Trego's Mountain Ear

"Serving North Lincoln County"

Category: Recipes

  • Skillet Chicken Pot Pie

    Skillet Chicken Pot Pie

    I’ve looked at many recipes for making Chicken Pot Pie using my cast iron skillet and didn’t find one in particular that fit into my “how can I make this with the least amount of work” philosophy. So I combined a few different recipes and this chicken pot pie is easy to make and the crust is flakey and very tasty. Enjoy!

    FOR PIE CRUST:

    • 8 tablespoons cold butter cut into cubes
    • 8 tablespoons cold shortening cut into cubes
    • 2 3/4 cups flour
    • 1 teaspoon salt
    • 1/2 cup cold water
    • (I have a 12″ skillet, so I make 1-1/2 times this recipe so I have plenty of dough). I put the butter and shortening in the freezer for a few minutes to harden and then cut them into your flour/salt until clumps form. Then pour in water and mix until dough ball forms. Cut the dough in half and form into two flattened round disks. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate until ready to use.

    FOR FILLING:

    • 2 tablespoons butter
    • 1 tablespoon oil
    • 2 stalks celery, diced
    • Frozen carrots
    • Frozen peas
    • Frozen or diced potatoes
    • 1 onion, minced
    • 1 clove garlic, minced
    • 1/3 cup + 1 tablespoon all purpose flour
    • 3 cups chicken broth
    • Salt and pepper to taste
    • 2 cups chicken, diced
    • (Flour and chicken broth can be adjusted based on size of pan–I use 1/2 cup flour and 5 cups chicken broth)Preheat oven to 400. Add butter and oil to large pan and melt. Sauté celery, onion, and garlic until soft, about five minutes. (If you are using uncooked chicken, at this point cook chicken until its internal temp reaches 165 and remove from pan), if not, add frozen vegetables and sprinkle flour over the vegetables and stir until evenly coated and cook for a few minutes. Then add chicken broth a little at a time and whisk after each addition until mixture begins to resemble a thick pudding. Once this consistency is reached, remaining broth can be added in. Stir in cooked chicken and salt and pepper and simmer until thickened.
    • Roll out pie dough until it is 1/4″ thick. Lay one dough across bottom of skillet (no need to oil/butter skillet). Add chicken/vegetable filling. Roll out second dough and place it over skillet. Crimp edges together. Cut vent holes in center of pie.
    • Bake for 20 minutes at 400. Then reduce temperature to 350 and bake for 25-28 minutes more, or until top is golden brown (you may need to wrap edges of pie with tin foil if the edge gets too dark. Allow 15-20 minutes before serving.

  • Pancakes with Onion

    Another recipe from Jeeta’s  Hutterite Community Cookbook is for Potato Pancakes, which takes an unexpected twist.  Remember, these recipes are sized for a colony, not a household.

    5 pounds grated potatoes                    5 pounds flour
    ¾ cup grated onions                            ½ tsp pepper
    5 eggs slightly beaten                         salad oil for frying

    Grate potatoes and onions.  Drain well.  Combine potatoes, onions, eggs, flour, salt and pepper.  In a large skillet, heat oil ⅛ inch deep until hot but not smoking.  For each pancake drop 3 Tbsp of dough at a time into the hot fat.  Flatten with spatula.  Fry for 2 to 3 minutes on each side or until golden brown.  Drain well on paper before serving.

    Recipe from The Hutterite Community Cookbook, by Joanita Kant.  Published by Good Books, Intercourse, Pennsylvania.  It’s not out of line to call Jeeta “Doctor” since she did her Ph.D. in the civil engineering department.

  • Easy Homemade Coleslaw

    This easy coleslaw recipe my mother shared with me. Friends and family that don’t particularly like coleslaw, love this recipe. It goes good with fresh caught fish! (See picture below that was featured last month in fish tacos with homemade tortillas)

    When preparing this recipe it’s important to remember when you shred cabbage, there is a lot of moisture in it that you wouldn’t find in bagged pre-shredded cabbage, so it is easy to make this recipe too soupy.

    • 1/2 a cabbage- shredded
    • 1 carrot shredded
    • 1/3 c. mayo
    • 2 tsp sugar
    • 1 1/2 tbs apple cider vinegar
    • 1/4 tsp garlic powder

    Shred cabbage and carrot into a bowl. Use a separate bowl to mix the rest of the ingredients. I usually dissolve the sugar and vinegar together and then add the mayo and garlic powder. Then pour the mixture into the cabbage. Let chill for 10 minutes and serve.

  • Sardine Burgers

    One of the more interesting recipes we brought back from South Dakota is from Jeeta Kant’s cookbook.  Jeeta’s BS was in Sociology, her Master’s in Geography, and her Ph.D program was in Civil Engineering – with her dissertation on edible wild plants used on the Pine Ridge. She has a rather eclectic academic transcript.

    Jeeta’s recipe is reduced to six sandwiches instead of serving an entire Hutterite colony with a burger based on canned sardines. 

    • 1 can mustard sardines
    • 1 can catsup sardines
    • 3 eggs
    • 2/3 cup milk
    • 2 and 2/3 cups cooked ground chicken meat
    • salt and pepper
    • 1 and 1/3 cups bread crumbs
    • 12 slices of bread, buttered on 1 side

    Mix all the filling ingredients together.

    Spread 6 slices of bread with mixture.  Top with the remaining 6 slices and cook slowly on grill, buttered side down, until the filling is done and the bread toasted.

    More of Jeeta’s recipes are available in the Hutterite Community Cookbook, by Joanita Kant.  The ISBN is 0-934672-56-3 if you want to get a copy of your own.

  • Homemade Tortillas

    Homemade Tortillas

    This is a tortilla recipe which requires no special equipment. Just simple ingredients found in the cupboard. I use this recipe when making fish tacos (See pic below-fresh perch taco with homemade coleslaw and tortilla…Yummy!). They don’t refrigerate well, but they’re so easy to make, you can make them fresh for the meal and impress your guests! Recipe makes 6-8 tortillas.

    • 1 cup flour
    • 1/2 cup cornmeal
    • 1/4 tsp salt
    • 1 egg
    • 1 1/2 cups water
    • Whisk all ingredients together. Pour enough in a hot nonstick pan and swirl to make a tortilla (about 1/4 cup). Don’t use oil in your pan. Cook until the edges turn up and flip to the other side to continue cooking. Cook a couple minutes on each side. Keep warm in oven until use.

  • Hungarian Lentil Stew for a prosperous New Year

    Hungarian Lentil Stew for a prosperous New Year

    Once, when I was a small child, growing up in eastern South Dakota, my father took my siblings and me to see reindeer in the parking lot of a Lewis Drug. One of the better customer-drawing gimmicks I had seen, at that point. While there, my father overheard a tall, dark-bearded fellow conversing with his two children in a strange tongue.

    Now, my father is very fond of languages, and enjoys learning more whenever the opportunity presents itself. I’ve early memories of him carrying one of his foreign-language Bibles to Church on Sunday, reading along with the sermon, albeit in a different tongue. The Estonian Bible was his most frequent church companion, I think.

    Anyway, the language this tall, dark-bearded father was speaking was as foreign to my own father as it was to me. So my father waited for a break in the conversation, and then went over, and asked that fine-bearded fellow what language he was speaking – might it be Hungarian? It wasn’t a language he was familiar with, but it had its similarities to Finnish and Estonian.

    As it turned out, Dad had guessed the language correctly – helped, no doubt, by his fondness for Finno-Ugric tongues – borne out of his Finnish heritage. While Dad shared his love of languages with me, and I’ve extensively pursued Latin and Greek, I’ve yet to spend much time on the tongues of my northern forbears.

    We ended up becoming close friends with that family of Hungarians, and were both guests and hosts many times over the next few years, sharing many meals. Friendships we’d never have had without Dad being inquisitive about language, and eager to have new, chance acquaintances over for coffee. And, of course, the help of a couple of reindeer.

    Here’s a traditional Hungarian recipe from the mother of that family.
    Something to eat on New Year’s Eve to bring fortune to you and yours throughout the next year.

    Lentil Stew:
    3 cups Lentils (for prosperity – see how the lentils look like little coins?)
    2 Tbsp Yellow Mustard
    Paprika powder
    1 medium Red Onion, quartered.
    1 small lemon, halved.
    5 bay leaves
    Garlic (either a generous sprinkling of powder or about 2 chopped cloves)
    Salt and Black Pepper to taste.
    A little smoked meat (if memory serves, smoked turkey was used the first time I had this, though lean pork is most traditional, especially cold smoked shortrib – Pork is supposed to bring good luck)

    Cook this assemblage in water until lentils are done – I like it to have the consistency of a porridge.
    Remove the onion, bay leaves, and lemon before serving with the following sauce.

    Paprika Sauce:
    Place 1-2 Tbsp flour in 2-3 Tbsp of hot oil, whisking until homogeneous.
    Add red paprika powder generously, letting it bloom in the hot oil.
    Mix with 1/2 cup sour cream and some milk, until desired consistency is reached.
    The sauce should be smooth and a bright orange in color.

    I suspect that this was how the mother of our Hungarian friends substituted for Hungarian Paprika Paste, being unable to get it in the American Midwest. She later brought us some Univer Red Gold paste as a gift, after a visit back to Hungary. What a treasure that was!

    The completed Lentil Stew with Paprika Sauce!
    May your New Year be filled with flavor.