Gramma Sartor Santas

Last year at Christmas, our friend Linda gave us a plate of these adorable Santa cookies. The kids (well, really all of us) loved them. So this morning, I got everything ready to make some. To do the Santa faces, frost the entire cookie with white frosting, then cover the bottom half of the cookie with flaked coconut. Sprinkle a crescent of red sugar on the top of the cookie for his hat, with a mini marshmallow for the ball at the tip of the hat. We used red M&M's cut in half for the noses (red hots are the "traditional" nose though, but M&M's was what I had), and chocolate chips for eyes. I think Madeline's turned out pretty cute too (with "rosy chocolate cheeks", and "little red feets" at the bottom of his beard.) Erik, and our friend Ben, did the boy-thing of pouring as many topping on their cookies as possible, and sampling the rest.
For the sugar cookie, I decided to use my Great Gramma Sartor's Sour Cream Sugar Cookie recipe. It's wonderful and pretty easy (and a slice and bake recipe, giving us good rounds for the faces).
I'm not even typing the recipe in — just click on it to make it bigger! I love to see her hand writing, and it's even in red... how fun for the holidays.

A Little Something Sweet

Now that our scanner is working again, I can get more old pics saved. Here's a photo of my Lil' Grammy from 1940, to go with a cookie recipe from her collection. I love how her recipes are concise and presume you know what you're doing in the kitchen.

Brown Sugar Cookies

1 cup shortening
2 cups brown sugar (light brown is best)
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp soda
1 tsp b. powder
2 1/4 cups flour
1/2 cup walnuts (optional)

Mix. Make into rolls. Chill in fridge. Slice & bake 350 about 10 mins (split baking time between lower and upper racks.)

Happy Birthday Grammy!

Today was my Lil' Grammy's birthday—I know I've posted this pic before, but it's one of my favorites, and she was (and continues to be) one of my favorite people ever. She did things from teaching me cool words like "davenport" to how to really have fun. She also did crazy things like driving herself to the hospital while in labor (but she had to since no one else was handy-Grampa was working). She's dearly missed, but Madeline's definitely got her spunk, and will learn lots of cool things about her as she grows up. Here is her excellent recipe for fudge. Mmmmm...

Grammy's Fudge

3 c. sugar
3 T. cocoa
1 t. salt
1 c. whole milk
1 T. butter
1 t. vanilla

Mix dry ingredients well, dry mashing out lumps. Add 1 c. whole milk and boil, but don't stir, until it forms soft ball in cold water. Remove from heat. Add 1 T. butter and 1 t. vanilla. Cool just until you can stick your finger into it. Stir until it loses its gloss. Spoon on a buttered plate and spread fast with a knife.

Genetic

So, maybe my propensity for "cooking by feel" is genetic. My mom is constantly altering recipes, making them amazingly better, and then having to recall what she changed. And I catch myself doing the same thing all the time. Sometimes because I don't have the "proper" ingredients for a recipe (or more likely, just can't find them in my pantry) and sometimes just because I feel like it. There's a scone recipe in The Cast Iron Skillet Cookbook that I have never made exactly according to the recipe... and they're always great. Anyway, Great Gramma Sartor's "recipe" for corn bread reminded me of this particular trait I share with mom...

Corn Bread

Dehlia Sartor

I don't have a regular recipe for cornbread just do it from scratch. This is what I do. Beat 1 egg, add tsp salt & 1 cup milk then sift 1 1/2 cups cornmeal and 1/4 cup white flour and mix all together. I melt about 1/2 cup margarine and bacon fryings in the pan I take it in and pour that in your cornbread mixture. Mix well & bake between 1/2 & 3/4 hr. in a 350 oven. Wish you were close so I could show you don't know if I make it plain in writing. Good Luck. Mom

Dressing Up

This week I have a recipe from one of the Sartor womens' men—my grampa, Arthur Freed. The story he told was that he got this recipe from a drunk guy in the lounge of the Benjamin Franklin Hotel in Seattle (built in 1928, became the Westin in 1948 and was demolished in 1992). Grampa used to make it and keep it in a corked Old Grandad bottle in the fridge. He liked it so well, he figured that he could've sold it to Nalley's...

Art's Salad Dressing

1/2 c. oil
1/2 c. ketchup
1/4 c. vinegar
1 t. salt
1/4 t. pepper
1/2 t. dry mustard powder
1 t. grated onion
1 clove crushed garlic

Mix it all up and dress up your favorite green salad!

Images— L: Vintage postcard from the Benjamin Franklin HotelR: Arthur & Doris Freed on their wedding day, July 13, 1940

Grammy's Red Devil's Food

This was the standard birthday cake for the Freed kids (there were five)—so a recipe that Grammy baked often—always frosted with Seven-Minute Frosting. My mom says

Red Devil's Food Cake

1/2 c shortening or margarine
2 c sugar
2 eggs
1 c sour milk or buttermilk
1 heaping t. baking soda dissolved in 2 T. hot water
2/3 c cocoa powder in 1/2 c boiling water
2 1/3 c flour
1/2 t baking powder
1 t vanilla
dash salt

Mix in the order given. Grammy notes that this is actually one of her mom's recipes. Bake at 350-degrees F until done.

Seven-Minute Frosting (a great one from Good Housekeeping, since I don't have her recipe)

1 egg white

3/4 c sugar

1/4 c water

1 1/2 t. light corn syrup

pinch salt

1/2 t. vanilla

Beat everything but vanilla in medium stainless steel bowl on low speed to blend. Place bowl over medium saucepan with 1-inch simmering water (don't let bowl touch water). Beat mixture on high speed for 7-minutes or until mixture stands in soft peaks and temp reaches 160-degrees F on candy thermometer.

Remove bowl from pan and beat mixture 3-5 mins longer or until cooled slightly and stiff, glossy peaks form. Beat in vanilla until blended.

From The Sartor Women...

So, this weekend Erika told me that I "...make baking look so easy," because we had two pies in the oven before the guys knew what happened. My Mom says that people used to say about my Great Gramma Sartor—"She can make a pie while other people are just talking about it." She made amazing pies, and took joy in baking although I'm betting that two of her greatest joys are the girls in these photos—her daughters: Alma and Doris (or Dode). They were both accomplished bakers as well.

Doris was the younger of the two and was my grammy. Just thinking about her makes me smile. She was an amazing woman who raised four boys and one girl (my mom)... and perhaps her biggest challenge—my Grampa (who was quite a handful in his earlier years...). I could go on for quite awhile about all the Sartor women, but this post is to introduce a couple of their recipes. Each week I'll post another (Alma's divinity, Grammy's red devil's food cake with 7-minute frosting, etc.)

This week, we'll begin at the beginning with "Mom" Sartor's pie...

Mom Sartor's Banana Cream Pie

1/3 c flour
2/3 c sugar
1/4 t. salt
2 c milk
3 slightly beaten egg yolks
2 T. butter
1/2 t. vanilla

Whisk in saucepan and cook until thickened.

Top custard with meringue. For meringue whip to stiff peaks:
3 egg whites
6 T. sugar

Bake your pie shell, slice 2 bananas into the bottom, top with cooked custard, then meringue and brown in oven.

And, the much coveted recipe for her pie crust...fairly straightforward, but she baked with love which always adds a little something.

Dehlia Sartor's Pie Dough

Again I do it from scratch. For 1 pie

1 cup flour
3/4 cup Crisco or shortening whatever you have I like Crisco best.
1 tsp salt and just enough cold water to make it stick together. Mix shortening & flour & salt together first then add water and roll out.