Recipes For Holiday Hunger

Every holiday season, families scramble to figure out just what they will make for the big dinners with family and friends. From Cranberry Salad to Pumpkin Pie, everyone’s inner chef searches for the perfect collection of recipes to feed every gut that cruises through their kitchen.

For those seeking new recipes that others in the house may not know, here are a few Southern foods for those born and bred in West Coast culture. These recipes include yams, which happen to be a “super food” that lowers cholesterol, battles cancer cells and adds health karma overall.

Sweet Potato Casserole

3 cups mashed sweet potatoes (baked yams)
¾ cup sugar
3 eggs
¾ stick butter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Mix all ingredients thoroughly with mixer and pour into buttered casserole dish.

Topping:
1/2 cup brown sugar
½ cup all-purpose flour
½ cup chopped pecans
3 tablespoons melted butter or margarine

Mix above ingredients together and sprinkle on top of sweet potato mixture. Bake at 350 degrees for 35-45 minutes.

For those with a sweet tooth, there is always divinity candy. It can trace its roots, at least in the current recipe, back to 1902 when Karo brand corn syrup was first established in the United States. Be careful with this one, as any moisture in the air will affect its consistency. Whether sold at candy stores as divinity fudge or made in the kitchen for holidays as divinity candy, it is as essential to the holiday spirit as snow is to a white Christmas.

Divinity

2 ½ cups sugar
½ cup water
½ cup light corn syrup
2 egg whites
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup pecan halves

1. Combine first 3 ingredients in a 3-quart saucepan, and cook over low heat, stirring constantly, until sugar dissolves. Cover and cook over medium heat 2 to 3 minutes to wash down sugar crystals from sides of pan. Uncover and cook over medium heat, without stirring, to hardball stage or until candy thermometer registers 260 degrees. Remove from heat.
2. Beat egg whites in a large mixing bowl at high speed with an electric mixer until stiff peaks form.
3. Pour hot sugar mixture in a heavy stream over beaten egg whites while beating constantly at high speed. Add vanilla and continue beating just until mixture holds its shape (3 to 4 minutes).
4. Working quickly, drop divinity by rounded teaspoonfuls onto wax paper; top with 1 pecan half; cool. Peel from wax paper.

Yield: 3 dozen (1 ½ pounds)

For anyone wishing to add a bit of Southern-style cooking to his or her culinary repertoire, a bit of Cornbread Dressing should do the trick. This has been a staple of Southern culture since before the earliest Colonial days.

Dressing, in and of itself traces its roots back to Nottingham, United Kingdom in 1504 where it was used as ornamentation when serving game fowl. Once Colonists settled in the New World, cornbread was used in place of the standard wheat bread as a matter of necessity.

Cornbread Dressing

1 ½ large onions, diced
¾ cups diced celery
4 cups cornbread crumbs
2 cups biscuit or loaf of white bread crumbs
5 cups chicken broth
¼ teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon pepper
3 beaten eggs
¼ cup melted margarine
1 tablespoons rubbed sage

1. Sauté onions and celery until tender. Crumble cornbread and biscuits/loaf bread into a large mixing bowl.
2. Add onions and celery, eggs and broth. Mix with a mixer all ingredients together thoroughly.
3. Add salt, pepper and sage, mixing another minute with mixer. Pour into 9” x 13” buttered casserole dish and bake in a preheated 350° oven for 30 minutes or until slightly browned.

Yield: 6-8 servings