Introduction
Despite some misgivings Mrs. Dixon accept a dinner
invitation from Bettina—and, once there, the domestic newbie can’t help but ply
her hostess with questions.
But Teacher Bettina is of course happy to tell all.
Between mouthfuls she gives a detailed lesson on the best way to cook cabbage,
bake potatoes—and, most important, a lesson in feminine reticence.
Always an apt pupil Mrs. Dixon takes the hint and
surrenders the conversation—“Now I won’t monopolize the conversation and
longer,” she tells Bob and Mr. Dixon. “You now may discuss business or anything
you choose!”
Part 1
The
Menu
Hamburger
Steak
Lemon
Butter
Baked
Potatoes
Escalloped
Cabbage
Pear
Salad
Bread
Butter
Prune
Soufflé
Preparing the Meal
Hamburger
Steak
A hamburger by any other name…
It’s rather hard for me to get excited about a pound
of ground beef (unless it’s shaped into patties and slipped between two buns)
but I appreciate Bettina’s efforts to gussy up this rather boring foodstuff.
The recipe calls for “1 lb of beef cut from the
round”, but I’ve been wanting to used up a half package of hamburger that’s
been languishing in my freezer for a couple of weeks. Whether it’s been “cut
from the round” (the head, the hooves, the tail) I have no way of knowing, but
it does need to be used up quickly.
(Obviously
cut from the lesser parts of the cow—doesn’t look too appetizing). But Bettina’s
“hamburger steak” certainly is simple—just ground meat and seasonings
It’s
going to be impossible for me to broil these as the oven’s maw is full of prune
soufflé—no choice but to fry these “steaks”
Lemon
Butter
Now this item seems a bit odd to me. I can see dabbing
steak with butter to keep it moist, but hamburger? Given the amount of fat
ground beef generally contains I don’t think the meat drying out will really be
a problem. But, as always, Bettina’s wish is my command.
Baked
Potato
Kind of a plain dish, but I’m intrigued by Bettina’s
technique for making baked potatoes “good and mealy”. Who doesn’t know baking
potatoes need to first be speared with a fork in order to let out the moisture?
But apparently there’s a better way…run “the point of the knife around the
outside of the potato. This cutting of the skin allows it to swell a little and
prevents it from bursting.”
Well, we’ll see. Maybe it this fails and the potatoes
explode I can summon up the spirit of Bettina to clean out my oven!
Had
a little trouble finding three potatoes in the sack that were more or less the
same size…
Here
I’ve run the tip of a paring knife around the spud.
And then just shovel them into the oven for “forty to
sixty minutes”. What could be simpler?
Escalloped
Cabbage
Cabbage is hardly one of my favorite dishes. Maybe having
white sauce dribbled on top will improve the taste.
Half
a cabbage chopped fine.
The
cabbage needs to boil in a large amount of water…hope this pot is big enough…
Now I'm to boil it for about twenty minutes. Oui,
mon capitain.
White
sauce
How many times have I made this? I certainly don’t
need to look at the recipe anymore!
Melt
the butter.
Add
flour and salt.
And
some milk.
Voila!
White
sauce a la Bettina!
Cabbage,
white sauce, and paprika. Charming.
Dumped
in a greased pan, with crumbs sprinkled on top. And now to bake until brown
(right next to the not-as-yet exploded potatoes).
Pear
Salad
What could be simpler than a salad made of pears?
Nothing…unless, like here, it requires homemade salad dressing.
Bettina’s books list a lot of different dressings, and
I was careful to choose one of the easier ones. Taste of course in a separate
but equally pressing issue. My family dislikes the tang of vinegar, and most of
these dressing recipes call for quite a lot. Bettina’s “Old Fashioned Sour
Cream Dressing” seemed like the least objectionable of the lot with only 1/3
cup of vinegar.
Beating
the sour cream.
Adding
egg yolk.
The
dry ingredients.
Whisking
everything together.
And onto the stove top.
This stuff came together in less than two
minutes—fast!
Cottage
cheese, chopped pimento, green pepper, and lemon juice to be mixed together and then
stuffed in the hollows of the pears (the dressing is to be spooned on top).
And now for the pears…
Umm…not
very appealing-looking. Maybe I should have used canned.
Definitely
look better once they’re peeled. Maybe these will work after all.
Major
excavation underway.
Now all I have to do is stuff these babies. Move over,
Julia Child!
Bread
and Butter
This is a sort of drab menu (hamburger, cabbage,
prunes), so I decided to splurge on some really good bread and butter.
From
a local bakery. For the price this had better be good!
Special
butter…imported from France (supposedly).
Prune
Soufflé
A superficially basic dish that actually took a lot of
pre-planning…the prunes had to be soaked in warm water for three hours (good
thing I checked the recipe before beforehand).
Hate
to say it but…ugh.
“Remove
the stones from the prunes”… at the time it seemed like a stroke of luck that
these prunes came pre-stoned, but later I’d regret it (see Part 2).
After
adding sugar the prunes are to be cooked until soft—according to the recipe a
mere three minutes.
Then
cool and add lemon extract.
Folding
in stiffly beaten egg whites.
Then
dump into a buttered tin, place the tin in a larger container of boiling water,
and put in the oven.
Didn’t
expect this. The pudding-filled tin actually floated in the water bath. I
needed something to weigh it down.
After
twenty-five minutes the pudding is supposed to be “well raised, firm, and light
brown in color”. The reality: not even close.
After
an hour I gave up and pulled the “pudding” from the oven. It seemed solid
enough…
Oops.
I
had no choice but to dump it into a pan and put it back in the oven sans water bath. This so-called soufflé
isn’t behaving at all.
Now for the custard sauce…
Beating
the egg yolk.
Adding
sugar, flour, and salt.
“Slowly
add the milk”
Now
the stuff is to cook until it’s thick enough to “coat a silver [plated] spoon”.
Done.
No complications, thank heavens.
How It Looked
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