at Bertram’s hotel

Cooking With Christie: Why is Everything Sticky?

Finder of Lost ThingsLeave a comment

Inspiration: After reading The Spellshop and all its lovely sounding jams, I couldn’t shake the hankering for jam. Then, I spotted a great deal on fresh blueberries at my local grocery store. Grabbing a couple of extra lemons, with visions of jam dancing in my head, we set out for home.

A couple of days later, with The New Homemade Kitchen open at my elbow, I started making blueberry jam.

Using the book’s simple recipe, with The Spellshop‘s main character’s method hanging about the back of my brain, I combined the sugar, berries, and lemon juice, then added a bit of cinnamon for depth of flavor. After the hot mixture finished roiling and boiling in the pot, I ladled the finished product into warmed jars.

The berries, sugar, & lemon juice macerating!

Then, using a double boiler, I melted wax. Please don’t get mad at using wax to seal the jars. Only after starting the jam process did I figure out I didn’t have any more of the proper lids for sealing them off with a water bath, but I did have wax. Hence, it’s what I used. 

(For those who might be confused, wax sealing jam jars is no longer considered the safest method. However, since it will live in the fridge and will undoubtedly get eaten before any mold should start growing, I went with it.)

Christie: Whilst an entirely different book series inspired this culinary creation, I still can see Tuppence and Miss Marple making and bottling jam made of summertime fruits. Whilst Tommy, Poirot, and Hastings enjoy the results!

The first broken wax seal!

Cooking With Christie: Veggie Tot Pie

Finder of Lost ThingsLeave a comment

Inspiration: Recently, I’ve been battling mental fog. This blank greyness not only makes it difficult to think my way out of a paper bag — it turns cooking/baking from a joy into a chore. (Which sucks, btw.) Which means my husband and I end up eating eggs & pancakes and toasty cheese sandwiches & soup. But as much as I love these comfort classics, there’s only so long you can eat them until you start longing for a veggie.

So, on a day when I found myself with two brain cells to rub together, I flipped open The Pioneer Woman’s Super Easy Cookbook, hoping to find something new and easy to make.

And Mrs. Drummond didn’t let me down.

Veggie Tot Pie is a super versatile veggie forward dish that’s easy and cheap to make!

My Recipe Changes: Just as Ree instructed, I switched up the veggies a bit to suit our tastes and what I had in my freezer. (Which explains why I used crowns instead of tater-tots.)

I also discovered that unless you’ve got an enormous cast-iron skillet, you only need one can of Campbell’s condensed soup called for in the recipe (it’s what makes the sauce that ties the dish together). I favor Campbell’s reduced sodium Cream of Mushroom soup. It helps control the amount of salt in the end dish, allowing me to add things like soy sauce or Worcestershire sauce for extra depth of flavor.

And because of stupid, stupid allergies, I can’t add the called for onions and garlic — so I leaned hard against my spice cabinet. In the above pic, I added teaspoons of turmeric, paprika, black pepper, mushroom powder, tomato paste, and chili crisp.

In recent iterations — I’ve added frozen cubed sweet potatoes and fresh peppers to my original corn, pea, and carrot veggie mixture. I also used Abbot’s Butcher plant-based chorizo to make the pie into a main dish rather than a side. Adding the faux meat meant leaning into the chorizo spices — so I added a teaspoon of coriander, sweet paprika, black pepper, oregano, and chipotle instead. And it turned out great!

Christie: This is a simple dish I can see Tuppence cooking on a weeknight when her (and Tommy’s) kids were growing up. The tots on top make it fun (and the entire dish goes well with a dash of ketchup), and the wealth of veggies hiding in the gravy makes it easy to get the kids to eat their vegetables!