From the Kitchen of ….

As you may have heard, we are exploring the idea of a recipe section within the magazine where we will bring you recipes and ideas from the kitchens of some of our favorites people and places. We look forward to hearing your feedback on the idea, along with suggestions about who or where we should go to next.

When we at Bella Magazine first started discussing this idea, we couldn’t help but think back to some of our favorite recipes, more specifically some of our loved ones’ favorite recipes. So, we thought, who better to sponsor the first recipe page than us!

Mom’s Summer Salad

By Charlotte Putnam

• Large bowl
• Box of elbow macaroni
• Two boiled eggs
• About a stalk of celery, just some for flavor
• About a half of a large block of sharp cheddar cheese
• About a cup of ham cut into cubes
• A small onion
• Add mayonnaise until the desired texture
• Add salt, pepper, garlic salt, and onion salt to taste
• 2 dashes of Worcestershire sauce
• Everything is to taste and desired amounts

Growing up, we were not exactly what you would call wealthy — heck, we were lucky to be considered middle class. So we didn’t have much. But Mom was always good at making the most of what we had. Mom’s summer salad was a cheap recipe that was rich in flavor. Over the years I have experimented with “improving it,” but try as I might nothing tastes better than using “cheap” macaroni and having plain old saltine crackers on the side. That and, of course, washing it down with a big ol’ mason jar of ice cold sweet tea. And, as Mom says, the longer it sets, the better it gets.

Tad Jones

Ratatouille

By Ladonna Armstrong

For the sauce:

• 2 tbsp. olive oil
• 1 small onion minced
• 1 clove garlic minced
• 1/4 cup red wine
• 1 12 oz. can tomato sauce
• 1 12 oz. can crushed tomatoes
• 1 tbsp. pesto
• 1 tbsp. sun dried tomato pesto
• 1 tsp. gravy master
• 1 tbsp. oregano
• 1 tbsp. parsley
• 1 tsp. pepper
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. sugar
• 2 medium yellow squash
• 2 medium zucchini
• Fresh chives

Sauté the onions and garlic in a deep frying pan or cast iron skillet. Add red wine and simmer for 1 minute. Add the 2 cans of tomatoes, pesto, and 6 seasonings. Stir until it starts to bubble, then simmer for 5 minutes. Slice squash and zucchini very thin on a mandolin. Spray the bottom of a 9” by 13” glass baking dish with non-stick spray. Pour the cooked sauce in the bottom of the dish. Place squash and zucchini in an overlapping pattern on top of the sauce and season with salt and pepper. Place a sheet of parchment paper on top and press down slightly. Bake at 375° for 30 minutes. To serve the way they do in the Pixar movie Ratatouille, spoon some sauce on a plate, then stack the squash one on top of another in a vertical tower 2” high, and then spoon more sauce over the top. Garnish with a piece of fresh chive.

My mom’s ratatouille recipe is a reminder of family time. It was actually inspired by the movie Ratatouille, which is about a rat who lives in Paris and loves to cook. My sisters and I would watch this movie and ask our mom to cook us the dish they make at the end of the movie. So she came up with her own special ratatouille recipe and it has become one of our favorite dishes. It is the perfect way to combine vegetables from the garden and tastes a lot like eating spaghetti. It is super delicious and healthy and I hope that you enjoy it as much as I do.

Anaya Armstrong

Easy Vacation Cobbler

By Betty Ann Foreman

• 2 cup fresh fruit (peaches, blueberries, and blackberries work well)
• 1 cup self rising flour
• 1 cup sugar (or more for tart fruits)
• 1 cup whole milk
• 1 stick butter, melted (don’t even think about using margarine or olive oil)

Preheat the oven to 350°. I use a glass dish but any glass or metal baking dish, even a disposable aluminum one, will do. Dump fruit and sugar into the dish and stir to coat the fruit, dump flour over this, then pour the milk and butter over it and stir with a fork until everything is moistened. Don’t overdo it — the lumpy bits add character. Bake for 45 minutes to 1 hour. The top will be brown and bubbly when it’s done. This is supposed to serve 8 but in our house it is lucky if it serves 4. This recipe can be doubled.

Cobbler is not a health food!

I first discovered this particular recipe in my GranGran’s recipe box when I was a child. It rarely fails that when summer rolls around, and fresh local fruit starts to arrive, I get a call from my mother or sisters asking me to remind them of the recipe. Every year, before I hand it over, I remind them of this: cobbler is not a health food. Yes, it contains fruit, fresh fruit even, but this does not make it good for you. It is a dessert. If you are looking for something healthy then go eat some broccoli and leave my GranGran’s poor little recipe alone. Its supposed to be easy, so don’t complicate it! Do not decrease the sugar. Remember, this is DESSERT and is SUPPOSED to be fattening and bad for you. If you choose a tart fruit you may want to add even more sugar. Replacing the flour with wheat flour will not make this a healthy dish; instead it will leave it heavy and you will have to figure out the leavening (salt, baking soda, whatever) since to my knowledge they don’t make self-rising wheat flour!

Any fruit can be used, but for me, fresh peaches from Cook’s Roadside Market on Augusta Road in Trenton, South Carolina, can’t be beat. As an added bonus, this is prepared and baked in one dish so clean up is easy!

EmilyAnn Raynor