Winter Roses

Happy Monday Morning! With Christmas only days away, fun and excitement are in full swing here at Winterpast. The frigid weather has made staying inside to craft, and snack an easy choice. Winter is the best time of year for inside activities when one is retired.

Friday morning, an unexpected knock at the door alerted me to the delivery of one dozen of the most beautiful long stemmed roses I’ve ever received in my life! Not only are they beautiful, they’ve filled Winterpast with their rich fragrance. My Mysterious Marine started off the celebration of my birth in grand fashion with the delivery of flowers from the new little shop on Main. Four red ones for the months we have known each other and 8 pink ones to celebrate the Joy of the season. Sentimental guy he surely is.

Not yet finished with his plans, he created a complete dinner from scratch just for me. Filet Mignon, lobster tails cooked to perfection, Potatoes Au Gratin, fresh asparagus and freshly baked rolls. The entire dinner was on point and served with an exquisite red wine carefully selected from the Valleys of Napa. His favorite wine, and now, mine too.

The day was finished off with a most special gift. A golden St. Christopher medal to wear near my heart. This was the nicest birthday celebration of my 67 years, all done at his insistence because Everyone should have a wonderful birthday Every year. I must say, after this weekend, I see the error of my ways in the past.

Now that the birthday is in the rearview mirror for another year, it’s on to the REAL reason for the season. This week, I plan to cook myself a wonderful German dinner in memory of my Grandmother who left us two days before Christmas in a year decades past.

Throughout my childhood, my Grammie started preparing for Christmas early on. With plenty of grandchildren, she began making signature slippers, one pair for each of us. She had our colors down and would insist Grandpa stop everything for a ride to get town when she needed more yarn. Of course, that would include lunch at The Harvest House Restaurant which was a part of Woolworth’s dime store. Funny how things have changed. Now, we have the $1.25 Dollar Tree Store without any restaurant.

By Christmas Day, each Grandchild had an envelope and a pair of slippers. How she ever got the sizes right for each child was a puzzlement to me. With sixteen years of girls in our family alone, she had to count her stitches properly. Those slippers were a precious part of our Christmas.

Before Thanksgiving, she’d start making egg noodles with my mother and Aunts. After the mixing and rolling out of the dough, there would be noodles drying on the arm and back of every chair in her house. All the noodles were draped lovingly on top of the whitest tea -towels in the county. She needed enough noodles to share with her four daughters, saving enough for her Christmas Eve Chicken Noodle Soup, which was a feast of the simplest kind.

As mentioned earlier, the German Sausage was purchased from the correct butcher. There were cookies, candies, and coffee cake to bake. The week before Christmas the house was cleaned to perfection, with Grandpa taking over the chore of vacuuming. By Christmas Eve, everything was ready and family would stop by for a visit, as people did when living miles apart in the country. This was after the Christmas Eve service at the local church.

Holidays were the time of year when farmers had darn-well better be scrubbed, shaved, and combed. Their suits would be dusted off for the once-a-year event. Tractors and discs sat idle. Other than the critical morning and evening feeding of the livestock, farmers rested in my little corner of the universe. Except, of course, for the poor dairy families. For them, Christmas fit between milking and mucking.

Grammie was the kind of grandmother you ready about in books. Chubby and sweet, she was always a smiling with a listening ear. How I wish I had spent more time listening to the stories of a young immigrant wife with four little girls to raise. Her husband wasn’t blessed with sons, either. It didn’t matter much. In those days, the girls would need to do the work just as sons would have. Yes. I wish I had sat with her to listen more than I did.

This week, I plan to try my hand a few dishes remembered. This is a recipe for Kuchen, (coffee cake) that you might like to try. I find it fascinating that on a random search this very day, this recipe came up. Schwabenland was my mother’s maiden name. This recipe came from Christina Schwabenland. I’ll need to think on that little coincidence as I’m cooking later today. Thanks, Grammie. I needed the right recipe. ( Remembered with love, Elizabeth Goeringer Schwabenland — 1901 – 1981)

This recipe came from the internet submitted by Christina Schwabenland — a distant unknown relative

KUCHEN

Ingredients

• 2 cakes yeast
• 1 T sugar
• 1 C milk
• 1 cube butter
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• 4 1/2 cups of flour

Preparation

1. Dissolve 2 cakes yeast and 1 Tbls sugar in 1 cup lukewarm water.
2. Scald 1 cup milk then add 1 cube butter, 1/2 cup sugar, 1 tsp salt
3. When milk has cooled to 90 degrees, add 2 cups flour to make a batter.
4. Add yeast mixture mixture and 3 beaten eggs.
5. Beat well.
6. Add remaining 4-1/2 cups flour or enough to make a soft dough and knead well.
7. Let rise to double in size (about 2 hours)
8. Knead down and let rise again
9. Divide into portions.
10. Put into greased pans.
11. Let rise 45 minutes.
12. Spread on topping made of ; 1 egg, beaten, 2 Tbls sugar, 1 Cup sour cream thickened with flour.
13. Place berries or any fruit on top of this spread.
14. Top with rivals (crumbs); 1 cube butter, melted, 3/4 to 1 cup sugar, 2 cups flour, mix well.
15. Bake at 375 F to 400 F for 30 minutes or until golden brown.
16. This recipe makes 3 – 9×12″ coffee cakes or 6 – 9″ round.
17. This dough can also be used for beirocks or kraut burgers

I’m off to the store to get the ingredients. Dieting will wait until next week. This week, I need to make and bake coffee cakes, cookies, and candies. This is the week to enjoy the memories of Christmas’s past.

Whatever you do today, reflect on some fond memories of your own sweet elders. If we could only go back and sit for a time with them, stories would live again. If you are lucky enough to have elders at your side, don’t waste a single minute. Take time to LISTEN. They have so much to share.

More tomorrow.