Staebler - More Food That Really Schmecks

Copyright 1979 by Edna Staebler

Cloth edition published 1979, reprinted 1985, 1988
Trade paperback edition published 1998

All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the publisher or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency is an infringement of the copyright law.

National Library of Canada Cataloguing in Publication Data

Staebler, Edna, 1906
More food that really schmecks

eISBN: 978-1-55199-598-4

1. Cookery, Mennonite. 2. Cookery, Canadian
Ontario Waterloo (County). I. Title.

TX715.S74 641.5971344 C79-094644-0

We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program for our publishing activities. We further acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program.

Typeset by M&S, Toronto

McClelland & Stewart Ltd.
The Canadian Publishers
481 University Avenue
Toronto, Ontario
M5G 2E9
www.mcclelland.com

v3.1

Right after Food That Really Schmecks was published people started asking me when was I going to write another cookbook!

Never, I told them. Ive put everything I know about cooking into Schmecks, I couldnt possibly write any more.

But as I kept finding easier or better ways to make some of the recipes, I felt a niggling compulsion to pass on the improvements. Besides, I had some good recipes that didnt get into Food That Really Schmecks because Id forgotten them or thought they were too fancy for a book on Mennonite country cooking. Also Id found or invented some new ones that I was really excited about.

During the years since Food That Really Schmecks appeared, thousands of people, it seems, told me that they love reading and using the book and hope I will write another one; many have sent me their favourite recipes; to put in it.

Meantime also, Ive done a lot of good eating with friends and relations who have given me their cherished recipes. For the next cookbook, they say. Ive spent much time enjoying great food and exchanging recipes with ray Old Order Mennonite friends on their farms. Ive learned a few things from a healthy young vegetarian niece. As well, Ive inherited my mothers old cookbooks with the tried and true standbys that brought joy to my childhood and gave Mother the reputation of being a wonderful cook.

And Ive made some discoveries: the uncollected recipes in Waterloo County are boundless. Strangers often phoned me to say, You havent a recipe for prune moos in your cookbook. Or wunderschnitten, beer cake, yogurt, or whatever; and theyd give me one. Or Id be told of a different way to make some local specialty.

As a perennial judge of the Kitchener-Waterloo Kinder-kochfest Competition Ive acquired prize-winning German recipes. Local Russian Mennonites have told me how to make some of their unusual dishes. English friends have been generous with traditional favourites. At Rundles Restaurant in Stratford I watched the chef de cuisine prepare superb French party meals during a Stylish Entertainment course. Harold Horwood, the Newfoundland writer, showed me how to make a Chinese supper. And whenever Ive travelled Ive come home with recipes.

Of course Ive kept trying and typing out recipes. For years. The yellow copy pages have been piling up on my desk, on my kitchen counter, on the long windowseat in my living room, and in a carton under my bed. There are so many now that Ive got to do something with them. I cant let all those possibilities for good eating go to waste, can I?

Ive thrown out or rejected all the recipes that use mixes or prepared foods loaded with additives. Ive kept to the fruits, vegetables, and meats that are produced in my county and sold at the Kitchener and Waterloo Farmers Markets: no mangos, she-crabs, kiwis, or other exotic, hard-to-get and pay-for things that would be a treat when you travel or go to an expensive restaurant.

As before, Ive stuck to the good old Mennonite tradition of economy, with no waste, only quick, easy and inventive ways to make things that really taste good, and use ingredients that are usually in ones cupboard, freezer, or fridge. Some are perfect for a loner, others for a family, or for company one can relax with. And some are dishes one can show off with.

I included dozens of recipes to make gorgeous plump muffins in half an hour. Ive collected a whole chapter of biscuits and bannocks, found things to do with those backyard plums. Drinks, soups, salads, casseroles, main dishes, and accompaniments are innumerable. Bread, cake, cookie, pie and dessert recipes are infinite and irresistible.

So you see I am hooked: I must write this cookbook because I have all these recipes. For those brides who say Food That Really Schmecks is their bible, for all those kind people who asked me to please give them more: here it is!

May you have as much fun experimenting and eating as I have.

I approach the writing of this book with some trepidation. Though I think I have learned a few things since Food That Really Schmecks was published, I am often embarrassed when people ask me questions about food that I cant answer, or when they say, You are an authority on Mennonite cooking, and I have to tell them Im not an authority on anything, just an amateur with a preference for schmecksy food that is easy to prepare.

I dont spend my life testing recipes. I cook because I love to eat. When I come across what sounds like a great-tasting dish I can hardly wait to get at it often with blissful abandon and disastrous results. I take short-cuts; sometimes I change the amounts in a recipe or the method of putting things together.

Though I appreciate so-called gourmet cookery when someone else does it, I havent the patience to spend hours in the kitchen fiddling with complicated directions. Nor can I be constantly producing great feasts not when 1 have to eat alone whatever I make. I splurge only when I have company. And thats when the bannocks burn and the custard curdles.

One Saturday I had a dinner party for a distinguished weekend visitor. When I was serving a second round of drinks I realized that my guests were chatting in a haze as smoke billowed from the oven. The casseroles were boiling over. I had to fuss to control them.

My guests were delighted. They said, After tonight we wont be afraid to invite you for dinner. I had proved I was not the great cook that Schmecks made them think I was.

And I wasnt sorry; I love being invited out for dinner.

I hope this recitation of my limitations hasnt shattered your faith in me as a collector of good-tasting recipes. Ive tried most of those Im giving you here and I think youll find them pretty good. And some are fantastic.