Anyway, my Mom has been making these deviled eggs for ages and they are always the first appetizer to go. You could, of course, jazz them up with caviar, candied bacon or even lobster chunks, as fancy deviled eggs seem to be a thing these days, but my Mom just sprinkles them with paprika or maybe some parsley sprigs.

Now if you have the Serve It Up! Ace for Autism Cookbook, you already have this recipe. You also have a great recipes for: Guacamole, Tuna Nachos, Caviar Pie, Pickled Eggplant, Buffalo Chicken Dip, John Schild’s famous Conch Fritters and my favorite Grilled Shrimp recipe. And that’s just in the Appetizer sections alone. P.S. I have one left if anyone’s interested.

Another secret my Mom taught me is to use my InstaPot to hard boil the eggs for this recipe. It’s pretty much the only thing I use my InstaPot for! So, put your eggs in the steamer basket, add 1 cup of water and cook on high for 5 minutes. Let sit for 5 minutes, run under cold water and peel. These eggs (I’m guessing because of the pressure inside the egg shell) peel like a dream!

Mom’s Famous Deviled Eggs

Recipe by Lyla RiceCourse: AppetizersCuisine: AmericanDifficulty: Easy

Servings

24

servings

Prep time

15

minutes

Ingredients

• 12 hardboiled eggs, peeled

• 1/2 cup Hellman’s mayo

• 1/4 cup Miracle Whip

• 1 1/2 tsp. hot dog mustard

• 1 tsp. grated onion

• 1/4 tsp. salt

• 3 Tablespoons sweet pickle relish

Directions

• Peel eggs and slice in half, removing yolks to a small bowl.
• Mash yolks and other ingredients, until mixture is smooth.
• Use a pastry bag with star opening for nicer presentation.
• Decorate with paprika, parsley or pimento.

Notes

• You can keep the egg halves and the mixture in the fridge for a day, if doing it ahead.

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I taught Anne and Denise (nee Joffre) how to make this recently at a Cooking Class at my house. Their mother Eleanor and my grandmother Julia were good friends and Denise was in regular touch with my Great Aunt Josie.

The recipe is easy to remember, with the proportions being 1/1/1. One egg, one cup of flour and 1 cup of ricotta. A recipe I read online said to drain the ricotta in a sieve for half an hour before using, but I’m pretty sure my Aunt Josie didn’t do that. It also said to use 00 flour, but I just used All-Purpose.

You want the dough to be a little wet and sticky, but able to form it into a ball and roll it with a floured rolling pin. If it’s too wet, add a little more flour. To freeze these gnocchi, place on a floured cookie sheet and put in the freezer for an hour or two. Remove and place in a plastic freezer bag. When you’re ready to use the gnocchi, just drop frozen gnocchi into boiling water. Easy peasy!

Ricotta Gnocchi

Recipe by Josie SmithCourse: EntreeCuisine: ItalianDifficulty: Medium

Servings

4

servings

Prep time

10

minutes

Ingredients

• 1 cup whole milk ricotta, drained

• 1 large egg, room temp

• 1 cup all purpose flour

• 3/4 tsp salt

• 1/4 tsp fresh ground pepper

• a generous grating of fresh nutmeg (optional)

Directions

• Drain ricotta, if desired. Put in a bowl and mix in the egg. Add the flour, salt and pepper and nutmeg. Stir until the dough comes together. If it’s too sticky, add more flour.
• Form dough into a ball and put on a lightly floured surface. Cut into 8 pie-shaped wedges.
• With a floured rolling pin (or your hands) roll each ball into a 3/4 ” snake-like shaped.
• With a butter knife, cut into bite-sized pieces. Gnocchi will expand as it cooks. If you desire, roll a fork over the top to make ridges (all the better to trap the sauce!). Coat the gnocchi in flour.
• Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil on medium-high heat. Drop gnocchi into water. When they float, remove with a slotted spoon and serve immediately with your favorite sauce and a grating of Parmesan cheese.

Recipe Video

Notes

• If you want to freeze gnocchi, coat in flour, put on a cookie sheet and freeze 1-2 hours. Remove from cookie sheet and put in a storage container. When ready to use, simply drop frozen gnocchi into boiling water.

With this easy recipe for gnocchi, you can have homemade pasta on the table in less than 15 minutes!

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It has made an appearance at every Fourth of July Party and other Barbeque at my parent’s house and then, at their children’s homes as well. It’s a very easy recipe. If you can open a can of beans, chop and stir, you can make these Baked Beans. If you wish to make it vegetarian, buy the Vegetarian Beans, don’t add bacon to the top and cover with aluminum foil. But, if you do like bacon, go for it! It adds flavor and crunch to the top and smells great.

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The cousins took my aunts to their apartment in Rome, where they had lunch. Part of the lunch was Pickled Eggplant, served on Saltines. My Aunt Josie was the cook in the family and she learned how to make it from her Italian cousins that afternoon. After lunch, they all changed into their nightgowns and took a nap. La vita bella! I think she told me dinner was a smaller meal than lunch, but she also told me that ever since that day, she always kept a jar of Pickled Eggplant in her refrigerator.

About ten years ago, I asked Josie to come over and show me how to make it. She was probably almost 90 years old at that point, and I figured it was best to learn from the maestro! Recipes are fine, and in fact I did have her recipe for Pickled Eggplant which she typed up and Xeroxed to give out, but there is no substitute for watching how a recipe is made. In person. Now, that Josie is gone, I’m so glad we had that morning together. She did have an issue with my eggplant, however.

This is the eggplant you got?

said Josie, picking it up disdainfully.

“Yes,” I said. “What’s wrong with it?”

“I like to get firm eggplants,” she said.

So, when you get your eggplant to make this, make sure it’s firm. I used two small eggplants, instead of one large, because that’s what I had from Empower Farms.

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My son Christopher asked for the recipe this year (he was home alone with the baby, cooking the meal while Courtney worked) and my sister Elise asked me about it, as well. She actually didn’t know the secret to our grandmother’s Sausage Stuffing (!), so I clued her in. I opened the oven to take out our turkey and took a crusty hunk of stuffing off the mound, coming out of the bird, and I have to say, it was my favorite bite of Thanksgiving.

And it got me thinking, why can’t I have sausage stuffing more than once a year? It’s so good and could be stuffed into a small turkey, a large chicken or cute little Cornish Hens. So here, without further ado, is my Nanny’s Famous Sausage Stuffing. P.S. This is actually the recipe on the back of Pepperidge Farm’s Herb Seasoned Classic Stuffing, with a couple tweaks.

Nanny’s Sausage Stuffing

Recipe by SergioCourse: Uncategorized

Servings

13

servings

Prep time

20

minutes

Cooking time

40

minutes

Calories

200

kcal

Ingredients

• Package (12 ounces) stuffing

• 4 Tablespoons Butter

• I cup chopped onion

• 1 cup chopped celery

• 16 ounce package of Jones pork sausage

• 2 cups chicken broth

• 2 beaten eggs

Directions

• Open sausage package and brown in a large skillet.
• Add butter to same skillet. Melt and saute onions and celery until tender-crisp.
• Add broth and heat to a boil.
• Remove skillet from heat. Add stuffing and mix lightly.
• When stuffing is cooled off, add two beaten eggs.
• Loosely spoon stuffing into a turkey, chicken or cornish hen cavity. Spoon any remaining stuffing miture into greased casserole dish. Cover and bake with turkey during last 35 minutes of roasting time.
• Roast turkey, chicken, Cornish hens according to package directions.
• Allow turkey to stand 20 minutes before removing stuffing and slicing turkey.

Notes

• The secret to this stuffing is the beaten eggs! It keeps it moist. I sometimes also add chopped herbs to this recipe, but it isn’t neccessary.

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Kelley got the recipe from a man named Marc that used to work at the Pharmacy; it’s a family recipe (always the best kind!). This brisket, with its gravy, is perfect for dipping challah bread into or served with something to soak it up, such as mashed potatoes, pureed cauliflower or rice.

Amazingly Tender Brisket

Recipe by Marc from Pharmacy

Servings

6

6 ounces

Prep time

30

minutes

Cooking time

40

minutes

Calories

450

kcal

This amazingly tender Brisket will be the hit of your Holiday Meal.

Ingredients

• 1 Brisket, trimmed of fat

• 2-3 packages of Onion Soup Mix/Beefy Onion

• 1 Beef Broth Carton (32 ounces), low sodium

• 1 Large White Onion, sliced

• 1 Bottle of Red Wine

• Salt

• Pepper

• Onion Powder

• 4 cloves fresh garlic, minced

Directions

• Trim the fat off the brisket.
• Season both sides of the brisket with onion powder, salt and pepper.
• Place the brisket on top of the Soup mix and sprinkle one to two more packages on top of the brisket.
• Open one package of Onion Soup mix and pour it on the bottom of a large roasting pan.
  
• Add crushed garlic and 3/4 of the onion slices to the top of the meat.
• Pour the bottle of red wine around the meat.
• Add the rest of the onion slices to the liquid.
• Put the brisket, covered with foil, into a 350 degree oven for one hour and baste.
• If the liquid is low, add the beef broth to keep it moist. Baste every hour for the next five hours. Base your time on the size of the brisket.
• Once cooked through, cool and slice against the grain. Put the sliced meat back in the juice to soak up more of the liquid.

Notes

• You can freeze the meat (if cooked days in advance) and reheat or keep in the refrigerator and reheat. You can add another package of soup mix at this point to the liquid, as this creates the gravy to serve. Keep covered with foil when reheating.