Category Archives: Mennonite Girls Can Cook

Mennonite Girls Can Cook

M is for the Mennonite Girls Can Cook! I am one of the ten girls who have a blog we collaborate on to post a recipe a day and a devotional on Sundays. That blog is called Mennonite Girls Can Cook. We also have two published cook books, Mennonite Girls Can Cook and Mennonite Girls Can Cook Celebrations. Both of these books are available on Amazon.

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Anneliese, Judy, Lovella, Kathy, Bev, Betty, Ellen, Julie, Charlotte, and Marg.

Sometimes my meme buddies think that MGCC is my blog and all the recipes are mine because of my blogger comment link that will take you straight to MGCC.  If your blog has the (name/url) option to click on when I comment everything works great for memes because I can put in the url that will take you straight to my ABC Wednesday post, etc.  My personal blog is The Happy Wonderer, ellen b. but blogger/google has hijacked me and will send you straight to the MGCC blog if you click on my comment name when I don’t have another option in commenting. Does that make sense? Enough of that…back to the Mennonite Girls.

In 2010 all ten of us got together for the very first time to sign the contract for our first cookbook. Nine Canadians and one American, me. The nine Canadians hail from Abbotsford, Chilliwack, Winnipeg and Steinbach.

Here we are with our first cookbook in hand. It’s easy for me to get together with the girls from British Columbia and we cherish the few times all 10 of us can be together since Betty and Charlotte are over 2200 miles away from us. Along our cookbook journey we’ve had some fun book signings at farm markets, 10,000 Villages, bookstores and more…

Barnes and Noble in Bellingham and Ten Thousand Villages in Vancouver.

We’ve also done cooking demonstrations at the West Coast Women’s Show, Lepp Farm Market, Mennonite Relief Sales and on Global T.V.

In July of 2012 we signed a contract for our second book “Celebrations” which would be released in Spring of 2013.

Since this book was first published the cover has changed.

IMGP0322The West Coast girls traveled to Manitoba for book signings at several locations around Winnipeg and Steinbach so Charlotte and Betty were our hostesses for this great trip. I drove up to Abbotsford, B.C. to hop on a plane with the west coast girls for this trip to Winnipeg.

2014-03-26 paska class10I never dreamed blogging would bring this whole new world of Mennonites and Cookbooks into my life. This journey started with me contributing some recipes to the newly formed Mennonite Girls Can Cook blog that was inspired by a Paska Post on Lovella’s blog. Because the girls and I have family recipes that are very similar I was invited to be one of the contributors on the newly formed Mennonite Girls Can Cook blog even though I am not Mennonite. The ten of us remained faithful to the blog and soon a publisher came knocking at our door. Beyond publishing and blogging we have formed lifetime friendships with each other. The girls call me their adopted American cousin.

It’s not just the girls who enjoy our times together. Our husbands get to come along for the ride, too. We get together for events that have nothing to do with our cooking blog, too, but there is always good food to be eaten whenever we gather together!!

All this fun has not stopped yet because in August we will be published again with a smaller Devotional book with some recipes included.

I’m linking up to ABC Wednesday started by Mrs. Nesbitt and carried on by the masterful Roger and the ABC team. Thank you!

Super Lunar New Year!

super sunday

We had a fun celebration on Super Sunday starting with a exhilarating church service. Two of our pastors squared off with a sermon duel with the theme of finishing strong. Quarter one was about Solomon and his varied appetites that kept him from finishing strong. Quarter two was about Moses and his anger that kept him from finishing strong. Quarter three was about Judas and his greed that kept him from finishing strong. Quarter four was about Jesus and although it seemed that He wouldn’t finish strong because of his crucifixion he rose again to victory over death and sin. In order for us to finish strong we need to follow Him. There were penalties thrown and commercials in between quarters, a half time show, and Bibles with football binding given out to kids in the end zone after touchdowns!  In the end and maybe a bit prophetic Pastor Alexander with the help of his stand in after his injury on the field (sprained tonsils), pastor Goetze, edged out Pastor Wolfgang for the win.

We came home pumped up and started a few preparations for our Super Lunar New Year Bowl party.

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It was fun to gather up goods to set a Chinese New Year themed table for our party. This inspiration started in January while I visited San Francisco’s Chinatown with an old friend of mine.

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These three wine covers were the instigators for the table. A large variety of these were offered for sale in every shop Alice and I went into on our visit to Chinatown. I kept handling them but walking away. Finally in the last shop we visited my resistance was depleted and I bought these three. Look at those little hats with the braid attached! They were only $1.99 each!

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Now I was in search of more items to complete my table and room decor. There are several large Asian stores around our area and I went to one where I found the Lucky pockets, candy, almond cookies and fortune cookies.

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The lanterns, dragons, plates and napkins came from a party store.

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Before hand I queried each of our guests for the party about their favorite Chinese take out dish. We ordered each of these dishes and picked them up just before our planned start time. This take out idea really made hosting the party easy peasy. We heated up the Panko shrimp from the frozen section at Costco that went real well with sweet chili sauce. We would recommend it if you ever need an appetizer for a party.

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The one thing I prepared from scratch for our party was this Egg Flower Soup. You can click over to Mennonite Girls Can Cook to get the easy recipe today!

Happy New Year to all our Asian friends who are celebrating today!

Raclette and the Mennonite Girls…

ra·clette (rä-klĕt’) noun

1.a dish, of Swiss origin, similar to a fondue, consisting of melted cheese traditionally served on boiled potatoes and accompanied with pickles

Raclette is a Swiss Cheese dish that has been popular for centuries. There are different opinions about who started it. Some say shepherds in the mountains, other say it was the grape harvesters in the vineyards of the Valais region of Switzerland. No matter who, the fact is that after a hard days work, they gathered around a campfire and enjoyed a Raclette.

Everybody agrees, that it took place in the Valais region of Switzerland and that the original cheese was made there.

Raclette has more than one definition. Raclette is a Swiss cheese dish, a cultural land mark, the name of a cheese, a table top appliance, a dining experience, a great time!

 

This past Friday Dear and I joined the British Columbia Mennonite Girls for an early Christmas Raclette party at Bev and Harv’s beautiful home in Chilliwack. For most of us it was our first experience enjoying this type of meal where meat, cheese, vegetables, and pickled accompaniments are provided but each individual is responsible to cook and melt their choices for themselves on an electric Raclette grill.

 

We had thinly sliced and marinated flank steak, shrimp, sausage, jack and cheddar cheese (instead of the raclette cheese), mushrooms, broccoli, peppers, scallions, dill pickles, baby gherkins, pickled onions and of course the boiled potatoes and fresh baked french bread.

But…first things first.

 

We all sat down in the Russian style with the men together on one end of the great huge table and the girls on the other end!

 

Instructions were given on how to use the grill and melt the cheese. We sang Praise God from Whom All Blessings Flow for our Grace and the new culinary adventure began.

 

We started with a delicious salad that Bev put together for all of us, greens, pineapple, beets, goat cheese and nuts with a homemade dressing that was so bright and delicious.

 

Anneliese baked the bread for our evening.

 

 

 

My messy plate full before I scraped the cheese onto my bread.

 

 

There was lots of busy fun around the whole table.

 

We had to make room for two desserts, too. This one was a delicious gluten free caramel cake that Julie baked.

 

And Anneliese made a Beautiful Black Cherry chocolate trifle.

 

We ended the evening with our gift exchange. A wonderful variety of thoughtful gifts were opened and enjoyed.

The celebrations went late and Dear and I were happy that Judy and Elmer provided us with a room for the night. When we woke up on Saturday morning we were served a delicious breakfast before we hit the road for the U.S.A. on Saturday.  It was another hearty and hardy experience for us with our Mennonite friends!

As soon as we crossed the line from Canada into the U.S. I turned my phone back on and researched where we could buy a Raclette! We’re still celebrating at our house as today is our 41st Anniversary. I’ll share our anniversary celebrations later in the week…

Photobucket is holding all my photos from 2007-2015 hostage on their site. All my photos that I stored and uploaded from that site are now big ugly black and grey boxes with a message to pay big bucks to get them restored to my blog. It will take me a long time to restore thousands of posts.

Promises Kept…

This recipe has been around the block a few times and I finally tried it and served my extended family this for dessert last Friday. I’m not saying who but one of my guests went back for a second serving. This recipe is enough for probably 16 and would be a nice alternative for Pumpkin Pie at Thanksgiving…

The recipe is on the Mennonite Girls Can Cook Blog today. Click over and enjoy. I’d like to wish our Canadian friends a very Happy Thanksgiving weekend coming up!

The card in the background is of a still life Dear’s Aunt put together for this photo card. She’s an artist and usually paints but enjoyed this still life photo shoot. The recipe for the Pumpkin Surprise was on the back of the card and I tweaked the recipe just a bit.

We are a bit foggy and gloomy today. I’m hoping to get out for a wee drive somewhere with Dear since there is no construction going on again today. He did just construct me a breakfast burrito. He’s a keeper for lots of reasons…

Have a wonderful October day!

 

There and Back Again…

Yesterday I put a dress on (gasp!) and grabbed my passport and headed to Chilliwack B.C. to attend a tea planned in honor of our own dear Kathy of the Mennonite Girls Can Cook. Kathy’s Mother-in-law Eileen invited us all to her lovely home and treated us to a very special time. What a wonderful example to all of us girls Eileen is as she chose to bless her daughter-in-law in this special way!

We missed our Manitoba girls, Betty and Charlotte!

Every detail was well thought out and chosen. Beautiful china, silver and 100 year old crystal goblets graced the beautiful table.

After we gathered Eileen shared some thoughts about Kathy using the letters of her name to describe some of Kathy’s attributes. Kind, active, thoughtful, honest, and youthful were just some of the words to describe Kathy. We raised our beautiful glasses to toast our dear friend.

Have you ever seen or enjoyed one of these sandwich loaves? This was my first and I was in awe!

I set aside my de-fluffing regiment on this day because it truly was a day for feasting not fasting!

We found our spots at the table and Eileen offered a blessing on our food and time together. Before we filled our plates for our main course Kathy’s father-in-law, who was our gracious butler for the afternoon, served us our soup course which was a lovely cold Raspberry soup…delicious and refreshing. After we filled our plates and enjoyed our main course there was a light and fluffy Pavlova with strawberries for dessert. Did I mention feasting not fasting?

Kathy is in the center of the collage and her mother-in-law Eileen is above her. Lovella, Eileen, Anneliese, Judy, Kathy, Bev, Marg, Ellen and Julie.

We all reflected on how nice it was to be served in such a special way. It was a wonderful time of catching up with each other. A great time of witnessing Bill and Eileen working together as a couple to help and honor each other and to be a great example of hospitality in action. We were all blessed and our cups were filled to overflowing.

I wanted to share this post before I’m in full swing wedding mode! Prayers appreciated for the blessed event coming up!

 

True Confessions…

…this will be my last confession of 2014…

 

I have not had much experience in working with yeast doughs or doughs of any kind. I’m going to work on this in 2015. Today on Mennonite Girls Can Cook I posted my first attempts on recreating one of my mom’s wonderful Pirog пирог recipes.

The standard shape for my mom’s pirog is rectangular. They can be closed or open-faced with no crust on top.

Sometime in 2015 I will share a savory pirog that my mom used to make with a closed presentation.

Click here to get to Mennonite Girls Can Cook and my Sweet Apple Pirog пиро́г.

 

Without the Guests…

…the preparations are in vain. It’s because of the long-awaited guests that the preparations were completed. This time of year as we remember our long awaited Savior who came to earth on that first Christmas, the preparations for my guests had more significance.  Most of my guest photos were taken by Anneliese and Lovella. Thank you for sharing girls!

Lovella brought this very cute flower arrangement as a hostess gift and I found the perfect spot for it next to my sign that Katie wrote on. It was time for the party to begin and for everyone to eat, drink and be merry!

Kathy and Lovella prepared an Antipasti Platter for us all to enjoy before we sat down to dinner.

Our daughter Katie came to help with the serving.

It was time to find our places at the table.

When everyone found their spot we sang Praise God from Whom all Blessings Flow. This has become a tradition for our gatherings.

Katie made sure the soup was hot before she served each person their cup.

Between the courses we sang Christmas Carols. O Tannenbaum and Silent Night were the two chosen and sung in English and German. I wasn’t surprised by the choices my “German” guests made.

It was time to get the dessert plates ready.

After dessert we had fun popping our Christmas poppers and wearing our crowns.

Before the girls retreated to another room to open the little gifts purchased for each other, Judy handed the guys their gift for the evening.

They each got their very own apron…

I’ll add the shout out to the young man who makes these to sell once I get the information from Judy. Since we let him use our logo he gifted us with the aprons for our “boys”.

By this time my eyes were drooping but my heart was full. I’ll leave you with a few closeups and cameos…

I got a kick out of this wine bag that Bev and her guy brought us a bottle of wine in.

What a wonderful world God opened up to us “Girls” over these past several years. I’m so thankful that God brought us together and has deepened our “love for one another”.

So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. (Philippians 2: 1-4)

More Xmas 006Praying you are feeling the Joy this Christmas!

The Preparations…

On Sunday December 14th our long awaited Christmas Party with the British Columbia Mennonite Girls and their husbands began at three in the afternoon. My preparations had been going on for a while.

2014-12-11 More XmasJoy was the theme and red and gold were the color choices I picked. I had red glassware but only had a total of 10 pieces so I was on the hunt for 6 more goblets or glasses to fill the 16 place settings we would need for our party. When we traveled to our son’s home in eastern Washington in early November we shopped at some thrift stores and found a set of 8 red goblets for a real good price. Yippee!

We do not have an open concept home by any means and to be able to fit 16 around tables we had to get creative. We decided to empty out some of the furniture from our living room so we could fit two round tables that would each be set with eight place settings.

Where there’s a will there’s a way. I saw a package of red and gold Christmas Crackers at Costco and knew they’d be a fun addition to the table. The red and gold sparkly chargers came from HomeGoods. I already had a stash of cloth napkins in red and gold tones and napkin rings that worked nicely with the color theme. I found flat Christmas wreaths and red candle holders for my center pieces.

Here’s a photo the day of our gathering with all the last minute touches added to the table. This photo was taken by Lovella. The next couple of  photos were taken by Anneliese.

Our front porch was transformed with a fake little Christmas tree that we had in our condo when we lived in Southern California for a few years. The vintage red step stool was a fun piece to put some of my lanterns on. The cedar branches and all the greenery with red berries, rosemary, and holly came from my yard. I had the large glass jars that I filled with the greenery and added a candle in to warm up the entry to our home.

I’m enjoying our new 3D star that we purchased this year that adds it’s light to welcome you to our front door.

My next post will show the people that made all these preparations worthwhile. Here’s the sneak peek of the girls and the guys.

More to come soon with some great photos from Anneliese and Lovella who clicked away while Dear and I worked on getting the food ready for everyone.

Since I finally set a table and took some photos I’m going to link this post to Cuisine Kathleen’s Let’s Dish for this week. If you’d like to see my guests seated at these tables click here.