Christmas Morning Casserole...A Favorite

Whether it is just SH and me on Christmas day or the whole family and friends I will always make my Christmas Morning Casserole. Now for a "do ahead" (no it is not doody head. I will save that for another post) person like myself this is perfect. I make this the night before then pop it into the fridge and take it out in the morning and in the oven it goes. Depending on how many I have at the house in the morning I will make a larger batch and put it into one of my bigger pans.

I am presenting the recipe as I have it written but I almost always add a little more sausage than what it calls for and I will add a little more onion to the O'Brien hash browns. This is so simple and so yummy.

Christmas Morning Casserole

1 large pkg. O’Brien frozen hash brown potatoes

1 c. diced ham or bulk sausage, browned

2/3 c. grated cheddar cheese

12 eggs

2/3 c. milk

Salt and pepper to taste

Line the bottom of 9 x 13 pan with partially thawed hash browns. Sprinkle with meat. Beat eggs, milk, salt and pepper. Pour eggs over the meat. Sprinkle with cheese. Cover with plastic wrap and put into the refrigerator overnight. Remove the plastic wrap and bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes.

Enjoy!

xxoo, Sue

Winter Cookies

Many years ago I had a neighbor that had a persimmon tree. One day he offered me several very ripe persimmons. I told him I didn’t know much about persimmons and I really didn’t know what to do with them. He told me I could make cookies or breads with them. O.K. but I still didn’t know much about persimmons. Do I chop them? Do I mash them? How does this get into the cookies? Keep in mind this was before the internet so I really didn’t have easy access to recipes using persimmons. He told me that he would get back to me.

The next day he gave me a very sketchy recipe for persimmon cookies. This recipe immediately reminded me of how my great grandma Nanny would have put together one of her recipes. The recipe seemed more like reminders of ingredients. I could tell that this was an old recipe. My neighbor said the recipe came from a lady who was 85 years old. Well, any who, I figured out the recipe and put it into a more recipe like format.

These have been one of our favorite winter time cookies. As a matter of fact I even changed the name to "Winter Cookies".

These cookies freeze well and taste even better after they have been frozen for a week or two. It gives the spices a chance to blend. Enjoy!



Winter Cookies (Persimmon Cookies)

1 cup persimmon puree
1 tsp baking soda
1 cup salted butter or margarine
1 ½ cups sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp lemon juice
2 tbsp orange juice
3 cups sifted flour
½ tsp salt
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
½ tsp nutmeg
½ tsp cloves
1 cup chopped nuts
Raisins if desired (the original recipe didn’t give an amount. I haven’t used raisins so I can’t say how much to put in. If I did I would use golden raisins)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Thoroughly mix the persimmon puree and baking soda and let stand.

Cream together the butter and sugar until it is light and fluffy.

Thoroughly mix the vanilla, lemon juice, orange juice and egg into the sugar mixture.

Give the persimmon puree a few stirs with a fork (it will be very gel like) then add to the sugar mixture and mix until blended.

Sift the flour again with the baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves.

Gradually blend the flour mixture into the sugar mixture. Mix until thoroughly blended. Stir in the nuts.

Drop level tbsp of dough, 2 inches apart onto a lightly greased, or parchment lined cookie sheet.

Bake for 12 minutes.

Makes 5 dozen.

These are a perfect cookie for breakfast. They are cake-like and pair perfectly with tea or coffee.

I want to thank everyone for their get well wishes. I am feeling much better from my annual head cold. As far as head colds this one wasn't as bad as some. I was just tired.

Hugs and love too all, Sue

Cooking, Decorating and Laundry?

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I have been visiting many blogs today and everyone is decorating for Christmas. Where is this energy coming from? I want some! Just kidding. I am looking forward to all the pictures.

My granddaughters and I decorated the Christmas tree on Friday. For me that was a big deal because I rarely get them over the holidays because Momma and Daddy always have to work the next day and they live 200 miles away. I must admit that I was exhausted Friday morning because I was up until 1 AM cleaning up from our Thanksgiving feast. At that point it now became a 21 hour day for me. I tend to be a control freak so needless to say I would not let anyone do the cooking or would I allow anyone to help with the clean up. But I would not change a thing because I love it and we had a wonderful time.

The tree decorating went very slow because I was moving very slow. At one point the girls were wondering if we would ever get the tree finished. As the evening rolled around we finally got it decorated.


The only mishap was I could not get the bottom branches to light. Either I missed a plug or they have finally burned out. Quite frankly, I did not want to rummage around inside the tree looking for the plug. Maybe next year.

I really have been very busy these last few weeks. I so want to get back to my blog. I miss everyone. In the next few days I will post some pictures of our trip to Texas. The weekend before Thanksgiving my husband’s nephew got married. It was a beautiful wedding.

We returned to Sacramento on Monday. On Tuesday morning I had to start a marathon shopping trip for Thanksgiving. Since I was having 19 people I had to carefully plan my day so I could get all the shopping done. Before I began my shopping I thought I would get some laundry started. You probably know where this is going. Yes, my 12 year old washing machine went out. Instead of the grocery store, my first stop was Sears. 45 minutes later and much poorer I had my new washer ordered. Oh and a dryer too. The dryer was even older than the washer and I figured it was only a matter of time before that was going to break down. I now finally own a matching washer and dryer. How many decades did this take? :)

I have been on vacation for the last two weeks and quite frankly I need to get back to work so I can get some rest. I AM POOPED!


Many hugs and much love to everyone, Sue