Swedish Tea Ring: A Cowles Christmas Tradition

Swedish tea ring, a Cowles family tradition.

For as long as I can remember my mom has been making this on Christmas eve or the day before so that it would be ready to eat Christmas morning. We ALWAYS had to have breakfast first, then dad would read from the Bible, then mom would make us kids get in front of the tree so she could take our picture (something we complained about like toddlers...into our 20's)...and then and ONLY then were we allowed to open our gifts...the exception of course being the one year mom and dad bought my brother a pug puppy...that couldn't be kept secret through breakfast. I got the recipe from www.tasteofhome.com credit should be given where it's due. Of course my mom had her own recipe, which I believe is out of an old Betty Crocker cookbook.

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon active dry yeast
• 1-1/2 cups warm water (110° to 115°)
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 2 egg whites, lightly beaten
• 1-1/4 teaspoons salt
• 5-1/2 to 6 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts
• 1/2 cup chopped maraschino cherries, patted dry
• 1/4 cup packed brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 2 tablespoons butter, melted
• 
  ICING:
• 1 cup confectioners' sugar
• 1 to 2 tablespoons fat-free milk

Directions

In a large bowl, dissolve yeast in warm water. Add the sugar, oil, egg whites, salt and 1 cup flour; beat until smooth. Stir in enough remaining flour to form a soft dough.

Turn onto a lightly floured surface; knead until smooth, about 6-8 minutes. Place in a bowl coated with cooking spray, turning once to coat the top.

Cover and let rise until doubled, about 1 hour.

Combine the walnuts, cherries, brown sugar and cinnamon; set aside. Punch dough down; roll into an 18-in. x 12-in. rectangle.

Brush with butter;

sprinkle with nut mixture to within 1/2 in. of edges.

Roll up jelly-roll style, starting with a long side; pinch seam to seal.

Place seam side down on a 14-in. pizza pan coated with cooking spray; pinch ends together to form a ring.

With scissors, cut from outside edge two-thirds of the way toward center of ring at scant 1-in. intervals.

Separate strips slightly; twist to allow filling to show.

Cover and let rise until doubled, about 40 minutes.

Bake at 400° for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown. Remove from pan to a wire rack to cool.

In a small bowl, combine confectioners' sugar and enough milk to achieve desired consistency; drizzle over warm tea ring. Yield: 1 ring (24 slices).

Bacon Wrapped Pork Medallions with a Pepper Cognac Cream Sauce.(Caution: Calorie BOMB!)

Markus, my incredible husband, really enjoys this dish. It's actually not very hard to make, but man, is it loaded with calories! You can adjust it by using milk instead of cream and tossing out the bacon and not using as much butter...but the taste won't be the same. Milk just doesn't compare to cream and creme fraiche.

Ingredients:

Pork tenderloin cut into 1 - 2 inch thick medallions
Bacon
1 Tbsp pepper corns - crushed roughly
1 8oz container cream
1 4 oz container plain creme fraiche
2 Tbsp butter
1/2 water, pork broth or white wine (for deglazing the pan)
Pepper
salt
1/2 onion chopped small
2 cloves garlic minced
** 1 shot congac (whiskey or rum)** totally optional, but gives it an extra kick in taste (the alcohol boils out)

First cut your tenderloin into medallions of equal thickness

Then if you want - marinate - I used a garlic italian mix, again, optional!

Let it marinate for about an hour...then wrap with bacon pieces and secure with toothpicks

Drizzle with the left over marinade and let sit at room temperature. Heat a pan with about 1 Tbsp oil and place 4 pieces of pork in at a time...

...Just sear the two sides without bacon

Then place back into baking dish. Preheat oven to 375°-400° When all the pieces are seared and the oven is heated, pop the pan into the oven.

Now fry your bacon, but in the same pan, you'll want all the flavor.

Once the bacon is nice and crispy remove from the pan and place on paper towels

Now deglaze your pan, use broth, water or white wine. Once the pan is mostly clean, pour the juice from the deglazing into a mug to use again in a few steps.

Put in about 2 Tbsp butter and melt, then add your crushed peppercorns

and then your onions and garlic

saute until soft and then add the juice that you got from deglazing the pan, along with the cream, creme fraiche, a little bit of salt and pepper and if you want a pork boullion cube.

turn down your heat, stir every few minutes and heat it through. Then add your shot (if using) and two pieces of bacon that have been crushed up, the other two are for garnish.

This should all take about 20 minutes or so...let the sauce warm back up after the shot and then pull your meat out of the oven...it will only take about 30 minutes to cook. Let it rest for a few minutes and take out the toothpicks. This dish goes great with rice. Today that's what we had, plus a typical styrian salad.

I also sprinkled some fresh chives cut from our garden

Hope you like it if you try it! :)

Sweet & Sour Meatballs

Sweet and Sour Meatballs, they go well with lots of different things. Normally I'd make these with rice, but we've had rice so much lately, I was just not in the mood for it again. Also I normally would add pineapple pieces and green peppers, but the fridge was out of those. So today it was mashed potatoes, meatballs and corn and peas.

Ingredients:

Meatballs:

1 pound ground beef/pork
1/2 onion chopped fine
2 garlic cloves
Salt
Pepper
1/2 - 1 tsp ginger
1 Tbsp soy sauce
1 cup breadcrumbs
1 egg

Mix all the ingredients together and form into meatballs

Set those to the side and get your sauce started

Sauce:

1/2 cup water (the recipe called for 1 cup water and no pineapple juice...do as you please)
1/2 cup pineapple juice
1/2 cup cider vinegar
1/2 cup ketchup
2 Tbsp Brown Sugar (the recipe calls for 1 cup brown sugar...I said "no way!!!")
2 Tbsp soy sauce (I put in 3-4)

* I also added some garlic powder and some onion salt...and as I said earlier, normally I'd put chopped green bell peppers and pineapple pieces in as well....none of these are in the original recipe. Experiment!

Combine all together and warm up in a pan on the stove

While that is warming up start frying up the meatballs. Use about 2-3 Tbsp oil. Brown them in batches, so you have enough space for turning, then set them aside on a plate.

Keep the pan on, but turn down your heat to avoid some serious spritzing. Pour some of the sauce into the pan that the meatballs cooked in, in order to deglaze. Stir until all the goodness comes off the bottom of the pan, then add the rest of the sauce and the meatballs.

Let simmer for about 20 minutes. If the sauce doesn't thicken up on it's own, add some cornstarch or flour mixed with a little water. I doubled the sauce recipe ...it was a tad TOO much sauce...I think doing 1 and 1/2 of the recipe is probably your best bet.

Once nicely cooked through, serve over rice or mashed potatoes or noodles...or....whatever else you think sounds good.

Enjoy!

Wienerschnitzel

Weinerschnitzel...the equivelant of the hamburger in America. Eaten at least once a week by ...well a LOT of Austrians, I won't say "all" because that's just never true. You can eat Weinerschnitzel with fries and ketchup or with rice and a mayonaise sauce...or both, the way my hubby likes it. Schnitzel goes great with a cranberry compote to dip it in, think of it as dipping your ham in applesauce (never heard of that?!? Then you've never had a Christmas Ham with the Cowles family!)

Ingredients:

2 pieces chicken, turkey, pork filets or veal
1/2 cup flour
Salt
Pepper
Garlic salt
Paprika
1 egg
Breadcrumbs
Oil for frying

I used Chicken breast, because, well...it will NEVER by chewy...pork on the other hand, could be. I prefer the taste of chicken, turkey or veal over pork.
Pounding a whole chicken breast is not the way to do it, unless you want a HUGE schnitzel, or one that's not very thin. Section the chicken breast into small, thinner pieces.

Then cover with plastic...

Then take the meat tenderizer to it.

Put the flour and spices in a bowl and mix together

Take each piece of chicken and coat well in the flour mixture

Mix an egg in a bowl and put bread crumbs on a plate and get ready to coat the meat.

Dip meat in the egg, then let the egg drip off a little bit and then dip into the breadcrumbs. *You can be heating your oil at this point. You'll need enough in a pan to cover a piece of chicken.

Once the oil is hot, start frying the schnitzel pieces.

Fry until golden brown. You can turn the oven on to about 300°-350° and put them in the oven to keep warm while you fry the others. The downside: They tend to not be AS crispy. I find that if you are just frying enough for 2-4 people...they stay hot enough on a plate with papertowels, as long as you serve them immediately after all of them are fried.

Serve with whatever sides your heart desires.

Schweinsbraten, Gemüse und Semmelknödel - a.k.a Roast Pork, Vegetables and Stuffing Balls.

Schweinsbraten, in Austria, is somewhat of the equivelant of Roast Beef in the U.S. It’s not hard to make, but is oooooh sooooo good! You’ll probably need to locate a butcher to get the right cut of meat (if you live in the u.s). You’ll want a pork butt, with the skin on! That’s the cruchy delishousness on top and oh so bad for you! If possible ask the butcher to cut a crisscross pattern into the skin, just going down to the fat layer. Otherwise, do it at home, but you’ll need a really good sharp knife.

Season the schweinsbraten by spreading fennel seeds, minced garlic, salt, pepper, and whatever else you think sounds good, into the cuts made in the skin.

 You can let it sit over night, or put it right in the oven. Which should be at a nice warm 400°-420°. Pour some pork boullion broth around the meat and leave it uncovered.

Let your meat cook for about an hour, then add your vegetables. I used potatoes, onions and carrots. Pour some more pork broth over the vegetables.

Now the trick to getting the skin to crisp up, is to keep the oven hot. Don't OVER fill the cracks in the skin with seasoning, or it won't get hot enough to bubble up and crisp.

Let it cook for about 2 - 2.5 hours, basting every 20 minutes or so. Then take it out and let it rest for about 10 minutes, before cutting into it.

Semmelknödel:

About 4 cups of cubed bread

1 onion chopped

3 Tbsp butter

Salt

Pepper

1 beaten egg

Seasonings of your choice

i.e - Parsley, sage, nutmeg, basil, garlic etc.

Put the bread cubes in a mixing bowl and get a big pot full of heavily salted water boiling.

Melt the butter in a pot and then add the chopped onion and sautee lightly

Then pour the butter mixture over the bread crumbs

Then mix well and then pour the beaten egg over and mix well - if it's too dry add a little milk.

You don't want it to be too wet, or the balls will fall apart once in the boiling water, Also you don't want it too dry, a stuffing texture it about right. Then take about a soup spoon full of the mix into your hands (wet your hands a little with water before) and form into a ball



Then once the water is boiling go head and put the semmelknödel in gently and cover with a lid. Turn the heat down to a simmer and let them boil for about 15-20 minutes

Once they are done, take them out and put them in a dish and stab with a fork to let the steam out. Serve them with schweinsbraten, vegetables and rice and top off with roast pork gravy. yum yum yum!