Lifestyles

KITCHEN SECRETS
Oven selector
can save time

IF YOUR oven has a ‘time bake" selector and you don’t
use 1, you're neglecting one of the most useful conveniences
in your kitchen. It's particularly helpful when you stare with

a frozen roast or casscrole.

For example, a frozen casserole,
average size, takes about two
hours to bake at 325°F. Because it
is frozen, it’s quite safe to take it
out of the freezer about neon and
set it in the oven.

Then, while you go out for
lunch and a shopping spree, the
oven takes over. At 4 p.m., the
oven switches on and by 6, din-
ner’s ready. Even if you decide to
stop by the club for a drink on the
way home, all is well — the oven
stops automatically at 6 p.m. and
the residual heat will keep
everything on hold for at least 45
minutes.

budget
beaters

by Barbara
McCreadie
(RT ee

Here’s an easy casserole — dan-
dy if you’ve got leftover cooked
chicken or turkey. If not, steam a
large chicken breast, both sides.

Chicken Noodle Bake
1% cups diced chicken
2 tablespoons grated onion
M% cup butter
% cup flour
salt and pepper
dash autmeg
2 tablespoons sherry
1 tsp. lemon juice
2 cups chicken broth
8 oz., 42" wide noodles
1 tablespoon butter

2 tablespoons butter
Y2 cup fine dry breadcrumbs

Gently saute the onion in the
butter. Add flour and stir to com-
bine. Add seasonings and liquids
and stir, over low heat, until
thickened and smooth. Add
chicken.

Cook noodles as package
directs. Toss with a tablespoon
butter. Melt the remaining two ta-
blespoons butter and combine with
crumbs for topping.

Alternate layers of noodles and
sauce in a two-quart casserole, en-
ding with sauce. Top with crumbs.

Bake at 400°F until browned,
about 30 min,

Alternately: Wrap and _ freeze.
Bake frozen — a deep casserole
takes about two hours at 325°F. A
quick run under the broiler will
crisp the crumbs if necessary.

It seems funny now, with all my
kids finished school, to see piles of
school supplies in the stores, |
don’t have to stock up on packages
of juice and individual tins of fruit
for lunches any more.

To tell the truth, I miss the ex-
citement of a new school year —
kids racing home on the first day
full of news and wearing the only
clean pair of runners I'd see them

in all year.

One year a large group of them
helped me with a column on school
lunches. The basic premise was
that halt the stuff Mom carefully
packs for junior ends up in the
lunchroom garbage can.

The whole problem is a form of
peer pressure. What cun 1 eat that
won't make my friends laugh? If
it’s messy — or smells funny (like
a tuna sandwich or egg salad)
forget it.

If it's anything that is unfamiliar
or considered ‘‘odd”’ or ‘‘foreign’’
chances are that someone will go
“yetch’’ and that’s that.

Fruit, like oranges that need
peeling or apples that take time to
eat, regularly hits the can. Hard
boiled eggs need peeling, smell
funny and are messy to eat. Con-
sider them filed in the round file.

What's left?

My enlightened observers voted
for:

— Deli meat, especially on small,
soft rolis

— Tiny fruits such as grapes

— Cookies but not cake (messy,
you see)

— Bagged junk food (and if you
fall into this trap [I’ve just lost all
respect for you).

They added that anyone sporting
peanut butter and jelly for more
than one day a week quickly gets
listed under ‘‘nerd’’ in the
phonebook.

The other side of the coin is the
family that lives close enough to
the school that the kids come home
for lunch every day. Sounds great,
doesn’t it? Well, I'm here to tell
you that it isn’t!

Sure, most days you can manage
{o put together a funch but what
happens on the day you want to go
out? Or, having gone out, you run
into an 11:30 jam on the bridge
and know your little darlings are
coming home to an empty house?
Having lived 4% a block from our
elementary school I had {0 years
of it and my best advice to anyone
planning to buy a house is make it
a good distance from the nearest
school!

One lunch that was always pop-
ular with the kids was homemade
soup. I’d make a big potful and
freeze it in three-serving portions.

Here’s one recipe they always
liked:

Cheese and Broccoli Soup

1 bunch fresh broccoli

1 medium onion
¥ cup butter
Y cup flour

3 cups light cream

3 cups chicken broth

2 cups grated sharp cheddar

Steam the broccoli until tender
in a bit of water. Save the water.
Chop the onien and saute in but-
ter. Add flour and stir. Set aside
while you remove a few whole
buds from the broccoli and chop
the rest.

Add chopped broccoli, broth
(reserved water) and cream to the
flour mixture and stir until
sinoothly thickened.

Buzz the mixture, a bit at a time,
in a blender. Return to the pot and
stir in cheese. Keep the heat low or
the mixture will curdle.

This soup is quite thick — as my
family likes it. If you wish you can
thin it down a bit with milk:

Stir in reserved broccoli buds.

This freezes well. Reheat very

35 - Wednesday, September 2, 1987 - North Shore News

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