With years of experience as a home cook, Arlene understood that sometimes you just need a recipe that’s fast and easy to make that will feed a lot of people. This episode from 1995 is devoted to just that: dishes that she calls “Quickies!”
There’s a wide variety here, with the Italian-inspired eggplant casserole, the old-fashioned corn beef and potato hills, and a recipe from a friend known just as “Sam’s Special.” All of them are fast, easy, and sure to please!
Quick Eggplant Casserole
Don't know how to cook eggplant? Try this tasty recipe!
Ingredients
- 1 egg
- 3 Tbsp milk
- 2 medium-sized eggplants
- 1/2 cup flour
- 1 can condensed cream of mushroom soup (10.5 oz)
- 1/4 cup chopped onion
- 1/2 cup milk
- salt and pepper
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Slice eggplant; combine egg and milk in a bowl and dip slices in mixture. Coat slices with flour.
- Place oil in skillet and over medium high heat fry eggplant slices until browned and. crisp. Drain on paper and then layer in casserole dish. Sprinkle with chopped onion.
- In a bowl, combine soup and 1/2 cup milk and mix until smooth. Pour over onion and season with salt and pepper.
- Bake in preheated oven for 30 minutes. Makes 6 servings. Enjoy!
Sam’s Special
Named for a friend, this easy pasta dish pleases everyone!
Ingredients
- 2 Tbsp olive oil
- 1 pound Italian sausage, sweet or mild
- 4 cups cooked elbow macaroni, drained
- 4 eggs
- Romano cheese
Instructions
- In a skillet heat olive oil over medium high heat. Remove casing from sausage and place sausage in skillet. As it browns, break up sausage into small crumbly pieces.
- Add cooked macaroni to skillet and mix well with sausage. Add eggs, one at a time, stirring as each is added to skillet. Cook until eggs are done. Sprinkle with Romano cheese, to taste. Serve immediately. Makes 4 to 6 servings. Enjoy!
Corned Beef Potato Hills
An old-fashioned favorite, these combine classic down-home flavors.
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups mashed potatoes (either leftover or instant)
- 1 can corned beef (12 oz, NOT corned beef hash)
- 1 egg
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease a baking sheet. In a large bowl break up the corned beef into very small pieces. Add mashed potatoes and egg and mix well.
- Using an ice cream scoop, make mounds of potato mixture and place on prepared baking sheet. Bake in preheated oven for 30 minutes. Makes 8 servings. Enjoy!
Transcript
- Well, Dale, you smile, will you? All right, Dale always tells me, “Now, smile, Arlene,” like I don’t have enough to smile about. I tell you, if you worked with this crew, you’d be laughing, too. What a crowd, what a bunch, all nice guys and girls. But how are you today? We hope there’s a smile on your face. We hope that something’s happened today that has made you have a very special moment that maybe you weren’t expecting. That just put a chuckle on your lips and a happy thought in your mind. And I hope that that happens for you. Sometimes you just kinda go along, go along, go along, and you need that unexpected humorous event to just change the way you feel about the day or the way you feel about things that are happening to you. And when they come along, savor them. ‘Cause they don’t happen very often, but when it happens, it’s just, it’s like a little gift from heaven, something special. Well we think you’re special because you come to visit us always “At Home” and you’re part of our family, and we care what happens to you. On today’s program, we’re gonna do some quickies, we’re calling them, because they’re three main entrees that are as quick as that to prepare, and if you’re a working mom or if you’re a mom that’s constantly transporting your kids around to soccer, to dance lessons, to whatever, aerobics, or whatever, then these three dishes are the types of things that you’ll want to prepare for your family because they are quick. You can run in and pop them in the oven and transport someone else someplace else and come back and prepare a salad or a vegetable, and you have dinner on the table, so you don’t have to stay in the kitchen. I like quickies. Now apparently, Denise from Connellsville, Pennsylvania, she wrote this letter, and she said, “Dear Arlene, I enjoy watching your show “on Wednesday evenings. “I find it to be a very rewarding experience “for myself and my two daughters, “Megan who is four and Laura who is two, “who are permitted to stay up extra late on Wednesdays “to watch ‘At Home’ with me. “They even try helping mommy in the kitchen “with some of the recipes I receive from your show. “I’m a working mother who doesn’t want to spend “all of her time in the kitchen “preparing a meal in the evening. “With these recipes, I don’t have to. “Now my daughters look forward to that extra bedtime story “Mommy has time to read them. “I thank you, and I’m sure they thank you, too. “Sincerely, Denise.” She says, “P.S. I’m sure they’d be tickled “if you’d mention their names on your show.” Well, I just did, and Megan and Laura, you have a very special mommy because not only is she looking for ways that she can cut time in food preparation, but that extra time, she’s spending it with you. Thanks, Denise, you’re a really special lady. I hope you’re having a great day. And please, give a big hug to Megan and Laura just for me, all right? Well, stay with us, we’ll be right back to get started with quickies, right here in the “At Home” kitchen. We’ll be right back. Here’s today’s “At Home” hint. Breading will cling to chops, chicken, et cetera, if you bread a few hours beforehand and refrigerate until ready to cook. Thanks, M.M. of Indianapolis, Missouri. If you’ve got a helpful hint that you’d like to share with us, we want to hear from you. Send your hint to At Home Hints, CTV, Wall, Pennsylvania 15148-1499. Well, the first one is called eggplant casserole, and it’s very easy, very simple. And for those of you that are wondering what the eggplant looks like, it’s a little different than zucchini, so don’t get them mixed up. These are just little seeds in there. Don’t worry about them, they’re fine to eat. They’re aren’t gonna bother you, they’re aren’t gonna hurt you. And what we’re doing is just taking and slicing, not even peeling it, slicing them into slices about that thick. Then we’re going to battering, putting a light batter on them, and I’ve got quite a few done, but I just wanna walk you through it. First of all, dip it in your flour, the slice of eggplant, and then dip it in, this is a beaten egg. You might have to use more than just one egg, depending on how many slices that you’re going to prepare. Back into the flour, cover it real well. This is called dredging, you’re dredging that in the flour. Then you’re gonna put it into your hot grease. Now as you can see, we have been getting ready for this, and we have been cooking some. You’re gonna brown them on both sides, and then put them in your casserole dish, just like I’ve done here. This is quite a few slices that we’ve prepared ahead of time. Brown them very quickly. My oil should have been a bit hotter. But that’s okay, it will be all right. While we’re waiting for these to go ahead and brown, I’m gonna show you what we’re gonna do. One more here. Actually, if the oil was a bit hotter, these would cook very quickly. And you wanna keep an eye on them, so don’t leave this unattended. If your children are around, be sure you stay with it. Okay, then what we’re gonna do while those are browning, you’re gonna take a bowl, and this is a can of cream of mushroom soup. And you’re gonna just empty the can out. I’m sure you could use the golden mushroom if you wanted to. I think it would work well, too. Clean it out good. And with that, then we’re going to take just a 1/2 cup of milk. Add that to the mushroom soup. Use your whisk and make sure it blends very well. Try to incorporate it very well, just like this. This would probably serve four to six people, depending on how many slices. If you have smaller eggplant, of course, you’re gonna need more, but these are rather large eggplant that I had. This is probably about 1-1/2 eggplant, I would say. Okay, now we’re going to turn these over. I’d probably let this brown just a bit more. This isn’t too bad though. You don’t wanna them to get like black-brown. And when you have browned quite a few slices, you’ll notice the bits of the flour that’s in the bottom of the pan, in the bottom of the oil, if you have your oil up too high, they’re gonna start to burn. So you have to be careful of that. You don’t want that to happen. All you do is you just turn them over. Now what I like to do is drain them on a piece of paper toweling, and that way you don’t have a lot of grease in your casserole, because this is gonna bake in the oven for about 30 minutes in a preheated 350 degree oven. You wanna keep that in mind. Okay, let’s just say these are a little browner, okay? For cooking’s sake, we’re gonna take them out. And they should be kinda tender when you put your fork in them, they shouldn’t be mushy, but they should be tender, because you don’t want them to cook clear through, or else your finished product isn’t gonna be that great. Then, turn this off, then put this back, there we are. Now we’re gonna pour our soup. Get rid of this here. Whoops, just pour out the soup over top. You say, “Well, I’ve never heard of that, Arlene.” Well, I think you’re gonna like this. This is a little something different. And this bakes quickly, you know, if you’re taking the kids to lessons or something. Maybe it’s something you could prepare ahead of time, even brown up your slices, get those done, and then come back, pop it in the oven, okay? Let’s move it around a little bit so that some of that good soup gets over top of all of them. There we are, I think that’s good. Now I’m gonna take some cheese, and I have a bit of Romano. I’m just gonna add some Romano to some mozzarella. And we’re gonna add this on top. Now this would be fine if you wanted to do this without the cheese, it’d be no problem, you could do that. But I’m just gonna put some cheese on top. And we’re gonna bake this again in a 350 degree preheated oven. I cannot stress to you how important preheating your oven is for the outcome of the dish or the foods or whatever you’re preparing. It really, really is important. You need to do that. All right, follow me to the oven here. We’re gonna go ahead and pop that in for about 30 minutes, okay? Now the next one was sent to me by a viewer, and this lady, I thought to myself, her name is Jean Nemeth, and she said, “I prepare this, Arlene,” she said, “I think your viewers would like it, “and I’d like you to try it.” Well, you know, I’m always game for something new and trying something different, and I really like it when you viewers will get into the fun of this program and send me some of your recipes. You know our last cookbook had a lot of your recipes ’cause it was family and friends, and we enjoyed learning how to make them and learning what you like. Did I make all of them ahead of time? No, ’cause I don’t have a test kitchen here, but I sure have made a lot of them since then because they sparked my interest, just like this recipe I’m gonna tell you about today. Jean said you take one can of corned beef. This is the can of corned beef, not corn beef hash, not corn beef hash, all right? You take one can, and this is what it looks like. There’s very little fat in it. This is a really lean can, it looks very good. Now she said you take leftover mashed potatoes, as many or as few as you might have. So we made up some mashed potatoes. I probably would do, oh, maybe that many. Maybe not quite that many. I guess it’s really whatever we would like to use. I’m not sure there’s any specific amount. It’s what you have leftover. And then you take one egg, and I’m sure that the egg is used to bind it all together. Again, we learn, we remember that the egg is always a binding agent, all right? Now she says all you do is mix this together. If this works and it tastes good, this would be great because, number one, you have your meat and you have your potatoes. Now all you have to do is put a vegetable and a salad or something like that, you have the whole meal right here. You say, “Well, what are you gonna do with that, Arlene?” Well, I’m gonna tell you in just a minute. Mix this up, I think I would probably… I don’t think I would add any salt to this because there’s salt in that corned beef, but I might add just a dash of pepper. Why don’t we do that, okay? Just some fresh ground pepper, and what you do now, you take the good old-fashioned ice cream scoop. You know the one that you have duck it from the kids ’cause they always wanna play with it when you have the ice cream out. These are some old ones. Sandy, the girl that works on the show with us, she had these. And you just take, just like that, and we have sprayed our pan, and she calls these potato heels, Jean does, and she said… Look at that, isn’t that nice? You know how we always talk about presentation, how important presentation is when we’re preparing foods. Isn’t that nice? And then we’re gonna put these in our preheated oven, 350 degrees. I tell you what, folks, this is one of the easiest things I’ve ever prepared, this is just great, easy to do, and they’re gonna bake for about 30 minutes also. All right, clean up that bowl, there we go. This will probably make… You can make them smaller if you wanted to, but I imagine this would make about nine or 10. Of course, these are nice big ones. So you’d probably serve two to a portion, I would think. There we are. I’m gonna put this in the oven. They’ll bake 30 minutes in a preheated 350 degree oven. I’m anxious to try these. I’ll bet you are, too. We’ll be right back in just a minute to continue. Now you know what? I forgot to put my onions in my eggplant casserole. So never too late, let’s do it now. We’re gonna open it carefully, just do it very carefully, and just sprinkle these. That’s just gonna add some flavor, but I wanted to remind you, you’d probably do that before you put the soup on them, okay? Just remember to do that. See, we make mistakes here, too, we’re not perfect. You know, the same things that happen to you at home happen here. They really, really do. All right, this last dish that I’m gonna prepare for you which is another quickie, there’s a whole story that goes with this because this dish brings back so many memories for me of the early days when Paul and I first got married. And I had a job where I worked in a delicatessen. It was an Italian delicatessen. I’ve spoken to you about this place before. It was called The Italian Store in my hometown. Prudy and Sam Brutone were truly unique and unusual people. They were like another set of parents to me, really. Not that anybody could take the place of my own, but they were very caring people, and Sam, his specialty… Mrs. Brutone, Prudy, she would make homemade bread, homemade buns, pepperoni rolls. She was the the baker. And Sam was the sausage maker. Every Friday night, and I worked there through the day, and we’re talking 25, 26 years ago, when Sam would come home, he also had a job beside the delicatessen. He worked in our city on the street department. Hard-working man, he was, Mr. Brutone, and he would go get a shower and he’d say to me, I’d be cleaning up because I’d be ready to go home, and he’d say, “Did the pork butts come today?” And I’d say, “Yeah, they’re in the cooler.” He had a special knife that he used, and he’d get the blade and he’d be sharpening the knife, and he would make sausage according to the orders. Now if you wanted sausage, you’d come in and you’d say, “Sam, I want two pound of sausage. “Don’t make it too hot, I want the kids to eat it, “but I wanna enjoy it. “Make it real hot or don’t make it hot at all.” He would custom make sausage just the way you liked it. A special, special man, and we would laugh. And then it would be Saturday, and it would be such a busy day at the store. And Sam would say, “Arlene, can you come in “for a couple of extra hours “and help us out in the afternoon?” I’d say, “Sure.” Well, the rush would be over, and here’s this man who’s about this tall, small little man, small of stature, but a real prince on the inside, just a fun, nice man. Loved to sing and dance the Tarantella, the Italian dance and the song. And he would say, “You know, I’m hungry. “I’m gonna make some of my special just for you.” And I’d say, “Oh, your special.” The first time, I didn’t know what he was talking about. Well, what he was talking about is what I’m making here. He would take about a pound, a piece. He’d say, “Give me a piece of sausage about that long.” And I would get it out of the case and I’d bring it back, and he’d have a skillet with a little bit of olive oil because his sausage was literally so lean that you could not fry it without putting oil in the pan. That’s how lean it was. So I would get it and he’d say, “Okay, now get this,” and he’d tell me what to get, and I’d go and prepare it. And he would make his special. He’d say, “If I ever have a restaurant, “this is gonna be Sam’s special.” So that’s what I call this dish. This is Sam’s Special. You take the sausage, you take it out of the casing, and what you wanna do is brown it real good, just like I’m doing here. You want it to brown over a high heat because you wanna render a lot of the juice out of it because of what you’re gonna do with it. And you wanna break it up, you keep breaking it up, break the pieces apart. You don’t want big pieces in there, and as it cooks, you keep breaking it apart and breaking it apart. Now, as Sam would be… He’d be telling stories about the old country, oh, what they used to do, how they would eat prickling pears, I think he called them, or how they would have some fresh pork chops. They’d go up in the mountains, they’d build a fire. He said, “You haven’t lived till you’ve tasted a pork chop “that’s been cooked over an open fire.” He said, “It just tastes so good, tastes so much better.” And I would love just to sit and listen to Sam tell the stories of the old country. I was so glad that before he passed away a few years ago now that he was able to go back to Italy, because he had come here when he was 16 years old. He’d been a coal miner, he’d been a lot of different… He had a lot of different vocations, but always was a man who was very nice to me. I remember one time he was worried about me working late and having to go home. He said, “I’m gonna get you a gun.” I said, “I don’t want a gun.” He said, “No,” ’cause he would walk me home to my husband and my apartment. I’d say, “But, Sam, I feel like I should walk you home now “because I’m afraid something’s gonna happen to you.” And we would laugh back and forth. Just a wonderful man, a lot of good memories with him. But this was Sam’s Special. Okay, now after this is well-browned, what you’re gonna do, he would cook some elbow macaroni. This elbow has been cooked and really well-drained. And in this, right in this skillet, with all the sausage bits that has cooked, make sure when you have broken it up that it’s all cooked through very, very well. Then you’re gonna add the pasta right in there, okay? This is a couple of cups of pasta that you’ve cooked more or less. There’s no specific amounts in this because you can stretch this. This is one of those dishes you can stretch, or you can make it really, really intense with just a lot of the meat in it. If you want more pasta, add more pasta. Now he’d mix this all up. You can see that the juices from the sausage are all coming through. If you like hot sausage, you’re gonna like this. You’ll enjoy it. Now what old Sam would do, and I say that affectionately, he would take a couple of eggs, and he would just crack them right on top. You say, “Oh, eggs on top of pasta?” Don’t knock it till you try it. I’m telling you, this is a lifesaver when it comes to a dinner that you have to have that has some sustenance to it. This will put the kids… They’ll love it, if they like sausage, they’ll love it. Now what you wanna do, you wanna just start mixing that around, and that egg will cook and you’ll have cooked eggs in with the pasta. And you wanna keep turning it over, turning it over, until it thoroughly cooks. Now it’s gonna take a little while. It’s gonna take a while. This is like eggs and sausage, kinda like breakfast, except you got your little pasta in there, that’s all. That’s the only difference. And you wanna keep your heat up high so that it cooks, ’cause you don’t want any raw eggs in there. You’ll see when it starts to get really thoroughly cooked. The eggs will gel up. This with some sliced tomatoes for breakfast, not for breakfast, but for lunch or for supper, sliced tomatoes, some stewed tomatoes. How about some tossed salad? A tossed salad’s always good. Sam just ate this with a big crusty piece of bread. He never had to have a salad or fancy vegetables or whatever. He’d just say, “Let’s just have my special. “Let’s just make my special.” He’s one of the greatest, fun-loving guys. Just always wanted to have fun, was fun-loving, and a really, really nice man. Okay, we’re just about there. It has to keep cooking. You can smell this, it’s incredible. All you can smell is that Italian sausage. You can hear it. It’s best to do this in the nonstick skillet because your egg would definitely cook to the bottom of your skillet if you didn’t, and you wanna keep it moving all the time, okay? You can see that the egg is gelling, ’cause there’s little bits of egg now that it cooked are attached to the pasta. Now, when we would get about to this point, and everybody would say, “Is it done yet, Sam? “Come on, just get the plates, come on.” He’d say, “Arlene, go get the snow.” I’d say, “Go get the snow?” “Yeah, go get the snow.” To Sam, the snow was the Romano cheese. You had to put Romano cheese on the top of this. When you put it in your plate, you would have to put a dusting of snow he’d call it all over the top. So this is Sam’s Special, made in memory of him today. I’ll tell you, Sam, it never tastes as good as when you made it. But I hope you’ll try it for your family. We’ll be right back in just a minute.
- [Announcer] To receive the recipes presented on today’s program, plus many more great recipe ideas, send your best donation in a stamped, self-addressed business-sized envelope to At Home, CTV, Wall, Pennsylvania 15148-1499. You’ll receive Arlene’s heart-warming newsletter, “Enjoy!” featuring an entire month of “At Home” recipes, including today’s mouth-watering dishes. Be sure to include the “Enjoy!” issue number with your request.
- Don’t forget now, that’s newsletter number 405. You’ll get the whole month’s worth of recipes just by sending a self-addressed, stamped business-sized envelope, the very best gift you can do, and include your name and address on that envelope. Be sure now to send it to us. We’ll be glad to send you a whole month’s worth of recipes. Let’s take a look at our quickies that we’ve prepared today. Here’s the eggplant casserole. Doesn’t that look great? Nicely browned and tender, mm, the aroma from… The onions really do help. You have to put the onions in. Don’t forget like I did. Next are the potato heels, aren’t they interesting? One of the girls tasted them and she said, “These are delicious.” Thanks, Jean, we really appreciate that recipe. And here’s Sam’s Special. I tell you, if you like hot, you’re gonna like this a lot. We hope that you like and you’ll try all of the things that we’ve prepared for you today. We hope that you don’t think, “Well, somebody else might like that,” or “That’s too much for me.” My aunt who lives alone wrote me recently and said, “Arlene, maybe you’d like to tell your viewers “just when you prepare things, “package them in serving sizes and freeze them. “If you do that for a couple of days a week, “then you’ll have a real big variety “for the next couple of weeks “if you’ll just package in one serving-size packets “and put them in the freezer, “and then bring them out as you need them. “Then that way you have a variety.” We hope that you’ve enjoyed “At Home” today. We are always glad when we can spend time with you. And if today has not been a great day, why not just stop and ask the Lord to help you through tomorrow? You know, he will, he’s always faithful. He’ll always be there for you. 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 then.
- [Announcer] Fresh produce provided by Jordan Banana, wholesalers of fresh fruit and vegetables in Dravosburg, Pennsylvania. Appliances provided by Dacor Distinctive Appliances, a reflection of your good taste. Groceries provided by Foodland where the answer is always yes.
- [Announcer] Cornerstone Television wishes to thank all our faithful viewers whose consistent prayers and financial support have made this program possible.
Thank you so much for putting Arlene’s recipes in this convenient format. At Home with Arlene continues to be so relevant and uplifting with all the delicious recipes and her kind and thoughtful perspective on family and God’s love. I truly appreciate Cornerstone continuing her legacy. Watching Arlene ,followed by RadiantTV is a welcome respite to a busy day. God Bless
Thank you so much for the kind words! We’re glad you’re part of the At Home family!
I love this recipe index!
I couldn’t agree more!! I wish Cornerstone could find a similar class act like Arlene who has the heart of Christ, gift of teaching and love of food and hospitality to share with viewers— she was amazing and so uplifting. She has left a beautiful legacy for us.
Thank you Cornerstone!
Nobody could ever replace Arlene, but Cornerstone does produce a new cooking show called “Dashing Dish.” The host, Katie, shares stories of her faith and God’s healing power as she cooks. You can find out more here: https://ctvn.org/shows/dashing-dish/
Today was damp and dreary..perfect day for soup so I tried the tortellini soup recipe. We love spinach so used that instead of endive…and served it with crusty bread as Arlene always recommended. It was delicious. Than you for continuing this program and making it even easier to get the delicious recipes.
Thank you so much for being a part of the At home Family! And that soup sounds delicious!