Cooking with Mary #6

As it appeared in the March 1975 Madonna House Restoration newspaper

by Catherine Doherty

I believe it might be timely for Easter recipes.

I am giving you the whole story of Easter cooking as it is recorded in our “Book of Customs.” We have quite a few customs accumulated in the 25 years of our apostolate. Amongst them festive foods.

Koolich – Russian Easter Bread
For a family of four to six

5 lbs. flour
10 eggs
1 qt. of milk (you might need a wee bit less or more)
1 to 2 lbs. of sugar (depending if you like your bread sweet, or not too sweet)
½ lbs. melted butter
1 cup raisins
½ cup of peel
1 teaspoon cinnamon
¼ teaspoon nutmeg
½ cup blanched chopped almonds
2 packages fast rising yeast
1 tablespoon cardamom seed with icing sugar
2 tablespoon saffron liquid
(You can skip the cardamom and saffron if they are hard to obtain, though most of the big department stores have them)

Sift the flour twice, so that it will be light, and make sure the flour has been placed the night before in the kitchen – not far from the stove – as the flour has to be warm. It rises better! The milk must be heated, lukewarm. Test on your wrist. Hot milk will kill yeast; cold will retard its rising. Next prepare the yeast, following the exact directions on the exact envelope. Separate the eggs. Beat the yolks with approximately ¼ lb. of sugar. The whites are left until last, but have to be beaten to “peaks.” Cardamon and saffron are the two spices that have to be prepared the night before. Cardamon is usually purchased in kernels or nuts. These must be heated on the top of the stove and then broken up. The little black seeds or kernels are then extracted and beaten with something heavy. Add a teaspoonful of icing sugar, until quite powdered. Sometimes you can buy them already hulled and ready to be beaten with sugar.

The saffron is placed in a cup and boiling water – about ½ cup – is poured over the delicate strands of that spice. It will produce a vivid, orange-yellow colour. This will penetrate the dough pleasantly and give it a lovely taste too.

When yolks are beaten, the flour sifted, the milk lukewarm, cardamom and saffron ready, the cook proceeds to work with same.

The flour is made ready by mixing into it all the dry ingredients – the remaining amount of sugar, raisins, peel, salt, cardamom, cinnamon and almonds.

Then the warm milk is taken, and into it is placed the saffron and the sugar-yoked beaten eggs and active yeast specially prepared. Now beaten whites of eggs are added.

Then the warm milk and its contents are slowly poured into the flour mixture. You might need a wee bit less or even more of milk – at this point it is hard to tell – it must not be too hard or soft, but easy to knead. When all the milk is put in, the kneading begins. The kneading proceeds until the dough easily falls off the hands of the cook and the utensil where it is kneaded.

As soon as this stage is reached, the dough is covered with a clean cloth and put near the stove to rise double its bulk.

While the Koolich is rising, prepare the tins to bake them in. Any kind of tins may be used, but it must be borne in mind that tow at least, representing Christ and the Church (if you are very ambitions and wish to increase the recipe, you can make 13 – Christ and the Apostles. These must be made higher than any others. For this, fruit juice tins could be used. The authentic size of a tin representing the Christ Bread should be 12” high and 6-8” wide.) The tin representing the Church should be 10” high and 5” wide. The rest of the Koolich can be baked in ordinary tins.

With the dough that is left over you can make the three letters P A X and use this as part of the center piece for the Easter table (Pax is Latin for Peace). The letters can be made by braiding the dough. Each letter is baked on a cookie sheet. All tins used for this bread are well greased.

Once the dough is in the tins, it is time to decorate them with blanched almonds that have been made ready. Before putting the breads in the oven, the top of them should be smeared either with melted butter or milk. That makes the baked laves shiny. The oven should be at 350 degrees, and the ordinary size tins should bake 1 hour. The tall ones should bake between 1 ¼ and 1 ½ hours, but it must be tested carefully to see if the dough is baked. You must be very watchful, as the tops of such reads burn easily. When the koolich breads are thoroughly baked, they are left to cool 24 hours. One can see immediately that baking time and preparation time begins Holy Thursday, so that by Holy Saturday everything is ready. When the 24 hours has elapsed, the top of the Koolich is further decorated with pink icing sugar, and white around the edges of the top. And dry icing sugar is sprinkled on them. The Christ Koolich and the Church Koolich are further decorated with an addition of a little cross on top, or a paper flower to make them stand out. They are then placed on the prettiest plates available, and are ready for serving.


Paska – represents the “Lamb of God”
For a family of four to six

2 lbs. of cottage cheese
½ lb. sugar
1/8 lb. of soft butter
3 eggs
1 cup raisins

Cottage cheese and sugar are well mixed first. Then the softened butter is added, and the mixture is beaten again. An electric beater can be used if available. The raisings and eggs are then added, and more mixing is done until the mixture is smooth and creamy.

Flower pots with a hole of 1 ½ “ in diameter are washed with boiling water and lined with gauze. Enough gauze must be used to line the pot fully and leave a surplus of about 5” outside of the pot.

The mixture is then poured into the flower pots lined with gauze. An inch and a half must be left at the top of the pot. The extra sides of the gauze are folded over the mixture so that it is cover with gauze. Little flat pieces of wood are then placed on top of the gauze to serve as a foundation for stones, iron pieces or what is available to weigh down the mixture. These must not touch the sides of the form of the pot, or they will not do their job of pressing out the fluid of the Paska. The whole idea of weights is to get the water, and other liquid, out of the mixture so it will be a compact mass when served.

It is advisable to have the Paska done on Holy Thursday, so that the pressing or squeezing process can be done that night. I twill take all of that time to achieve the required results for Easter. Friday, around noon, a little more eight is added.

The ingenuity of the cook is required to see that the pots drain right. The post cannot stand on the floor, but must be placed on two pieces of wood with a big empty space between them, allowing the liquid to run off. Nothing may touch the hole from which that liquid comes out, or the Paska will be spoiled – being too liquidy or too mushy to stand up.

Before going to Mass, the weights are removed gently, the gauze opened, and the Paska, now hardened and having the shape of a flower pot, is put on a nice plate. A paper flower, or a cross, is put on top. It represents Christ the Lamb. Now it is ready for serving.

In Madonna House a special form, made of wood, has been prepared for the Paska. It consists of four sides slanted, with liturgical symbols carved into the inner sides (so that these will show on the completed Paska).


Eggs

Eggs, symbolizing Eternal Life, which Christ has given us by His death and Resurrection, are quite a wondrous part of the Easter meal. We hard-boil and dry them. And, when the eggs are completely dry, we polish them with a rag dipped slightly in butter. Then we place the eggs on nice plates, lovely bowls or baskets. They add much to the decoration of the table.

It would be nice if you explained to the children the liturgical meaning of the bread as Christ and His Church, Paska, the Lamb of God, and the eggs, Eternal Life, which Christ gave through His death and Resurrection.