Have you ever wished you could smile out of both sides of your head at the same time? It would give a whole new meaning to the phrase two-faced wouldn’t it? Well, growing up, we used to do just this with our snowmen. One smiling face would look into my mom’s kitchen window and the other would smile at the cars passing by on the Cramer Road in Schroeder.
I think a smiling snowman is just one of those things that holds enchantment…. you see him and you have to smile too. (One hint—maraschino cherry juice makes an excellent coloring for rosy red snowman cheeks!)
I was really excited to see kids out playing in the snow again—building snowmen and snow forts. I have to tell you we loved snow forts as kids! We would build two walls facing each other for great snowball fights.
Once my dad helped us to build an igloo with a tunnel door and everything. When the sun melted the roof we called it an igloo with a “skylight.” Playing inside was like playing in a cave. If you were really quiet you could hear a pin drop. More than two kids in there, though, and we were sweating. Who knew something made of snow could be so warm?
Our mittens were knitted wool and they would get totally encrusted with snow. There is no smell like wet wool mittens and wet wool socks drying behind a wood stove. Pools of water would run out of the melting mittens.
Mittens and gloves are much better today. Now fingers don’t even turn red!
That was why we drank hot chocolate, to thaw out our fingers wrapping them around the mug. Maybe that’s why I crave hot chocolate when my hands get cold.
At Birch Grove Elementary we were not allowed to build snow caves or igloos, but we could play king of the mountain. The snowbanks in front of the school would get really high and sometimes it was a miracle if you battled your way to the top. In those days Jimmy and Jeff were usually kings. (The penalty for attempting to de-throne them was snow down your back!)
My best friend, Colleen Lamb, and I liked to stand on top of an opposing snow bank and sing the Coca-Cola theme song: “I’d like to buy the
world a home and furnish it
with love, Grow apple trees and
honey bees, and snow white
turtle doves…I’d like to teach
the world to sing in perfect harmony…
I’d like to buy the world
a Coke and keep it company.
It’s the real thing, Coke Is!”
(If you’ve forgotten this song, check it out on You Tube.) We’d change the last line to “It’s the real thing, We Are!”
That made the song about us instead of Coke but we didn’t care. I even wrote “I’m the real thing” on the back of my jacket. Real compared to what I have no idea but we knew we were cool.
I think it was our first attempt at a peace demonstration against the snowbank war across the parking lot. We should have just built a smiling snowman…who could want to fight over a snow mountain after seeing that?
A smile is a curve that sets
everything straight.
Phyllis Diller
Warm-Up Winter Skillet Soup
Ingredients
bb1 to 2 lbs. beef – cut into cubes
bb2 Tbsps. flour
bb2 Tbsps. oil
bb1 envelope Lipton Onion Soup mix
bb1/2 tsp caraway seeds
bb1-1/2 cups beer
bb1/2 cup water
bb4 medium potatoes, quartered
bb4 carrots, cut into 2-inch pieces
bb1 10-oz. frozen cut green beans
Di rections
Toss beef with flour. In a large skillet, heat oil and brown beef. Add Lipton soup mix, caraway, beer, and water until blended. Bring a boil, simmer, covered, for 30 minutes.
Add potatoes and carrots; simmer, covered, 30 minutes. Add green beans and simmer, covered, an additional 10 minutes or until beef and vegetables are tender.
Chocolate Sour Cream Buttermilk Bundt Cake
Ingredients
bb3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
bb3/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
bb1 tsp. instant coffee or
instant espresso powder
bb3/4 cup boiling water
bb1/2 cup sour cream
bb1/2 cup buttermilk
*or use one half cup milk
with one half Tbls. lemon juice
bb1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
bb1 teaspoon salt
bb1 teaspoon baking soda
bb13 tablespoons butter, room temp
bb2 cups light brown sugar, packed
bb1 tablespoon vanilla
bb5 eggs, room temperature
Di rections
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Spray a 12-cup Bundt pan with flouradded cooking spray.
Combine cocoa, chocolate, and espresso powder in medium heatproof bowl; pour boiling water over chocolate and whisk until smooth. Cool to room temperature; then whisk in sour cream and buttermilk.
In a second bowl, whisk together flour, salt, and baking soda.
In a standing mixer fitted with paddle, beat butter, sugar, and vanilla on medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about three minutes. Reduce speed to medium and add eggs one at a time, mixing about 30 seconds after each egg.
By hand, stir 1/3 of the flour into batter. Add half of the chocolate/ sour cream mixture and stir. Scrape bowl and add remaining flour mixture and all of remaining chocolate mixture; Pour batter into prepared Bundt pan. Bake until wooden skewer inserted into center comes out with few crumbs attached, about 42 to 45 minutes.
Cool in pan 10 minutes, and then invert cake onto parchment-lined wire rack.
Hot Applesauce
Ingredients
bb3 to 4 lbs of peeled, cored,
and quartered apples.
(Use a good cooking apple like Golden
Delicious, Granny Smith, Fuji, Jonathan,
McIntosh, or Gravenstein. You can also use a
combination of cooking apples in your recipe.)
bb4 strips of lemon peel –
use a vegetable peeler to strip 4 lengths
bbJuice of one lemon, about 3-4 Tbsp
bb3 inches of cinnamon stick
bb1/4 cup of dark brown sugar
bb1/4 cup of white sugar
bb1 cup of water
bb1/2 teaspoon of salt
Di rections
Put all ingredients into a large pot. Cover. Bring to boil. Lower heat and simmer for 20-30 minutes. Remove from heat. Remove cinnamon sticks and lemon peels. Mash with potato masher. Ready to serve, either hot or refrigerated. Delicious with vanilla ice cream or vanilla yogurt.
Freezes easily, lasts up to one year in the freezer.
Tastes Like Home columnist Sandy (Anderson) Holthaus lives on an
alpaca farm in South Haven, MN with her husband, Michael, and
their children Zoe, Jack and Ben. Her heart remains on the North Shore
where she grew up with her parents, Art and LaVonne Anderson of
Schroeder. She enjoys writing about her childhood and mixes memories
with delicious helpings of home-style recipes.
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