A Few Recipes From Alma

Recently I had the great pleasure of having a Friday dinner with my oldest and closest friend and her family. Her grandmother, Alma was there and she and I got to talking about food. Well, since then we have traded several e-mails and she has done me the great favor of committing several of her favorite recipes to electronic "paper" in order to share them with me, and all of you. I hope you get to try them out and that you enjoy them!

Dear Shannon.....
Here are some more of my recipes. I am pleased to think that someone may be interested in trying something different....

Alma's Bran Muffins
Cream together:2 eggs, 1 cup brown sugar, ½ cup oil,
Add:
1 ¾ cups milk
2½ cups flour sifted together with ½ tsp salt, 1 tsp mixed apple pie, or pumpkin pie spice, and 2 tspns baking soda
1 cup digestive bran, (obtainable in health shops)
½ lb raisins or golden raisins
Mix all together thoroughly.

Keep tightly covered in airtight container in fridge at least 24 hours before baking. Bake in muffin tins at 425º for 15 minutes.
Mixture will make 22 to 24 muffins.
You can leave the mixture unbaked in an airtight container in the fridge for a month and just bake as many as you need, but I bake the whole lot and keep them in the freezer. They take about 12 or 13 seconds to defrost.

Fruit and Ginger Cookies
Melt together:
4 ozs Butter
2 tablespoons oil
2 tbspns golden syrup or honey
Sift 2 ¼ cups flour, ½ Cup sugar, 1 tsp Baking Soda, ½ tspn Baking Powder, 1 tsp cinnamon, 1 tsp Apple or Pumpkin Pie spice, 2 tsp ginger
2 eggs beaten
1 cup raisins or golden raisins
Mix all together.
Mixture is quite soft and sticky but the oil makes it quite easy to handle. I put about 3 to 4 blobs in a row and pat them gently into two long sausages with my fingers to about 2 1/2” width on a greased cookie pan and bake for approx 15 minutes at 350ºF

- Cut diagonally into 1” slices while still warm but do not separate.
If desired ice with glace icing when cold. I don’t ice them, because my family prefers them plain. These are very popular but do not stay fresh for long. I freeze them within one day.

Buttermilk Rusks:
9 cups Self Raising flour
1 cup sugar
1 tsp Baking Powder
1 tsp salt
8 ozs butter or margarine
1 pint buttermilk plus 2tbspns milk
1 egg
25 ml oil.
Sift dry ingredients together. Rub butter into flour (I use a grater ), beat egg, add oil, add buttermilk. Pour into centre of dry ingredients, Knead thoroughly.
Form into buns about the size of a golf ball in pan about 12” X 10” X 2”. Fit them in tightly together.

The recipe should make about 60 plus rusks. Bake at 350 for 45 minutes. Allow to cool slightly, separate gently with a sharp knife and place on two flat baking tins. Allow to dry out in very cool oven - overnight if possible, takes about 12 hours. You have probably never heard of anything like these rusks but I assure you, they are worth the effort!"