noodles, drain but save some of the water, enough to make a soup. Put it back on the stove, add the broth concentrate or powder, then a beaten egg and stir. Add in a splash of the oil, and the amino acids or soy sauce. Top with green onion (you can use them frozen as mentioned in a recent column).

These SOS home cooked meals that are simple and easy to make create a deep sense of physical well-being. It’s pure pleasure to eat well, especially when feeling hurried, jangled, or out of sorts. You can stir up something comforting to eat and immediately feel settled.

Everyone has chaotic days or weeks. Knowing you can make dinner when under stressful circumstances provides comfort. Do you have a favorite SOS recipe? If so, I’d love to share it with our readers.

A family recipe handed down for generations is truly a happy thing to treasure. These recipes are tried and true, having proven they can withstand the test of time because they are sooooo good. When I was little, I often visited my grandmother and the first thing I did was to make a beeline for the round pink glass cookie jar in the kitchen. It was always filled with sugar cookies, never any other kind, but they were sweet and crisp and topped with big crunchy sugar crystals. I have her recipe, handwritten in cursive on lined paper. The recipe has aged and yellowed but it still warms my heart and then I recall the joyful memories of my visits there. I keep a notebook of recipes handwritten by my friends and relatives and it is one of my most favorite possessions.

Another favorite recipe is from my Aunt Bee who had a quaint small restaurant with a limited menu but everything was homemade. Working there was my first job and the recipe was a secret until her death. Now I have it and I’m giving it to you! This is a one-pot meal so you don’t have to spend precious time cleaning up.

Mrs. B’s Special

1 pound ground beef
1 onion chopped
1 cup chopped celery
½ cup green pepper
1 tbsp olive oil
1 teaspoon salt
3-4 cloves garlic or heaping teaspoon garlic powder
½ tsp dry mustard
1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
¼ cup ketchup
8 oz tomato sauce
Beef bouillon

Cook the ground beef in a pot big enough to hold all the ingredients. Remove and drain the beef after it is browned. Add olive oil and sauté all the vegetables until they are soft. Add remaining ingredients including beef and simmer for 10-15 minutes, diluting with beef broth to your desired thickness. Serve over toasted hamburger buns.  Squirt some yellow mustard on the top, if you like.

I keep green peppers frozen in halves so those are always on hand, also beef bouillon concentrate. You can substitute garlic salt for the garlic and the salt. One time I was out of ketchup so I used tomato paste and brown sugar. This is one recipe you can play around with to make it your own. You can easily double the recipe. Once I made it for a gathering of 18 people and it was delicious and satisfying.

Do you have a favorite heirloom recipe? If so, consider writing it down and giving it as a present to someone. Who knows, maybe your recipe will be unforgettable and give joy and nourishment to people down the road for many generations to come. I’d love to hear about yours!

I love the constant procession of the little joyful things in life, those small sweet moments that could quietly slip by unnoticed, if you weren’t paying attention. Because they are fleeting, we can sometimes disregard them as being insignificant. But I like to remind myself that “big is just a whole bunch of little”, then I can be alert and watching for these lovely small things that make such a big contribution to life. When I was young, I remember lying awake just after having gone to bed and been aware of myself as being infinitely small and infinitely big all at the same time so I have been aware that big things are made of lots of little things.

This concept holds true in your cooking, too. Sometimes the addition of just one tiny flavor can kick your creations up a notch or even two. They can go from good to extraordinary in just one small sprinkle. I call these powerful small additions “flavor bursts”.

One such flavor burst is chopped green onions. They are so versatile and just a few can add a punch of flavor and texture to many dishes, such as baked potatoes or scrambled eggs with cheese. But how often do you keep fresh green onions in the fridge? My friend Denise recently told me that they can be chopped and frozen, so you can have them on hand. I decided to freeze some to see how well this works. I bought a few bunches of green onions, chopped them and spread them out on a small cookie sheet (to keep them from sticking in one big lump), then popped them in the freezer. Once they were frozen, I put them into an airtight freezer container. I then took out a spoonful and they maintained their color and flavor. Some of their crisp texture was lost but I made a tuna salad with dill weed and capers and the green onions were a wonderful addition to the overall flavor.

You can even freeze lemon and lime juice, heavy cream, and chicken and beef broth. Freeze these in ice cube trays and then store the cubes in airtight containers. This way, you can use just a small amount at a time. Last year, I bought a half gallon of organic cream on sale after the holidays and froze it. It lasted almost a year. I do the same thing for lemon and lime juice; I buy the whole fruits in the winter when they are inexpensive and then make the juice and freeze it.

Just as these as small moments bring so much joy to my life, these small and mighty frozen flavor bursts can add zing to your cooking as well – so delightful!!!