Super Coleslaw #recipe @LucyBurdette #giveaway @levelbestbooks

Tennessee Steve and his better half, Dorothy Rahn

LUCY BURDETTE: During the high season in Key West, our fabulous kitchen store and bakery (The Restaurant Store) sponsors an artisan market. I'm there sometimes in the Key West Writers Guild booth, and there are lots of local artists, craft beers, music, and delicious food. But our must-stop is Tennessee Steve's BBQ rib booth. Oh my the ribs are tasty! And I would not even attempt to make them. But I can and do make the healthy and delicious cole slaw that we serve along with the ribs.

I have started buying Fresh Express packages of super kale salad in the supermarket. It comes with packets of pumpkin seeds and cranberries, along with a poppyseed dressing that I don’t use because of sodium content. 

Since I always like to try to have extra vegetables on hand, especially during the holiday treat indulgence period, I decided to make a big pile of this coleslaw that I could eat for lunches and dinners all week, in addition to a rib side dish. The "recipe" is very flexible, so you could add carrots or peppers or onions or various herbs as you choose. The secret is to prepare the vegetables ahead of time, and then take them out and dress them as needed. I suppose you could even add them to soups and stews if the whim hits you.

Ingredients

1/2 cabbage
8 to 10 Brussel sprouts
Two broccoli stalks
Large handful of kale
1/3 cup pepitas (pumpkin seeds)
1/3 cup dried cranberries, raisins, or cherries

For the dressing

2 tablespoons good mayonnaise
1/8 cup or more cider vinegar
1/4 cup olive oil
1 teaspoon celery seed
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon sugar


Fresh black pepper

Either chop, or even better, put the vegetables through your Cuisinart so they are all shredded. Mix.

Stir the mayonnaise with the vinegar, celery seed, salt and sugar, and then whip in the olive oil. Taste to be sure it’s seasoned to your liking.

An hour or two before serving, mix the dressing with the vegetables, then fold in the pepitas and cherries. You could even add a sprinkle of goat cheese if the mood struck you!

We served this with Tennessee Steve’s ribs and baked beans Yum! (Recipe for beans to come...)

Because my purchased copies of SNOWBOUND, this year's anthology of best New England Crime Stories from Level Best Books arrived yesterday, and because it's holiday season, and because my short story "Dorothea and the Case of the Noxious Nanny" got the lead position (wow and yay!), I'd love to give a copy away. Leave a comment telling us who on your list would enjoy the short stories (of course, it can be you.) I'll post a winner on Monday, December 11!

Lucy Burdette writes the Key West food critic mysteries--find them wherever books are sold! Find her on Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest--Instagram too...

And the next Artisan Market at the Restaurant Store is December 17, 10-2. I'll be there from 12-2! 

Mincemeat Tarts

by Sheila Connolly

Mincemeat pie has long been associated with Christmas—think Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, where a mince pie awaits at the end of the final meal. (BTW, Tori Avey, who write about food and culture for PBS, called Dickens “a true Victorian foodie, a man who took serious pleasure in eating and drinking.”

Long, long ago, when I first heard the term “mincemeat,” all I could think of was the “meat” part. I was pretty sure I didn’t want meat in my dessert. Luckily nobody offered me any mincemeat.

But then one summer many years ago I had a job in a department store in London (Simpson’s Piccadilly—I had a great time!), where if we worked the late opening days, we were entitled to “tea” in the basement cafeteria, around five. Tea might include tea, of course (black or white), plus kippers and buns and—mincemeat tarts. I quickly became a convert.

This past week I was strolling through my supermarket and was halted by a display of teeny, tiny boxes of mincemeat, in a package smaller than a kid’s juice box. Surely you jest! That little box will make a whole pie? But the maker was serious: it’s dried mincemeat, that you have to restore by adding water and boiling for a minute. This I had to see to believe, so I brought one box home as an experiment.

Okay, it looks like dog food,
but it does get better!

But I don’t like the stuff well enough to eat a whole pie’s worth, so I decided to recreate the tiny tarts instead. If you want to dress them up for the holiday, use a decorative cutter instead of a plain round one for the top crust.

Mincemeat Tarts

Crust:

1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 cup powdered sugar

1 Tblsp grated fresh grated 

     orange peel

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 cup (1 stick) chilled unsalted 

     butter, cut into 1/2” cubes

1 large egg yolk

2 Tblsp orange juice (more if needed)

Filling:

3/4 cup purchased mincemeat

3 Tblsp minced crystallized ginger

1/4 tsp ground cinnamon

Glaze: 1 egg, beaten

Mix together the flour, 6 Tblsp powdered sugar, 2-1/2 tsp orange peel and salt in a food processor. Add the butter and process in spurts until the mixture resembles coarse meal. In a small bowl, whisk together the egg yolk and 2 Tblsp orange juice.  Add the liquid to the processor and blend until moist clumps form (add more juice by teaspoons-ful if needed). Gather the dough into a ball and flatten. Chill for 30 minutes. (By the way, this made a very nice crust: it’s light and flavorful, and also easy to roll and handle.)

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Generously butter or grease 18 1-3/4 inch mini muffin pans. Mix together the mincemeat, ginger, cinnamon, and the rest of the powdered sugar and orange peel. (A note on muffin tins. I have lots, many of them vintage. I tried my two smallest ones, and while the baby size made nice two-bite tartlets, it was easier to shape and remove them from the slightly larger tin.)

Roll out the dough on a floured surface to make a 17” round. 

I had to include this--it was a gift from my sister-
in-law and it's just gorgeous!

Using a 2-1/2” round cookie cutter, cut out 18 dough rounds. Press a round onto the bottom and up the sides of each muffin cup. (A note on forming the bottoms: try not to tear the sides while pressing them into the molds, because then the filling leaks out and the whole thing sticks to the pan. I found the rounded top of a champagne cork worked quite well. If you don't have one, go out and buy a bottle of champagne--now!)

Fill the lined muffin cups with 1 heaping teaspoon filling (do not overfill). Now, you can go one of two ways with this next step: (a) seal the top with a smaller circle, or (b) say the heck with it and use whatever little decorative shape you want. (The second is easier!) For (a), using a slightly smaller (1-3/4”) cookie cutter, cut out 18 more rounds (reroll the dough if you need to). Brush the edges of the smaller rounds with some of the egg glaze. Place one of the smaller rounds atop the filling in each cup, glazed side down, and press the edges to seal. Cut a small X in each top crust. For (b) just have fun!

Glazed and ready to bake

Brush the pies with the remaining egg glaze. Bake until the top crusts are golden, about 20 minutes. With a small knife, cut around each tart to loosen, then turn out onto a rack to cool. Don’t try to remove them while they’re hot, because then they’ll crumble.

And have a lovely holiday!  

Here are a couple of pictures of Dublin just before Christmas:

I do wish I'd bought the sign in the middle:
Life is What you Bake it

In case you can't guess, An Early Wake, the third book in the County Cork Mysteries, will be out in February.

You can pre-order it at Amazon or Barnes and Noble

And you can get a taste of Ireland for free with my e-story, Under the Hill (Amazon and Barnes and Noble)