Well, how bout all you Mothers? Did ya’ll have a great Mother’s Day? I know Deb and my Mom did. We went to Moms and had a great time. All of our kids and grandkids made it, so yes, Deb was in her environment!

My Mom as well had all her children, and was only missing one granddaughter from having all her grandchildren as well. All in all we had a great meal, a great time visiting, and a great day as a whole! We hope you guys did too!

Well, how about we take a look at what our good friend Gary sent to us…it’s about golf.

Two women were playing golf. One teed off and watched in horror as her ball headed directly toward a foursome of men playing the next hole. The ball hit one of the men.

He replied: It feels great, but I still think my thumb’s broken!

I thought that was hilarious, and thanks Gary for sending it.

Well, let’s fire off a cook stove and bake up a cake or two…

Milky Way Cake

• 8 milky way bars
• 2 sticks oleo
• 2 cups sugar
• 4 eggs
• 2-1/2 cups flour, plus ½ cup more if flour is sifted first
• ½ teaspoon soda
• 1-1/4 cups buttermilk
• 1 cup chopped pecans

Melt Milky Way bars and 1 stick oleo and set aside. Cream sugar and 1 stick oleo; add eggs. Add alternately flour and soda with buttermilk. Add melted candy mixture. Add pecans; fold them in. Bake in tube pan on 325 for 1 hour and 10 minutes, or until a knife inserted in center comes out clean.

Icing

• 2-1/2 cups sugar
• 1 cup evaporated milk
• 6 ounces semi-sweet chocolate chips
• 1 cup marshmallow cream
• 1 stick margarine

Cook sugar and evaporated milk to soft ball stage. Add chocolate chips, marshmallow cream and oleo. Stir until all melted. Spread on cooled cake.

Shirley Patterson

VV’s Chocolate Dump Cake

• 2 cups flour
• 2 cups sugar
• ½ cup Crisco
• 1 stick margarine or butter
• 1 cup water
• 4 tablespoons cocoa
• ½ cup buttermilk
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla

Mix flour and sugar in large bowl. In saucepan, bring Crisco, margarine, and cocoas to a boil, stirring often. Pour over flour and sugar. Add baking soda to buttermilk and add to above mixture. Add eggs beaten with vanilla. Bake in large, greased and floured pan on 350 for 20 minutes or until cake is done.

Icing

• 4 tablespoons cocoa
• 6 tablespoons milk
• 1 stick margarine or butter
• 1 box powdered sugar
• 1 cup chopped nuts
• 1 teaspoon vanilla.

Five minutes before cake is done, mix and heat cocoa, milk, and margarine to a boil, stirring frequently. Remove from heat and add sugar, nuts and vanilla. Mix thoroughly and pour over cake while hot.

Patty Sue Walters Griffin

Chocolate Apricot Fruitcake

• 1 cup dates, coarsely chopped
• ¾ cup dried apricots, coarsely chopped
• ¾ cup raisins
• 1 cup Grand Mariner
• 2/3 cup flour
• ½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 cup walnuts, chopped
• ½ cup unsalted butter (room temperature)
• 2/3 cup sugar
• 3 eggs, room temperature
• ½ teaspoon baking soda

Combine dates, apricots, raisins and grand mariner. Cover, let stand 2 days. Stir occasionally. Then drain fruit, pressing lightly to extract excess liquid. Reserve liquid. Place fruit in another bowl. Butter, then flour a 8-1/2 x 4-1/2 x 2-1/2 in baking pan (loaf).

Stir flour, cocoa and baking powder in small bowl. Add walnuts and set aside. With an electric mixer, cream butter with sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, blending well after each addition. Gently fold in flour mixture and fruit. Spoon batter into pan.

Bake for 50 minutes on 325 or until tester comes out clean. Remove from oven and glaze cake by brushing on ¼ cup of reserved liquid. Cool cake completely. Unmold and wrap in plastic. Store in container and let mellow for one week before serving. (Can be made ahead and frozen for up to 3 months.)

Jane Leathersich

Dirt Cake

• 1 (20 oz.) package cream-filled chocolate sandwich cookies
• 1 (8 oz.) package cream cheese
• 2 (3 oz.) packages French vanilla instant pudding mix
• 3-1/2 cups milk
• 1 (12 oz.) carton non-dairy whipped topping

Blend cookies in blender until they look like potting soil. Set aside. In large bowl, beat cream cheese until light. Beat in dry pudding mix. Stir in milk and combine well. Fold in whipped topping. In clean 8 x 10 inch clay pot, alternate layers of crushed cookies, and cream cheese mixture, ending with a thick layer of crumbs. Decorate with silk flowers, if desired, and serve wityh a trowel for a spoon. Serves 8 to 10.

Bev Bray

Our recipes today come from a cookbook we’ve used in the past. Deb and I both have gotten a kick out of readin it, and there are some good, down home recipes in it.
It’s called “White Trash Cooking,” and was written by Ernest Matthew Mickler. It was published by Ten Speed Press.

Mammy’s Date Cake

• 1 cup sugar
• ½ cup Wesson oil
• 4 eggs (whites beaten separately)
• 1 cup flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 1-1/2 to 2 pounds dates
• 1 quart shelled pecans, chopped

Cream sugar, oil and egg yolks until fluffy. Mix nuts and dates with ½ cup flour. Add 1 teaspoon baking powder to the other 1/2 cup of flour. Add salt and combine with creamed yolk mixture. Add flour, nuts, dates, and mix well. Add beaten egg whites and vanilla extract. Mixture will be stiff as a board. Do not moisten. Will have to mix with hands. Place in tube or loaf pan (greased). Bake on 300 until done (brown). If you’re not sure…test with a broom straw.

Reba’s Rainbow Ice-Box Cake

• 1 cup confectioner’s sugar
• 2 egg yolks
• 1 cup pecans
• 2 boxes cherry Jello
• ½ cup oleo
• 1 No. 2 can Dole crushed pineapple
• 2 boxes lime Jello
• 1 box (medium size) Graham crackers

Cream your sugar, oleo, egg yolks, and then add your strained pineapple and nuts. Beat your egg whites stiff and fold them in. Then place a layer of Graham crackers on the bottom of a pan, pour in the mixture, and put into the ice box to chill.

Now fix your cherry jello as for regular use, except use pineapple juice for one cup of water and the other just plain water. Don’t pour this mixture over the other mixture in the ice box until it’s ready to congeal.

Next, fix your lime jello and let set in the ice box until ready to congeal. Then whip with the egg beater until fluffy and spread it over the pan of mixtures. After this has all congealed, whip one half pint of cream and cover the whole thing.

Slice and serve topped with cherries if ya got em; if ya don’t, ya don’t.

Stewed Fig Cake

• 2 cups flour
• 1-1/2 cups sugar
• 1 small spoon (teaspoon) baking soda
• 1 small spoon ground ginger
• ½ small spoon ground cloves
• 1 sight, small spoon salt
• 1 small spoon allspice
• 1 cup of melted shortening
• 1 cup of buttermilk
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 3 eggs
• 1 cup of stewed figs (chopped and reserve the juice)
• 3 tablespoons whiskey (optional if you’re Baptist)

Mix all the dry ingredients in one bowl. Mix all the liquid ingredients, except the shortening and the figs, in another bowl. Add the liquid to the dry, and mix well. Now add the figs and the shortening. Pour into a cake pan with a hole in the middle and bake slow, (on 275) for 1 hour. Check center for doneness. Depan when cool and use the stewed fig juice with the whiskey to pour over the cake.

Betty Sue says, “You’ll never eat that ole gingerbread cake again.”

Gerdie’s Groundnut Candy

• 1 quart molasses
• 4 cups shelled peanuts, roasted
• 1 cup brown sugar
• ½ cup oleo

Combine all ingredients except nuts, and boil for half an hour over a slow fire. Then add roasted and shelled peanuts and continue cooking for 15 minutes. Drop on lightly greased cookie sheet. Make little cakes or cookies of the candy and let harden.

If you’re on a diet, or just tryin to eat more health wise, forget about hangin out, although I do tell Deb these cakes do have SOME fine, healthy ingredients. You just have to look, and use your own definition to the term…healthy.

If you look though, you can read into it what ya want. Let’s see now, hmmm, I see right off the bat…oranges. Those are good for ya, right? Then I see cloves. There’s two right off the bat, huh?

Shoot, I’m lookin now at an ingredient that just has to be beneficial to us all…coconut! Okay Deb, I’m three for three! Last but not least I spy something that “back in the day,” I dearly loved. Loved it so much I’d only buy it by the gallon.

BOURBON…yes sir, good for pretty much whatever ails ya! Medicinal purposes were my main use. My head hurt…I’d take a shot. Sometimes several. Stress, shoot, there ain’t nothing no better. Cough or sore throat, you betcha!

On top of all that, it’s supposed to be very, very good for…snakebite! So good in fact , that me and several of my good, doctorin buddies just like myself, would always tote small snakes in our pockets.

So as you can see, the recipes we’re sharin with you guys today, all CAN be described as healthy! It’s just like anything else in life. You get out of it, only how you read it!

These recipes come from one of my Mom’s cookbooks. It is a church cookbook we’ve shared from before, and was put out by the Presbyterian Church in Apopka, back in 1990.

Mom and Dad don’t attend this particular church, but many of their friends do. The title is, “Treasures and Pleasures.”

Why don’t we fire off the dern cook stove and get started. Miz Judi TOLD me a while back, “Why don’t you do a whole lot less talkin, and a whole lot more cookin?” I asked her if she was telling me this, but she said she was…only suggesting. Yeah, right! LOL!

She tried to explain it to me as simply as she could. Less communicatin works out to be more, “profit makin!”

Simply put, these days you better be into much, much, more “profit makin,” cause our current administration condones getting your wealth… “through takin!”

Let’s git started!

Clove Cake

• 1 cup butter (or Crisco)
• 1-1/4 cups sugar
• 5 eggs
• 3 cups sifted all-purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon cloves
• 1 tablespoon cinnamon
• Pinch salt
• 1 cup buttermilk
• 1 teaspoon soda

Beat eggs and add to creamed butter and sugar. Sift flour and spices. Add alternately with buttermilk mixed with soda, ending with flour. Bake on 350 for 45 to 55 minutes in a 10 inch tube pan. Check center for doneness.

Mary Green

Four Day Four Layer Coconut Cake

Day 1

• 2 cups sour cream
• 2 cups sugar
• 16 oz. frozen coconut, thawed

Mix all ingredients. Refrigerate for 24 hours.

Day 2

• 1 box yellow cake mix

Mix up a Duncan Hines yellow cake mix. Substitute milk instead of water. Mix and bake according to box. Use 2 round cake pans. Let cake cool. Cut rounds in half crosswise, making 4 rounds. Put icing between layers and cover the top with icing too. If icy happens to be too soupy, just add more dried coconut.

Cover in tight cake storage container.

Days 3 and 4…Must remain in refrigerator before eating.

(Note from Dub…Deb would have her hands full tryin to keep me outta that mutha for days 3 and four!!)

Lynn Goodwin

Bourbon Pecan Pound Cake

• 1 cup solid shortening
• 2-1/2 cups sugar
• 6 eggs
• 3 cups sifted flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• ½ teaspoon nutmeg
• 1 cup sour cream
• ½ cup bourbon (I usually set out 3-4. Don’t want to be coughin and hackin, while bakin)
• 1 cup finely chopped nuts

Preheat oven to 325. Grease and flour 10 inch tube pan or Bundt pan.

In large mixer beat shortening and sugar till light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until very smooth. Meanwhile, sift flour, baking powder, salt, and nutmeg; add to sugar mixture alternating with sour cream and bourbon- beginning and ending with flour. Beat just till well blended; fold in pecans.

Turn into prepared pan and bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes, checking center for doneness. Turn out onto wire rack to cool. Pour glaze over cake; decorate with pecan halves if desired.

Bourbon Glaze

Mix 2 cups sifted confectioners sugar, 1 tablespoon bourbon and enough water, about 2 tablespoons, to make a pourable glaze. Beat until very smooth and pour over cake.

Sis Pitman

Little Orange Chiffon Cake

• 2 egg yolks
• ½ cup egg white (4 whites)
• 1 cup, plus 2 tablespoons sifted flour
• ¾ cups sugar
• 1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• ½ teaspoon salt
• ¼ cup salad oil
• 1-1/2 tablespoons orange rind
• ¼ cup, plus 2 tablespoons orange juice
• ¼ teaspoon cream of tartar

Sift flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in a mixing bowl. Make a well in mix. Add egg yolks, orange rind, juice and oil. At medium speed, mix until smooth. Beat egg whites and cream of tartar to very stiff peaks.

Slowly pour first mixture over whites. Fold in gently until just blended. Pour into a 3-1/2 inch deep tube pan. Bake on 325 for 50 to 55 minutes. Check center for doneness. Cool as you would an angel food cake.

Betty Mountan

We had some friends of ours send Deb and I an e-mail a couple days back. They’re Bill and Sandy, and they live in Mobile. They’ve become friends just like so many of you guys have since the startup of our site.

Anyway, although I’d seen this before, Deb and I had never participated in one. It is a pretty dern neat way of sharing recipes. So, Deb and I participated, and what a great way to pick up recipes from friends around the Country, and even worldwide. We thought it was a very good idea.

So, I thought we’d take it a step further, and put it up on the site this morning. If you guys would like to participate, feel free to do so. We’re always looking for new recipes and we found this unique in its ability to supply you with tried and proven ways in which to prepare meals.

Just take a look at the way this is done, and again, if you’d like to participate…just jump right in. You send one, and in return you’ll be supplied with many. The way to go about this is very simple. This in itself is a Godsend for me, cause…I’m pretty simple anyway.

Here’s the e-mail Bill and Sandy sent us. Just follow what they have to say, and before long you’ll see your new recipes begin to start dropping in!

We are participating in a collective, constructive, and TASTY experiment.

After you’ve sent the recipe to the person in position 1 below and only to that person, copy this letter into a new email, move my name to position 1 and put your name in position 2. Only my and your name should show when you send your email. Send to 20 friends BCC (blind copy). You should receive 36 recipes. It’s fun to see where they come from! Seldom does anyone drop out because we all need new ideas. The turnaround is fast as there are only 2 names on the list and you only have to do it once.

1- billgrant@bellsouth.net

2-dubanddebs@gmail.com

Now…how easy is that? Isn’t it wonderful to meet new friends and share your ideas and techniques in different ways? THIS, is what our Country is all about…sharing knowledge, and helping others!
Granted, there are some who don’t know how, or care enough to help themselves. Sadly, this has become a sort of “indoctrination” our elected leaders are instilling in many today. Whether you contribute or not (Work), makes no difference…you STILL should benefit from the people who do contribute, or work.

Somehow, or somewhere along the line, our politicians figured out the convenience of “buying the vote.” As most know, this is by no means to help “we the people” out! But, far too many today believe this to be a fact.

Through this, the legacy of our Country, as laid out for us through our Founding Fathers is being interpreted by our elected leaders as full of flaws, and as they claim, not was what our Forefathers actually intended.

BUT, It IS EXACTLY what our Founding Fathers intended…life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness! America was built upon the right of free people to start a business, if so desired, worship as you like, and supply you, through capitalism, to better not only your own lives, but the lives of your family as well!

This is why all these people have immigrated here since the founding of our Country. All they wanted by coming here was the ability to work, save, and worship freely. Today though, too many immigrate here only for…a free ride on the “Nanny State” train! It just makes me sick.

Take from the haves, and GIVE…to the have-nots! Our current administration believes this whole heartedly. This is the agenda with community organizing. Our President…is a former community organizer.
Isn’t it amazing that he has “preached” this type of rhetoric for all these years, YET…he didn’t live in community housing, no, no. He lived in a mansion in Hyde Park. He lived the life of, well, let me see…a Capitalist! Still does! Plus most of our other politicians.

You see, capitalism FOR THEM, is okie dokie, just not us! We are actually going through a period of class warfare. Our politicians fire up the have-nots by preaching of all the corruption and fraud of capitalism. In the end, what happens?

The politicians and their cronies end up with ALL the money, All the power, and this means…no middle class eventually. We become a communist based ideology Country, and the freedom we’ve always known is lost forever.

We better wake up and start DEMANDING our rights. In this Country, we’ve always helped each other out. Like our site and so many like it, this old practice continues. We help each other not because we have to, but simply because we want to!

This little recipe sharing by Sandy and Bill is but one example of this. We do not need to be taken care of by our politicians. To be quite honest, I’m quite capable of taking care of my family and myself, but, for only along as “Our Government” continues to allow us these freedoms!

Plus the biggest point is that our politicians are not doing a good job by the most lax of definitions with the use of our taxpayer money! Look at our Country…14 trillion in debt, a school system in shambles, and at the very best mid-pack worldwide. This is literally criminal!

Alright, let me get back out of this. My dern keyboard is beginning to take too much abuse from my fingers now, not from typing, BUT BANGING on the dad-gum keys! But, you get the picture…
Well, let’s get out of politics and fire off a cook stove!

Our first recipe today comes from Diane, I believe from Virginia. If not, please correct me in this Diane! This recipe is very easy to make, and very easy on your pocketbook too!

Thank you Diane!

Sloppy Joes:

• 1 lb ground beef
• 1 rib chopped celery
• chopped small onion
• 1 small can of Hunt’s tomato sauce
• spices that you like
• Olive oil, for sauteing celery and onion
• One beef bouillon cube
• 2 Tablespoons of water

Heat oil in a medium/hi heat pan. When the oil is hot, cook celery for a few minutes and then put the onion in. Add ground beef and brown. Drain liquid.

Add bouillon cube and water and spices. Reduce for a couple of minutes. Add sauce from the can and cook for a little bit. Serve on top of hamburger buns.

Our second and third recipes are for those with a sweet tooth! I gotta tell you, these are two great cakes, and our ole buddy Roger supplied us with pictures to boot!

Roger is quite the joker, and has supplied many of the jokes we throw in our columns from time to time! Course, if I could bake cakes that turned out as good as evidently his do, shoot, I’d be a happy camper 24-7 myself!!

Thanks Roger!

Black Forest Cake:

• • 2 1/8 cups all-purpose flour
• • 2 cups white sugar
• • 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• • 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• • 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• • 3/4 teaspoon salt
• • 3 eggs
• • 1 cup milk
• • 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• • 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• • 2 (20 ounce) cans pitted sour cherries
• • 1 cup white sugar
• • 1/4 cup cornstarch
• • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• • 3 cups heavy whipping cream
• • 1/3 cup confectioners’ sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour two 9 inch, round, cake pans; cover bottoms with waxed paper.
In a large bowl, combine flour, 2 cups sugar, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Add eggs, milk, oil, and 1 tablespoon vanilla; beat until well blended. Pour batter into prepared pans.
Bake for 35 minutes, or until wooden toothpick inserted in centers comes out clean. Cool layers in pans on wire racks 10 minutes. Loosen edges, and remove to racks to cool completely.
Drain cherries, reserving 1/2 cup juice. Combine reserved juice, cherries, 1 cup sugar and cornstarch in a 2 quart saucepan. Cook over low heat until thickened, stirring constantly. Stir in 1 teaspoon vanilla. Cool before using.
Combine whipping cream and confectioner’s sugar in a chilled medium bowl. Beat with an electric mixer at high speed until stiff peaks form.

With long serrated knife, split each cake layer horizontally in half. Tear one split layer into crumbs; set aside. Reserve 1 1/2 cups Frosting for decorating cake; set aside. Gently brush loose crumbs off top and side of each cake layer with pasty brush or hands. To assemble, place one cake layer on cake plate. Spread with 1 cup frosting; top with 3/4 cup cherry topping. Top with second cake layer; repeat layers of frosting and cherry topping. Top with third cake layer. Frost side of cake. Pat reserved crumbs onto frosting on side of cake. Spoon reserved frosting into pastry bag fitted with star decorator tip. Pipe around top and bottom edges of cake. Spoon remaining cherry topping onto top of cake.

Check out these pictures from Rajah…

Black Forest Cake

A couple comments from Roger in regards to his “cake making!”

Mmmmm! Sinful! I find that now that I have the time I find I still have the knack for making cakes! Want me to save you a bite? The wife was freaking out when I made her sit down and watch me put this baby together. I made her shave the chocolate for it!

I’ll send you a picture of me holding it. I used to make a lot of cakes when I had my own catering business back when. I used to make multiple tiered wedding cakes with bridges and the bride and groom placed on them. I should have saved some pictures of them from back then. I have the makings for a German Chocolate and a Carrot Cake in the cupboard. Yeah you never know who can bake a cake or use a sewing machine. (I own 2 sewing machines too!) Roger

Mississippi Mud Pie:

Chop pecans. Mix flour and butter. Press in pan. Brown 20 minutes at 350 degrees. Cool completely. (Best damned crust there is!)

Mix cream cheese, Cool Whip and powdered sugar and spread over crust. Then put chocolate pudding layer, then vanilla pudding layer on the chocolate pudding. Top with Cool Whip. sprinkle chocolate bar shavings on top.

Mississippi Mud Pie