What's Cooking? Archives

Perfect Poultry Pot Pie

September 14, 2022September 13, 2022Amy Schisler

It’s that time of year when I start thinking about good, old-fashioned comfort food. The air is beginning to feel a bit chillier, the days are getting noticeably shorter, and my youngest has already been away at school for an entire month. When I’m planning my weekly menu this time of year, my shopping lists fills with ingredients for hearty soups, delicious pastas, and foods that fill the house with long hours of scintillating aromas. And chicken pot pie is always the family favorite.

Last week, our middle daughter, Katie Ann, said, “Mom, I think it’s time for chicken pot pie.”

Now, this is not an unusual request from Katie who could eat homemade pot pie 365 days of the year, but I knew what she meant. It’s not a meal I make in the summer when my handmade, flaky crusts are reserved for blueberry, peach, or strawberry rhubarb pies. It’s one of those meals that is just right for a cold, blustery, snowy, or rainy day. A day like this past Sunday.

Sweet Blessings and Blueberry Pie

August 17, 2022August 23, 2022Amy Schisler

Have you ever experienced a time when something unexpected happened that threw off all your plans but ended up being a blessing in disguise? Of course you have. We’ve all had those moments when we realized that whatever was causing a disruption to our plans was actually a good thing, in some cases, a bounty of blessings.

Earlier this summer, Ken and I were planning our drive across the country from our home in Maryland to our cabin in Colorado. One of the things we love about this drive is that there is so much to do between here and there. Each trip is a grand adventure, and we always look forward to the stops we will make and the people we will be blessed to see. We had the entire trip planned out–a stop at the Air Force Museum, dinner with friends in Ohio, a tour of the Eisenhower Presidential Library, a trip to the Sternberg Museum of Natural History, a quick visit to the Cathedral on the Plains, and a drive up Pike’s Peak. Everything was perfect until about three days before we were to leave.

Mind, Body, Spirit

March 9, 2022March 8, 2022Amy Schisler

About seven or eight months ago, I made two major changes to my personal health and fitness. I started seeing a chiropractor to help alleviate my arthritis pain, and I began an anti-inflammatory diet. What a difference I am seeing in my life as a result of these two things! I go for days, weeks, even months with zero arthritis pain (barometric pressure changes still get me every time), and my gut health is better than ever. These two changes have led to other changes in my lifestyle, and Lent is a great time to usher in even more.

For many years, I have done daily exercise. I visited the YMCA every morning for close to ten years before the pandemic struck and I discovered a whole world of exercise classes right on YouTube! Now, exercise fits into my schedule, and the type of class I choose is reflective of my needs that day. After trying lots of different things, I’ve settled on a Pilates and yoga mix each morning and a cardio workout every evening. Between the anti-inflammatory foods and the two exercise routines, I am actually losing weight for the first time in years without feeling like I’m missing out or killing myself doing it. This Lent, I decided to take some of these practices as well as my prayer life to the next level.

Preserving Tradition

November 24, 2021November 24, 2021Amy Schisler

I have wonderful memories of holiday meals with my extended family. We would all gather for every major holiday–Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter–and most of the minor holidays–Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, and often Independence Day.

The faces at the table changed over time. Babies came, loved ones passed, and new husbands or wives appeared. Always present, though, was the love for each other. And the Southern Maryland Stuffed Ham.

When Ken and I got married, I insisted on a complete, traditional Southern Maryland fall menu. That had to include stuffed ham. My Dad and my grandmother spent days making enough stuffed ham for 300 people. Ken’s Eastern Shore relatives never again saw holidays meals the same way. Each time we returned from Thanksgiving or Christmas at my Mom’s house, Ken’s family asked, “Did you bring back any stuffed ham?”

Looking back, I’m amazed that Dad and Gram pulled off this feat for my wedding. Stuffed Ham is not your average meat.

If you look closely at the Thanksgiving picture above, you will see the stuffed ham in the middle of the table. “What’s all that green stuff?” you may ask. That, my friend, is the stuffing. It’s not your average stuffing made of some kind of bread and mild spices. This ham is stuffed with a bushel of fresh, leafy kale and a boatload of hot, savory spices. It’s unlike anything you’ve had before, and unlike anything you will have anywhere other than St. Mary’s County, Maryland (yes, Charles County and a small area of Virginia have their own versions of stuffed ham, but it’s not the same) and small parts of Kentucky to which early Marylanders migrated.

While the dish itself is one of the most unique you could ever have, it’s the process and the history that really make this truly different and special.

Brownies – Good for the Body and the Soul

October 20, 2021Amy Schisler

I am a brownie person, and I’ve raised brownie-loving girls! It’s not unusual for me to come down in the morning (when the girls are home) to find a batch of brownies on the kitchen counter–half-eaten of course! On the other hand, I’ve come down to peanut butter cookies, oatmeal no-bake cookies, and cakes in assorted colors (the green cake with blue icing looked so awful that even the baker–whose reputation I will protect–didn’t even eat it!

My sister-in-law, Lisa, makes wonderful brownies, and I never turn her down when she offers to bake them for any family occasion. And who doesn’t love brownies topped with ice cream like the delicious ones my mother made the last Christmas we were all together?

Alas, I’m on this anti-inflammatory diet, so brownies are off the menu, or they were…

Sweet and Sour – Necessary Ingredients in Life

September 1, 2021September 1, 2021Amy Schisler

There’s just something about this time of year that makes me think of sweet things as well as sour things. Summer is winding down, and fall is quickly approaching. Schools are heading into session, and our youngest daughter has been back in Pittsburgh for just over a week now for her junior year of college, the hardest year for nursing students.

This is the time of year when the lazy days of summer are waning, and the busy fall season begins, the time of year when we start thinking about the holidays. Before we know it, January 1 will be upon us! Hot, sunny days will give way to cooler, blustery ones, and then winter will arrive just before ushering us into spring. Hot and cold, sunny and bleak, sweet and sour.

Serving on Earth

August 4, 2021August 4, 2021Amy Schisler

Our family loves to entertain. I’ve written about taking friends crabbing, hosting our annual Mother-Daughter Cookie Swap, and hosting huge gatherings for holidays, graduations, weddings, and any other occasions that come along. I get a real thrill out of seeing a new RSVP pop into my inbox, and I spend hours planning menus, setting tables, putting up tents, decorating, and trying to make our home feel as festive and inviting as I can. I love finding and sharing new recipes as much as I love making the same beloved recipes over and over.

Whether we’re hosting a large event or simply having friends over for lunch or dinner, inviting others to our home and finding a way to make it special is the way I show my love and appreciation for them. That’s how our annual cookie swap got started–as a way of inviting our closest friends into our home to celebrate the gift of their friendship and let them know how special they are to us.

Make Your Sacrifice and Eat It, Too

March 31, 2021March 31, 2021Amy Schisler

Here we are in the last week of Lent. It’s time to reflect on the past nearly forty days and examine how we did, not as an exercise of beating up oneself for our failures but in recognizing how far we have come. Have we grown spiritually? Have we gotten better at prayer? Have we grown closer to God? What sacrifices did we make, and how did they improve us?

Sacrifices come in many different forms. I’ve often wondered about those who forego chicken on Fridays but dine on lobster instead. I’m not judging. Perhaps they would rather be having chicken! Besides, in our house, Friday dinners during Lent consist of homemade crab cakes, but it’s not the crab cakes that I see as the sacrifice.

It’s everything that goes with them. Here’s what I mean…

Better than Chuck E. Cheese

March 24, 2021March 24, 2021Amy Schisler

There was a beautiful, tear-jerking scene toward the end of last week’s This is Us (I know, right?) in which Kate calls her mother to thank her for giving the three “triplets” a childhood in which they never knew they didn’t have money. She told her mother that their homemade Halloween costumes and big, backyard birthday parties with homemade cakes “were better than at Chuck E. Cheese.”

Boy, can I relate to that, and I think my girls can, too, if not now, then when they have kids of their own.

Until my girls were in high school, I made every Halloween costume they wore. They were simple and inexpensive and were often made of materials we had around the house or purchased from the Dollar Tree. Despite all that, the girls loved them, and some even brought home trophies, winning accolades over the most expensive store-bought costumes or the hours-long, detail-oriented ones of Pinterest fame. Even thrift shop dresses and grandma’s old stole can turn an ordinary girl into an Academy Award Winning Actress (who traded her Oscar for a Prettiest Costume trophy).

My mother taught me to a make what you can, buy what you must, and use more imagination than money, but the key ingredient was always love. Mom loved us, and she loved showing us how much she loved us, not by breaking the bank, but by putting her heart into whatever she did (and still does).

And something else Mom taught me is something that I can’t help but wonder if so many moms have forgotten in the past several years: The more you spend on something…

Not Your Grandmother’s Egg Nog

December 30, 2020December 30, 2020Amy Schisler

We’re in he midst of the holidays, and most people are still stuck at home. It seems that most home improvement jobs have been completed, the exercise equipment gathers dust, and Netflix binges are becoming stale. However, it looks like many are still cooking and baking and trying to come up with new recipes. We’ve been baking cookies, cakes, and pies and making hot chocolate bombs. Today, I’m going to experiment with pumpkin spice bread pudding. I can’t wait to taste it!

One thing that is always the hit of the party in our family is our homemade ice cream cake. At the end of Island of Promise, it’s what Kayla makes for Todd for his birthday, and subscribers to my newsletter received the recipe in my Island of Promise Companion Cookbook.

This year, my mother had the brilliant idea to make an egg nog ice cream cake for Christmas, and I decided to make my own version. We decided one a challenge to see what recipe seemed to be preferred. I can’t tell you that there was a clear winner because not a scrap of the cake was left over in either house. Clearly, this is one that may need to become a staple in our Christmas recipe file!