Please vote for me!

by Mrs Marvel

Wow, I am incredibly honored to have been nominated as one of 14 other cooking and baking blogs in Orange County (California) in the 2nd Annual You’ve Just Been Spotted Orange County Blog Awards!! In my mind, it’s an honor to be listed on their site, but to have been nominated – no, I did not nominate myself – by one of my readers as being among the best blogs in Orange County, well that is something I never thought would happen.

Friends and relatives, here is where you come in: VOTE for me!!!  Please follow the link above and click through their site (big capital letters that say HERE throughout their page), scroll down to Cooking & Baking Blogs, then click the radial button next to Gram’s Recipe Box. You can submit your vote after giving me the love, OR you can spend some time exploring the other blogs in the other categories and maybe voting for one of those. You do not have to live in Orange County to vote, so vote early, vote often, and tell your friends!

Thank you everyone! I am really enjoying this ride and I hope you are too.

Savory Shrimp

by Mrs Marvel

Here’s a tasty sounding recipe for shrimp with rice and a creamy sauce. This might be a fun recipe to reinterpret with garnishes you enjoy. For instance, I’m not a big fan of peas, but I might try this with edemame. It calls for a cup of shrimp but that does not seem like very much to me. Perhaps it wants bay shrimp?

Savory Shrimp

1 small onion sliced

1 tbsp butter

1/2 c cream

1 cup peas fresh or canned

1 1/2 cups cooked rice

1 cup shrimp

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp paprika

Cook onion in the butter. Add cream, rice and peas. Boil for 1 or 2 minutes. Add shrimp, salt, paprika & bake in slow oven 15 to 20 minutes.

Not Gram’s Plum Cake

by Mrs Marvel

Recently, I read a recipe for a plum cake that sounded good and different. Since my recent attempt at an upside down prune cake, lightly sweet and fruity cakes have been on my mind. So I followed this recipe and although I think it would be good with a scratch cake mix, I did use a box because I was pressed for time.

First we sliced the plums. I had six lovely plums, sliced three, Melody ate one, two were in reserve. Next, we prepared the batter. I did not add the almond extract to the cake mix because 1. I hate almond extract and 2. I didn’t have any. Third, we poured the batter into a large skillet. I for some reason don’t have a cast iron skillet, so I just used a skillet/casserole that I know can go in the oven. This casserole is about 11″ diameter and was 2/3 full if that gives you any idea of how much cake batter there is in a box cake mix.

Then we laid the plum slices on top of the batter. Some of them sank in right away and I tried to rescue them. Melody was surprisingly good at laying the slices on carefully. She did almost the entire center of the cake by herself.

Ready to go into the oven

We baked the cake at 375, starting out for 35 minutes. At that time the inside was still not done so I put it back for another 10 minutes. At the timer, the cake was nicely done so we took it out to cool.

Wait, where are the plums?

As you can see, the plum slices sank completely into the cake. The top was sprinkled with sugar, which accounts for the carmelized top of the cake. We let it cool about an hour, and then cut into it.

Topped with a little whipped cream

I turned the slice over so that the plums would be on top, then topped with a bit of whipped cream. It is a not-too-sweet and very moist cake, with a nice fruity finish. I was pleasantly surprised. I think in the future, I’d try putting butter, brown sugar and pecans on the bottom of the pan, then the fruit, then the cake batter. This would be turned out completely onto a plate as an upside down cake. I’ll definitely try this again but with a scratch cake mix.

We also made tamale pie again. This time I didn’t have zucchini on hand, added cholula sauce, and then had hot sauce on hand at the table. It was delicious!

Oh my gosh it was good!

Salad (Nancy B)

by Mrs Marvel

Here is Nancy B’s salad. It is another of the Jello-and-other-stuff variety. I’m not quite sure about the Jello and macaroni portion of this. Could it be a macaroni ring that you put the other salad ingredients inside of? There are many things about this that don’t sound good to me. Continue reading →

German Potato Salad (Marnie)

by Mrs Marvel

I *think* Marnie is Jessie Marion, my mother can verify this when she gets a minute. It was confusing to me as a child because my mother would refer to Aunt Mernie (Gram’s sister) and Aunt Marnie (Gram’s aunt). I still call my aunts Aunt Ruth and Aunt Ginny, and I could see where my daughter could get confused as well, because they aren’t her aunts. But, we also have several friends who are addressed as Auntie So-and-so, so it makes life even more fun. Continue reading →