Episode AH9624: Well, hello, welcome to “At Home” today. We’re so glad you could be with us. Home just feels better when you’re here. You know when someone’s not there and you miss ’em? The way I feel when you don’t show up. You haven’t been here a couple weeks and I don’t get your letter saying, “Hey, give me some of the recipes,” I feel bad. You say, “Arlene, you have no idea if I’m watching or not.” Yes, I do. Because I know from what you tell me when I see you in the stores or at a flea market or someplace, football game or whatever, you tell me when you watch, and I know that we have a lot of people who I feel like are part of our family. And it’s you that I’m talking about today because today’s program, we’re doing all dishes that you have sent the recipes to us. These are called viewer recipes and I’ve never tried them before. We’re trying them for the first time today because I try to put myself in the same position that you are when you get the recipes that I do and you’ve never tried them before. So we’re gonna get started with viewer recipes right after our hint. So stay tuned, and you’re gonna be amazed. These are some pretty good recipes from some great cooks that watch “At Home.” We’ll be right back Here’s today’s “At Home” hint from Richard F., Ontario, Canada. When putting batter into muffin tins, use an ice cream scoop. No drops of batter to clean off the pan and all the muffins will be the same size. Thanks, Richard. If you’ve got a helpful hint you’d like to share, we want to hear from you. Send your hint to “At Home” Hints, CTV Wall, Pennsylvania, 15148-1499. Well, the first recipe from you viewers that we’re doing today is called tamale pie. And this is a great casserole. We have a 13×9 baking dish that we’ve covered with just the plain tortilla chips that you get at your supermarket, and you’re gonna line that dish with that. Now, I’m gonna walk you through this because to save time, we’ve already begin to cook the filling. There’s a pound and a half of ground chuck, that’s the lean ground meat, and we browned it first, drained the grease off. Then we’ve added one onion, diced, one can, I’ll show this to you here. Let me get the right angle. This is stewed tomatoes. We added that, just one can. Then I added some garlic powder, half a teaspoon of garlic powder, and then this size can of tomato sauce. This is tomato sauce and a small, very small can of the Ortega or the Old El Paso green chilies that are all diced up. Some of that went in here. Some salt and pepper. And this cooked now for 15 minutes, until all the flavors blended together. Now what we’re gonna do, let me get rid of some of this. Whoops. Okay, now what we’re gonna do is take our filling, which is this tamale part of this, turn off this gas here, and we’re just gonna pour it all over the chips, just like that. This is very quick, easy dish for your family. If your kids like Mexican or like the tortilla chips and stuff, they’re gonna love this. Now, after we’ve done that, can see that everything has cooked very well together. Now we proceed by, we have an half a pound of mozzarella cheese and half a pound of cheddar cheese that’s been grated up. And to that, we’re gonna add half a cup of Parmesan. This recipe by the way is from Sherry Sasinoski, and I appreciate you Sherry for sending that to us. Everybody’s ooh and ahing because it smells so good. We’re gonna add our cheese right on top of the meat, just like that. This seems like a lot of cheese, and I’m going by the recipe so this is what they said to do, and this is what we’re doing. But I think when you make tamales, tamales are primarily a lot of cheese. And I think that that’s what’s gonna make this a really tasty, delicious casserole. And I like to use it all. If it says to do it, then I like to put it all in there, which we have. Now what you do is a little unusual, because you wanna flatten this out a little bit, because now you take a large container of sour cream, and she says you put a dollop every here and there. I guess a dollop is a dab, or a bit, a spoonful, whatever you wanna call it. I never understood what dollop meant. I’m sure there’s an official definition for it as to the exact amount, but this is a dollop to me. It can be any size, in-between, whatever. A dollop is a dollop, right? All right, now we’re going to take a metal spoon, because I think a metal spoon will work better with this, or maybe even a knife. We’re gonna try to spread this. She says to spread it like an icing. Not real easy to do when you got all that cheese there, but let’s see what happens here. Isn’t this an adventure? Cooking is an adventure, ’cause you never know what it’s gonna turn out. When you read something, some people can visualize what it will be, others can’t, and until you get into it and really start making it, you have no idea what it’s gonna taste like, and sometimes you’re pleasantly surprised and sometimes you’re disappointed, but that’s the adventure of cooking because when you give it a try, those pleasant surprises, boy, there’s just nothing like that. There’s just nothing like that. You say, okay, now you’re done, right, Arlene? Wrong. Now we do black olives. These you have to put all across the top. These are the top of this tamale pie, and Sherry, I’ll tell you, I think this is gonna be a winner. I can just get that feeling that this is gonna be something that we’re all gonna enjoy. Particularly, the crew. They are getting to be quite selective in what they enjoy. So this goes into a preheated oven, for, let’s make sure, 325 degree oven, and we’re going to bake it for 35 minutes. 325 oven for 35 minutes. There we are. Thanks so much, Sherry. That’s just great. Now we’re going to move right along. The next one is something that I have thoroughly enjoyed reading about because Paul happens to really like macaroni and cheese. This is called- This is from Lucille Calmanere, and she says this macaroni and cheese is not only quick and easy, but it tastes great. This is too simple, I’m telling you. First of all, what you do, you’re gonna spray your baking dish with some Pam. Just the butter flavored is nice when you have something that you’re cooking or making that has butter in it. And then she takes two cups, and these are little Creamettes, these are the elbow macaronis. We put them in a bowl. Then she takes a half a cup of melted butter, she adds that. She adds a half a pound of cheese, diced. Now this happens to be Longhorn, but you can use any kind of cheese, she says in the recipe, any kind of cheese you want, and you just dice it up, and you put it in there just like that. And then you take a quart of milk, and you just pour the quart of milk over top of everything. And I’ll tell you, you’re talking about simple, here. You’re talking about easy. No white sauce, and boiling the macaronis, and doing all this. That stuff makes me crazy. It’s just, it’s too much. And by the time I get home from work, it’s just too much to go through all that procedure to get it so that you can serve it. I mean, you’re talking 8:00 or 9:00 ’til you get to eat. But this is so easy. And all this does is this bakes for one hour. She says no more and no less. One hour in the oven at 350 degrees. Tell you what? This is unbelievable. You say, you don’t have to do the macaronis? Nope. Sure don’t. There it is right there, just like that. That’s all you do. And when we get done with this, I want you to try this at home. And I’m gonna show you- Here we go, down in this oven. It’s great to have these two ovens at different temperatures, okay? That’s all there is to it. Quick and easy baked macaroni. I’ll tell you what. Now this is another one that I’m going to show you. This is not exactly a viewer, although she watches the program. She works here with us at Cornerstone Television and she gave me this idea and I think it’s great because it’s for a different kind of a sandwich. You’re tired of the meat, you’re tired of the cheeses and stuff, watch this. First of all, you take asparagus and you cook that in your microwave. You steam it. It should not be overdone. It should still be a little bit firm, okay? Not real limp. You know how to do that. You break it where it breaks, where you hold it both ends, and you snap it where it breaks. That’s where the tenderness starts to the top, okay? So you have some of that. You boil some eggs, hard boil the eggs. You have a little bit of mayonnaise here. And we’re gonna add celery seed. Now, I had on the recipe, originally I said, “Is that about 1/8 of a teaspoon?” She said, “More like 1/2 a teaspoon.” ‘Cause the celery mixed with the mayonnaise is what makes this so, so good. Now here’s what we’re doing. We’re gonna mix the mayonnaise together with the celery seed, and I’ll show you how to assemble this sandwich that is so good in a lunch because it just is so different than anything you’ve ever had. First of all, you take, it’s a soft bun. There’s no hard crust, it’s a soft bun, and you’ll take a spoonful of the mayonnaise, and you wanna kind of put it on a little bit thick. It’s what she told me. One day she gave me one of these, she said, “Arlene, would you like to taste this?” I said, “Oh, this is incredible.” Cindy Chester is her name, she’s a great girl. She’s one of our technical people here at Cornerstone. Then she takes the asparagus, just like this, and you lay them along just like that. You can pile them up. If you like a lot, put more on. Then you take a hard boiled egg and you slice it, and just lay it over the asparagus, just like that. All right. Nope, we’re not through yet. Then after that’s done, you take good paprika. And she said you tap a lot of paprika all over the sandwich. Now, I’m gonna tell you something. Don’t get turned off before you try it. Don’t say, “Ooh, I, I don’t think I’d like that.” I’m gonna tell you though, you’re gonna be pleasantly surprised. What you would do now is wrap this up, put it in the refrigerator, or you can eat it just like it is now. It’s ready to go. Great for a lunch. If you like asparagus, you like eggs together, we’ve talked about that before, this is one great sandwich. Stay tuned now because we got a whole lot more coming your way. We’ll be right back after this break. Well, here I am measuring 1/2 a cup of boiling water. I’m gonna add this to one package, the four serving size of lime Jell-O, because we’re going to be making the easiest salad in the world. Now this recipe comes from a lady who’s so precious, she writes a lot to me. Her name is Jane Guy, and she shares a lot of recipes with me. So we’re just going to mix this up until it’s very well dissolved. Meanwhile, what you have done previously, we’ve taken one can of pineapple slices and we’ve drained them very well. Well, there’s a little extra there, but we’ve drained it very, very well. You wanna get all of the moisture out of that. Leave the pineapples in the can. What you do now is you’re going to measure 1/2 a cup of this pineapple juice. Now, don’t do it according to what’s on the directions, because the directions call for a cup. We’re using half as much the liquids. So this is about another 1/2 cup. We’ve dissolved it with the boiling water. Now we’re adding the cold, just like that, all right? Now this is what I think is fascinating, because you wonder, how do people come up with these ideas? What Jane said now is you’ve got all your pineapples still in there, just like they were, and there’s 10 slices. You just pour- If I can do this without making a mess, I’ll be very happy. Just begin to pour that lime juice right in that can ’til it comes to the very top, just like that. Now what you’re gonna do with that, you’re gonna put that in the refrigerator, make it the night before you want to use it, and when it comes time to serve it, this will be gelled, of course. You take your knife and you cut it around the edge, you turn it over, and you cut the can lid, which is the bottom, you cut it out and you push it out, slice it between the pineapples, put it on a leaf lettuce, little dollop of sour cream, and you have the easiest salad in the world. Jane, I think it’s a great idea and I appreciate you sending it to me. Thank you so much. We have one we’re gonna show you at the end of the program. Now, this next one comes from a lady and her husband, who, very, very special people, and her name is Joanie. She and her husband have volunteered here at Cornerstone Television many times to help us get our mailings out, or the cookbooks, or whatever we really need her to do. She’s always very willing, and we appreciate volunteers so much. And she brought this one time. She said, “Arlene, I want you to taste this,” because what this one is is really different in that we’re using noodles, but this is a dessert. This is called Aunt Sally’s noodle strudel. All right. I understand, you think it’s funny. I thought it was a little strange myself. But Aunt Sally apparently was a beloved relative of Joanie’s, and she just passed away not too long ago. So what we’re gonna do is make this in honor of Aunt Sally. And I want you to listen, because it’s really easy to do. Lot of cheese and stuff, and you’re gonna be wondering, but it’s gonna be all right. First of all, we take two pounds of cottage cheese, okay. This is 24, it’s a pound and a half like this, so two pounds. You need this, plus half of another one. Just like that. Here it is. I knew because we had one before. And you put this in a big bowl. Now, I don’t know, but I think you could probably use low fat or at least less fat cottage cheese. I wouldn’t go the no fat because I think you’d probably lose some flavor, and I think probably Aunt Sally wouldn’t appreciate that. But then we take, let’s do three eggs that we’re gonna beat them. One. And beating up the eggs, you say, well, why do you have to beat them up? Well, you do because you wanna incorporate the whites and the yellows together. And if you don’t do it, then you might have some yolk one place and some whites another place, but if you mix them all up together, just like this- Then you’re sure that that egg will be evenly distributed. And you just put that right in there with the cottage cheese, okay? Next we have a cup of sour cream. This is a two cup size, so we’re just gonna take the other half that we didn’t use before. One cup of sour cream. And again, you could probably use a lower fat or a reduced fat sour cream, that would be all right. I’d give it a try anyway, because what do you have to lose? Maybe you’ll come on something that really is gonna taste good and it might be much lower in fat. All right, now we add two cups of golden raisins. And just make sure that they all break up as you’re adding them in. If you don’t have quite two cups in a box, add a few dark ones, doesn’t matter, I don’t think. I don’t think it would change it too much, but I think it will be all right. And let’s see, one cup of sugar, which is this. Now what we do is we mix all of this together. This is the cheese, and the raisins, and the sour cream, and the sugar. And you wanna blend that, and the eggs, blend that very, very well, just like that. Mix it all together. Make sure that it’s mixed well. You shouldn’t see any of the egg, the yellow there. You don’t want that to be showing. All right, so you mix it around, mix it around. This is the creamed cottage cheese, too. Don’t buy the dry, buy the creamed. Now, this is 1/2 pound, eight ounces, of the wide, like, a soup noodle or a stroganoff noodle that we’ve cooked, and they’re cold. And we’re just gonna add all of them to Aunt Sally’s noodle strudel. Unusual to see a pasta in a dessert, isn’t it? I think it’s fascinating. All right, now we’re gonna mix together, just like this, mix it all together. Make sure all the noodles are covered. Cover them very, very well. And you want to be sure you have a 13×9 baking dish. And I would use a dish rather than a pan, if you know what I mean. I think if you wanted, probably, you could add maybe some nuts to this if you wanted to, but I think it would take away from the taste of the raisins. I think that’s what you really taste. And you want to be sure to spray, of course, your baking dish with some Pam. All right. Now this will bake at 350 preheated oven, and it will bake for one hour. Just like this. Gonna pour that in there. Now, you say, I don’t know, Arlene, Aunt Sally probably liked it, but I don’t know. I’m telling you- You’re gonna like this, and you’re gonna try it. And don’t make snap judgements just because of the way things look. Have you ever experienced meeting someone and instantly you thought, huh, boy, I don’t like that guy, or boy, I don’t think I’d ever like that person, and then you had an opportunity to get to know them and you found out that really and truly, they were very nice people, that your first impression was not a good impression? So be more tolerant. Be that way about people that you meet. Also be that way about about the things that you eat, too. Now what we do now- We’re going to sprinkle, I have some graham cracker crumbs. These get sprinkled all over the top, just like that. Remember, this bakes for one hour in a 350 degree preheated oven. Make sure you use ’em all, because if you don’t, some of that pasta that’s in there, those noodles will get real dark, and we don’t want that to happen. There it is, Aunt Sally’s noodle strudel. We’re gonna put this in the oven, and while we do, we want to tell you how you can get today’s recipes. Here’s that information. Stay with us now. We’ll be right back.
[Announcer] To receive the recipes presented on today’s program, plus many more great recipe ideas, send your best donation and a stamped, self-addressed, business-sized envelope to “AT Home” CTV, Wall, Pennsylvania, 15148-1499. You’ll receive Arlene’s heartwarming newsletter, “Enjoy!,” featuring an entire month of “At Home” recipes, including today’s mouthwatering dishes. Be sure to include the “Enjoy!” issue number with your request.
Don’t forget, self-addressed, stamped, business-sized envelope. That’s really, really important to us. Well, today, these are the viewer recipes that you’ve sent, some of them anyway, and we’ve prepared. Here in the front, we have our tamale pie. Doesn’t that look great? You bake that 35 minutes, and then you need to let it sit for about 15 so that it just cools enough that it kinda coagulates and you can cut it in squares and serve it in a square. Really important that you let that set. Keep that in mind when you’re timing. Next to it is our baked macaroni and cheese. Doesn’t that look great? I’ll tell you what, that’s the easiest ’cause you don’t cook the macaroni first. Really important. Next to it is Aunt Sally’s noodle strudel. Down there, I’ve cut a piece out so you can see the texture of it. It’s kind of like a cheese custard in-between all those noodles with some raisins here and there, and that graham cracker on the top really adds to the flavor. Don’t not put the graham cracker on. You have to do the graham cracker, because that really sets off all of the flavors there. And then we have Cindy Chester’s asparagus hard-boiled egg sandwiches. Don’t they look good? Tell you what, these pack really, really well, really for lunch, or if you’re gonna take a car trip somewhere and you have a nice little cooler, you can make up some of those sandwiches. They cut nicely, the asparagus stays nice, and the egg, of course, and then that you have to put that celery seed. Lots of celery seed. You say, Arlene, seem like that’s all I’m gonna taste, but you will not believe how that perks up the flavor of the asparagus and the egg. And all of these of course then need a salad. And this is the salad, and we’ve just added a little bit of sour cream on top and a little cherry, but two slices on a little bed of lettuce, how easy this is to do and how delicious it is. This is our salad. And I think you’re really gonna enjoy it. It’s real different and really refreshing. For the holidays, you maybe wanna use cherry Jell-O or some other flavor. I think you’d really like it. Well, we always like it when you come by, and we like it when you send us your recipes. And true, we don’t get to try all of them, but keep watching, because you’ll just never know when maybe your recipe that you send to “At Home” ends up on one of the programs. I wanna thank all of our contributors today. Thank you so much for sending your recipes, and I know a lot of our other viewers are going to be enjoying the fact that you sent it to us and we presented it here on the program. We love you, we care about you, and we’re glad that you’re part of our family. So be sure to join us the next time, because it just wouldn’t be the same without you here “At Home.” We’ll see you.
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