Mrs. Buckley's Stuffing

     Page One Hundred Sixty-Three.
     About 18,500 or 18,501 years ago, I lived across the street from the Buckleys. This was in Ireland. It wasn't called Ireland at the time, of course. It was called "Honolulu" by its contemporary inhabitants in the native language. But it was what we call Ireland today, none-the-less. It was an idyllic neighborhood. Almost everybody was charming and redheaded, the hills were a vibrant green and everybody wore beautiful sweaters.
     The only "less than fuzzy" element on the entire street were a family of druids who lived down the way. They drank excessively and rented out their upstairs apartment to a bunch of frat boys who were always having wild parties. But, except for that one house, it really was just a lovely area.

     So one evening I was out raking leaves and Mrs. Buckley walked over and invited me to join her family for dinner. Never one to turn down free food, I accepted. She'd made a very good meal that I can still taste today. It was spiral sliced emu; stuffing; quinoa with morel mushrooms; falafel; creamed jicama; fried plantains; pad thai and rolls with butter. Then, for dessert she made a Chocolate Decadent Cake. The entire meal really was great.
     What made the greatest impression on me at the time was the stuffing. My family was Orthodox Jewish. So, if my mother was required to have a stuffing-type item on the table for a given holiday, it was matzo farfel. I'll talk about my mother's matzo farfel more in another blog, but what you need to know for the sake of this blog was that it was awful. Basically, it was dead, dry, flavorless chunks of Soylent Green. So when Mrs. Buckley explained that this stuffing was gentile-style food, I just quivered with glee. It was great!
     I innocently asked her how to make it. She graciously responded and I've been making a similar version ever since. Here 'tis. Fry up an entire log of Italian seasoned sausage in a very large pot or stock pot 'till brown. (I think the log will be a pound. But you'll see it in the store.) Remove sausage to a bowl. To the sausage drippings, add 1 large finely chopped onion, 2 finely diced celery ribs and 1 finely chopped red pepper. Saute 'till soft. Add a stick of butter and let melt slowly. Replace cooked sausage and stir. Pour in 2 cups of chicken broth and heat 'till warm. Dump in a large bag (12-16 oz.) of seasoned bread croutons or stuffing mix. Stir thoroughly. Dump into a couple of casseroles and bake, 325 for 20-25 minutes or so. Eat and enjoy. Serves a small army- maybe 10 or 12.

Frech Bread Pizzas

     Page Ninety-Three.
     I'll tell you what ALWAYS sells when trying to feed hungry teenaged boys. Fresh French Bread pizza. And they're just about the easiest things to make, too.
     Go to your favorite bakery or grocery store and purchase a couple of fresh, full-sized loaves of French bread. Also, buy a couple of cans of your preferred pizza sauce, some mozzarella cheese and whatever toppings your kids like: pepperoni, sausage, onions, mushrooms, olives, what have you. Bring the whole mess home and put everything out on your counter.
     Slice the loaves in half and the top half you'll have to level off. So, put the top half on the counter, crust side down and look to see what you'll have to carefully trim off so it sits evenly. Once that's done, just assemble everything as you like. If you go in for onions or sausage, you'll have to cook those things up. But that notwithstanding, put on the sauce, then cheese, then everything else. Place on a cookie sheet and then pop in the preheated 425 degree oven for about 13 minutes.* Viola! These things are so good it's just crazy. They're surprisingly economical, too.
     There's a very famous brand of frozen French Bread Pizza. Those are perfectly okay for a teenaged boy... until he tastes the real thing. Be prepared, once he tastes the ones that you make fresh, he'll never go back to frozen. You'll have to make these things a lot. But his birthday gift to you will be bigger. He'll still be a bi-polar teenaged boy, but he'll occasionally be a little nicer to you, when he wants these things.
    



*Trick #1: Assemble pizzas on the cookie sheet so you don't have to move them around too much prior to baking.
 Trick #2: Don't overload stuff on the bread. It'll just fall off. Use just a little of this and just a little of that. Don't worry, it'll add up.