Desserts

177/365: National Chocolate Pudding Day

Posted on June 26, 2013 by Midwest Mark

Today’s food holiday is decadent, creamy, and smooth. Unless you live in England, where it’s more of a spongey cake-like consistency. June 26 is National Chocolate Pudding Day!

We’ve had pudding holidays before, so if you’re keeping track of all your food history through our blog, you’ll remember that “pudding” once referred to sausage, and was savory long before it ever became sweet. In England, if you order chocolate pudding, you’ll get a cake-like dessert that is thickened with eggs and steamed. Here in the good ol’ USA, pudding is thickened with starch and boiled, resulting in a much creamier treat. I’ll give Britain their cool double-decker buses and Big Ben, but I personally think our version of pudding is about a hundred times better than theirs. And I know. I’ve had both.

Jell-O started making puddings back in 1897, but most of the early flavors were fruity. In 1934 General Foods introduced Walter Baker’s Dessert, a chocolate confection named after Baker’s chocolate company. In 1936, in an effort to fend off a million “who the hell is Walter Baker?” questions, the name was simplified to Jell-O Chocolate Pudding.

We went the easy route today and had prepared chocolate pudding cups. Before you cry foul, just remember that we slaved over souffles twice this year, and have made a majority of desserts from scratch. We needed a break!

National Chocolate Pudding Day

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176/365: National Strawberry Parfait Day*

Posted on June 25, 2013 by Midwest Mark

Today’s food holiday is perfect! Literally. It’s the French word for “perfect.” June 25 is National Strawberry Parfait Day!

It’s also National Catfish Day. I personally would have preferred celebrating this dish instead, as I love a good fried catfish and there are a couple of really good Southern restaurants in Portland that serve catfish. But Tara isn’t real keen on the fish, so we agreed to celebrate with strawberry parfaits instead. Why break the dessert streak, anyway?

Not too long ago we had chocolate parfaits, so this is somewhat familiar territory for us. Only this time we are fortunate to have fresh strawberries to use. Specifically, Hood strawberries from Oregon, which we picked up from the farmer’s market on Sunday. Hoods are the sweetest, juiciest, most flavorful strawberries in the world. I’m convinced of this. I have friends in California who insist their strawberries are better, but to me it’s not even close. Ours blow theirs away hands down. Click on the above link if you want a refresher course on the history of parfait.

Here’s a fun and random fact about strawberries. In Bavaria, people living in the countryside have an annual rite each spring in which they tie a basket full of strawberries to the horns of their cattle as an offering to elves, who they believe love strawberries and will reward the farmers with healthy calves and an abundance of milk as a thank you gesture.

Ha. Country folk.

I decided to mix things up and go healthier with these parfaits. I layered Tillamook vanilla yogurt, fresh Hood strawberries from Oregon, and granola for a tasty low-cal, low-fat treat. It was very good. But also would have been more apropos for breakfast. Hmm…

National Strawberry Parfait Day

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174/365: National Pecan Sandies Day

Posted on June 23, 2013 by Midwest Mark

Today’s food holiday is a little nutty. Literally. June 23 is National Pecan Sandies Day!

Pecan sandies are essentially sugar cookies with chopped pecans. Their name comes from their sand-like color. Originally called “sand tarts,” pecan sandies are the descendants of sugar cookies that originated in the Middle East. Cookies themselves started out as grain cakes cooked over hot stones some 10,000 years ago. These early “biscuits” were largely flavorless but kept for long periods of time, and became a popular ration for soldiers and sailors alike, both of whom needed a durable food that wouldn’t spoil during their long journeys. A popular early cookie that contained nuts, sweetener, and water was called the jumble. English settlers brought cookies to America in the 17th century, though the name itself comes from the Dutch koekje. In many countries of the world, including the U.K., cookies are still called “biscuits.” Which makes me wonder what biscuits are called…

Keebler makes a variety of Pecan Sandies cookies, and they’re pretty good. So we picked up a package to celebrate today’s food holiday. Pretty simple!

National Pecan Sandies Day

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172/365: National Peaches and Cream Day

Posted on June 21, 2013 by Midwest Mark

You may be feeling peachy keen because it’s the first day of Summer. Which would be appropriate, considering June 21 is National Peaches and Cream Day!

I’m glad peaches and cream get their own holiday and everything, but what about Peaches & Herb?! Reunited and it feels so good? Shake your groove thing? Come on, people. Honor the groovy 70s duo!

Anyway. Peaches and cream is the South’s answer to strawberries and cream, which is a British invention. It’s considered a relatively healthy dessert because it is made with fresh fruit chock full of vitamins, though there’s still that pesky thing called “cream” keeping it from being a true dieter’s friend. Peaches, once called Persian apples, originated in China and were a favorite of emperors. As it spread through Europe it became a popular but rare treat. A fresh peach wrapped in a fancy cotton napkin was considered a high-falutin’ dessert back in the day. Peaches were brought to America by Spanish explorers in the 16th century, but commercial production didn’t actually begin until the 19th century in Maryland, Delaware, Georgia, and Virginia.

Like strawberries and cream, the “cream” in peaches and cream is actually whipped. To celebrate the holiday, we sliced a fresh peach (the benefit of having this holiday land on the summer solstice) and topped it with a generous dollop of whipped cream. There are fancier recipes out there, but we had a concert to attend tonight and needed to keep it simple. It was delicious, anyway!

National Peaches and Cream Day

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171/365: National Vanilla Milkshake Day

Posted on June 20, 2013 by Midwest Mark

Those susceptible to brain freezes beware: June 20 is National Vanilla Milkshake Day!

The term “milkshake” has been around since the 1800s, though it originally referred to an entirely different drink altogether. It first appeared in print in 1885 and was described as a”sturdy, healthful eggnog type of drink, with eggs, whiskey, etc., served as a tonic as well as a treat.” I don’t know if your liver would necessarily agree about the “healthful” part, but whatever. By 1900 the alcohol had disappeared, and milkshakes were made with vanilla, chocolate, or strawberry syrups. It wasn’t until 1922 when the milkshake as we know it and love it was invented; a Walgreens employee named Ivar “Pop” Coulson added two scoops of ice cream to a malted milk (milk, chocolate, and malt powder) and, voila! A new creation was born. By the 1930s milkshakes were popular across the nation, and the invention of freon-cooled refrigerators during that decade provided a safe and reliable method of making and dispensing ice cream. Fancy stainless steel automatic milkshake mixing machines soon followed, and in the 1950s Ray Kroc bought exclusive rights to one of these automated milkshake makers to speed up production in his fledgling new chain of fast-food restaurants called McDonald’s. These machines folded air into the drinks, making them smooth and fluffy. Like a koala bear. Milkshakes have remained popular over the years, evoking nostalgia for a bygone era. They are an especially profitable source of revenue for restaurants since the fluffy drinks contain so much air; one market research study showed that 75% of the cost of an average milkshake is pure profit. Almost makes me want to not order a milkshake just out of spite, but come on…how could I do that? Milkshakes are delicious!

To celebrate, we stopped at McDonald’s. After all, it was Ray Kroc’s foresight that helped milkshakes become as widely popular and readily available as they are now.

National Vanilla Milkshake Day

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165/365: National Strawberry Shortcake Day

Posted on June 14, 2013 by Midwest Mark

Today we celebrate a redheaded doll and her cat, Custard!

Oopsie. Scratch that. We celebrate a dessert, not a cartoon character. June 14 is Flag Day…and it’s also National Strawberry Shortcake Day! And how fitting, because few dishes are as American as strawberry shortcake.

Shortcake is named for the butter, or shortening, added to dough to soften it up. It’s actually a European invention that dates to the 16th century. And even though strawberries were enjoyed in ancient Rome, putting the two ingredients together was an American concept that occurred in the 1840s. When transcontinental railroads were built during that decade, strawberries – which before had only a limited local following – were shipped all over the U.S., and became an extremely popular summertime fruit. An early American colonist was quoted as saying, “Doubtless the almighty COULD make a better berry, but doubtless he never did.” The first strawberry shortcake recipe was printed in Eliza Leslie’s 1847 cookbook Lady’s Receipt Book: A Useful Companion for Large or Small Families. Soon, strawberry shortcake parties became all the rage as a celebration of summer’s approach. This recipe has stood the test of time, and remains popular to this day.

Tara and I met up for lunch at Burgerville, which sells fresh, seasonal, individual strawberry shortcakes. We split one, and wow, was it good!

Coming tomorrow: we asked, and you shared. Our readers describe their klutziest kitchen moments ever. Stay tuned!

National Strawberry Shortcake Day

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163/365: National Peanut Butter Cookie Day

Posted on June 12, 2013 by Midwest Mark

You might find yourself in a sticky situation if you celebrate today’s food holiday…but you’ll love it! June 12 is National Peanut Butter Cookie Day.

George Washington Carver may have had a confusingly Presidential name, but the agricultural teacher at Alabama’s Tuskegee Institute was more interested in peanuts than politics. He advocated them as a replacement crop for cotton, which was being decimated by insects at the time. Carver published a cookbook in 1916 called How to Grow the Peanut and 105 Ways of Preparing it for Human Consumption, which might just win the award for Longest Cookbook Title Ever. The book contained three recipes for peanut cookies, all of which called for crushed or chopped peanuts. It wasn’t until a few years later that peanut butter was listed as an ingredient. Originally, the cookies were formed into balls, but these did not cook properly. Bakers began flattening the dough with forks, leading to the signature criss-cross marks so closely associated with peanut butter cookies. Pillsbury touted the use of a fork to make these waffle-like marks, when their recipe for Peanut Butter Balls was published in 1933. Cooks were instructed to press the cookies using fork tines. Alternative methods called for using a device called a cookie shovel, and then transporting them to the oven using a cookie wheelbarrow. Crumbs could be cleaned up using a cookie rake.

Our peanut butter cookies still contained crosshatch marks even though we didn’t make them from scratch. Instead, we opted for some Nutter Butters, which have the added advantage of being peanut butter cookies shaped like peanuts. Mr. Carver would be impressed.

Nutter Butter

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162/365: National German Chocolate Cake Day

Posted on June 11, 2013 by Midwest Mark

Don’t even think about saying auf weidersehen without trying a slice of today’s celebrated food. June 11 is National German Chocolate Cake Day!

Despite the name, this cake has no ties to Germany whatsoever. It’s actually an American cake consisting of chocolate layers and topped with a coconut-pecan frosting. In 1852 Sam German, a chocolate maker, developed a dark baking chocolate for Baker’s Chocolate Company. It was named Baker’s German’s Sweet Chocolate and was a popular ingredient in cakes. It would take another century for the cake we recognize today to catch on; in 1957 the Dallas Morning Star printed a cake recipe submitted by Mrs. George Clay using the baking chocolate and a sweet coconut-pecan topping. Called German’s Chocolate Cake, the pastry was an immediate hit. General Foods, which now owned Baker’s Chocolate, distributed the recipe to newspapers across the country, dropping the possessive (‘s) and renaming it German Chocolate Cake. Baker’s Chocolate saw sales increase by 73%, and the cake became a nationwide staple.

Next you’re going to tell me french fries aren’t really from France.

Anyway, I’ve always been a big fan of German Chocolate Cake, and used to request it for my birthday, so I was certainly not complaining about “having to” celebrate this food holiday. German chocolate cake is notoriously difficult to make from scratch – eggs need to be separated and beaten, chocolate needs to be melted – so we took the easy way out and used a dark chocolate cake mix and coconut/pecan frosting. You know what? It still tasted pretty good! Even if it isn’t really German engineered.

National German Chocolate Cake Day

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160/365: National Strawberry-Rhubarb Pie Day

Posted on June 9, 2013 by Midwest Mark

Today we’re enjoying something a little bit sweet, a little tart, and closely associated with summer. June 9 is National Strawberry-Rhubarb Pie Day!

I’ve already talked about the kajillion and one pie holidays celebrated this year (20, to be exact). For some of these we’ve taken the easy way out. But, I promised that when June rolled around, I would make a strawberry-rhubarb pie from scratch. And I had every intention of doing so. Until I happened upon a strawberry-rhubarb pie at the grocery store for $2.99. Adding up the cost of the ingredients I’d need – fresh strawberries and rhubarb, flour, sugar, etc. – not to mention the time and labor involved – and I quickly realized that I’d be a fool to pass up the $2.99 all-the-work-is-already-done-pie from Fred Meyer.

I’ve already talked about the history of pie and discussed strawberries, so let’s delve into rhubarb, shall we? It’s such an interesting food: a giant celery-like stalk that is really, really sour. It’s actually a vegetable that originated in China, where it was used for medicinal purposes for thousands of years, and was brought to the U.S. by Benjamin Franklin, the same dude-who-was-inexplicably-never-President-but-played-a-huge-role-in-American-history. It’s a member of the buckwheat family, but you have to be careful with it: only the stalk is edible. The leaves and roots are poisonous and should be avoided. Typically, the stalks are cut into pieces and stewed with sugar, then used for cooking in dishes like…well, pies. I don’t think I’ve ever had rhubarb any other way. It matches well with strawberries because the sweetness and tartness balance each other out.

In case you’re wondering how the grocery store strawberry-rhubarb pie tasted, it was pretty good! I suppose homemade would have been better, but I’ll just have to save that for a future pie day. We have a few left, you know. Pumpkin pie, for sure…mark my words.

Strawberry Rhubarb Pie

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158/365: National Chocolate Ice Cream Day*

Posted on June 7, 2013 by Midwest Mark

Want the latest scoop? Psst…June 7 is National Chocolate Ice Cream Day!

It’s also National Doughnut Day, a “floating” food holiday that occurs on the first Friday in June. Normally we’d be all over that, except for the not-so-insignificant fact that tomorrow is National Jelly-Filled Doughnut Day. Gotta have a little variety, you know? Then again, a few days ago we celebrated rocky road ice cream…

But back-to-back doughnut days are overkill. So we went with ice cream instead.

When it comes to ice cream flavors, vanilla is the most popular choice hands down (with 29% of the vote). Chocolate comes in second place (8.9%). But hey, there’s no shame in being a runner-up! (Unless you’re only up against one other competitor. Sorry, Super Bowl-losing San Francisco 49ers). Chocolate ice cream is made by blending cocoa powder with eggs, cream, sugar, and vanilla. It’s been around for centuries; the first ice cream parlor in America opened the same year we became a country, in 1776. Quakers brought over their favorite ice cream recipes, and the frozen treat became a widespread hit. Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, and Thomas Jefferson all indulged in ice cream when they weren’t busy flying kites in thunderstorms or secretly crossing the Delaware River and stuff. In fact, there’s a brown smudge on one corner of the Declaration of Independence that is rumored to be a dripping from the chocolate ice cream cone that Jefferson was licking when he put quill to parchment. That’s a totally made up fact, by the way. But it could’ve happened.

To celebrate, we picked up a small container from Fred Meyer. And ate it in the bedroom by candlelight. Chocolate = romance, right?

Chocolate Ice Cream

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