The Forum: Salad, dessert nail down dinner

Published 6:20 pm Thursday, December 23, 2010

As a friend of mine eventually became nearly famous for saying — and as I’ve mentioned before, but might be worth a rerun — if you’ve got the salad and dessert nailed down by noon, the rest of dinner is a breeze.

So here we go, starting with the salad portion of the program.

“Here’s an easy recipe for a colorful salad that became a traditional part of our holiday meals in about 1980,’’ Everett cook Lindy Happy says.

“We don’t know where our mother found this recipe, but it’s also great in the summer, for picnics, and can be made a day ahead.’’

Next, frequent helper-outer Carol Wilson of Everett tells us, “This year, my sister Margaret Eichenberger had us all for Thanksgiving dinner. For dessert, she served both impossible pecan and impossible pumpkin pies.

“I had never made these before and found them to be very tasty and, from the looks of the recipes, easy to make. I thought I would pass these along so others can make and enjoy these easy, yummy pies.’’

First the salad, then we’ll move along to the quick-fix pecan pie:

Mother’s make-ahead staccato salad

3tablespoons lime juice

3tablespoons olive oil

1large clove garlic, pressed

1cup raisins

1/2cup raw sunflower seeds

1cup grated carrots

2cups chopped broccoli

2cups shredded red cabbage

In a large salad bowl, mix together the lime juice, olive oil and garlic. Add the raisins and let soften for 15 minutes. Add the sunflower seeds, carrots, broccoli and cabbage and stir gently but thoroughly to combine ingredients. Cover and chill well in the refrigerator to blend flavors. Can be made a day ahead of serving.

Makes 4 to 6 servings.

Impossible pecan pie

11/2cups chopped pecans

3/4cup milk

3/4cup corn syrup, either light or dark

1/4cup butter, softened

11/2teaspons vanilla

4eggs

3/4cup brown sugar

1/2cup Bisquick

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9-inch pie plate.

Sprinkle the pecans over the bottom of the pie plate. In a blender container or in a mixing bowl, combine the milk, either light or dark corn syrup, softened butter, vanilla, eggs, brown sugar and baking mix; process in electric blender 15 seconds on high, or beat 1 minute in mixing bowl with electric mixer. Pour into pie plate and bake until a knife inserted in the center of the filling comes out clean, about 50 to 55 minutes. Remove from oven and cool before serving.

Makes one 9-inch pie.

The Forum is always happy to receive your contributions and requests, so never hesitate to send them along to Judyrae Kruse at the Forum, c/o The Herald, P.O. Box 930, Everett, WA 98206.

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The next Forum will appear in Wednesday’s Good Life section.