Mama’s Cookin’

$ 5.99

Top Recipes for this Holiday Season!Pg. 7

Eosinophilic Esophagitis!Pg. 23

Sarah Saves For the Holidays!(All about holiday couponing!)Pg. 27

Table Of ContentsOn the Cover...Top Recipes for this Holiday Season!Pg. 7

Eosinophilic Esophagitis!Pg. 23

Sarah Saves For the Holidays!(All about holiday couponing!)Pg. 27

Table of Contents Continued...AppetizersPg. 7

Main DishesPg. 12

DessertsPg. 17

HealthPg. 22

WealthPg. 26

Letter From the EditorPg. 31

AppetizersMeatballs

Ingredients

2 cups ketchup1/2 cup water1/2 cup white vinegar1/2 cup honey2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce1 tablespoon dried minced onion1/4 teaspoon pepperDash garlic powderDash cayenne pepper1 package (32 ounces) frozen fully cooked homestyle meatballs

In a Dutch oven, combine the first nine ingredients Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; simmer, uncovered for 15 minutes. Mean-while, thaw meatballs in microwave according to package directions. Stir into sauce; heat through. Yield: about 6 dozen.

Cheese & Sausage AppetizerIngredients

16 ounces (4 cups) shred-ded cheddar cheese1 cup butter, softened2 cups all-purpose flour1/2 teaspoon salt1/2 teaspoon black or cay-enne pepper8 ounces pork sausage, cooked and drained

Directions

In large bowl, beat the cheese, butter, flour, salt and pepper on medium-low speed. Stir in cooked sausage. Form dough into 1-in. balls; place on ungreased baking sheet.Bake at 400° for 15-20 minutes or until light golden brown. Serve warm or cold. Store in refrigerator or freezer. Yield: about 5-1/2 dozen appetizers.

Jalapeno PeppersDirections

Cut peppers in half lengthwise; remove seeds, stems and cen-ter membrane. Stuff each half with about 2 teaspoons of cream cheese. Wrap with bacon and secure with toothpick.Place on a broiler rack that has been coated with cooking spray. Bake at 350° for 20-25 minutes or until ba-con is crisp. Remove toothpicks. Serve im-mediately. Yield: 20 appetizers.

Ingredients

10 medium fresh jalapeno peppers4 ounces cream cheese, softened10 bacon strips, halved

Main DishesTuna NoodleIngredients

1/3 cup chopped onion2 tablespoons butter1 tablespoon all-purpose flour3/4 cup milk1 chicken bouillon cube1/4 teaspoon salt, optional1/8 teaspoon pepper1 can flaked tuna

Directions

In a small saucepan, saute onion in butter until tender. Stir in flour until blended; cook and stir for 1 minute. Gradually stir in milk. Add the bouillon, salt if desired and pepper. Bring to a boil. Cook and stir for 1 minute or until thickened. Stir in the tuna, peas and pimientos; heat through. Serve with noodles.

Broasted ChickenDirections

Pat chickens dry. Place with breast side up in an ungreased 13-in. x 9-in. baking pan. Combine season-ings; rub over and in-side chickens.Cover and bake at 400° for 1 hour. Un-cover and bake 30 minutes longer or un-til a meat thermome-ter reads 180°. Yield: 4-6 servings per chick-en.

Ingredients

2 roasting chickens (about 5 pounds each)1 teaspoon each salt, sea-soned salt, celery salt and onion salt1/2 teaspoon pepper

Apricot HamDirections

Drain apricots, reserv-ing 1 cup syrup; set aside. Cut apricots in half; set aside. Score edges of ham; place in a shallow 2-qt. mi-crowave-safe dish.In a small bowl, com-bine brown sugar, cornstarch and nut-meg; stir in vinegar and reserved syrup until smooth. Pour over ham. Cover and microwave at 70% power for 3-1/2 min-utes.

Ingredients

1 can (15 ounces) apricot halves1 ham slice (about 1-1/2 pounds)1/4 cup packed brown sug-ar2 tablespoons vinegar

DessertsSherbert

Directions

Place the sherbet in a large bowl; stir in raspberries and bananas. Freeze until firm. Yield: 18 servings.

Ingredients

1/2 gallon orange sherbet or flavor of your choice, softened1 package (10 ounc-es) frozen sweetened raspberries, thawed2 medium ripe banan-as, mashed

Dessert PearsIngredients

4 medium pears, peeled, halved and cored1/4 cup cranberry juice1/4 cup strawberry pre-serves1/2 teaspoon vanilla ex-tract

Directions

Place pear halves in an 11-in. x 7-in. dish. In a small bowl, mix the cranberry juice, pre-serves and vanilla un-til blended; pour over pears. Microwave, covered, on high for 7-9 min-utes or until pears are tender.

Peach MeblaDirections

Place cakes on dessert plates. Drain the peaches, reserving 2 tablespoons syrup; spoon 1-1/2 teaspoons syrup over each cake. Place peach halves, hollow side up, on cakes. Put a scoop of ice cream in each peach. Heat jam; drizzle over ice cream. Sprinkle with nuts. Serve immediately.

Ingredients

4 individual round sponge cakes or shortcakes4 canned peach halves in syrup4 scoops vanilla or peach ice cream2 tablespoons raspberry jam1 tablespoon chopped nuts

Health

Arriving a couple minutes later then the agreed upon 7:00pm, coach was ready to head out he door, he had order pizza for dinner, and set out all the fixings to concoct Seth’s liquid meal later that night. After provid-ing me with final instructions, and giving his boys a hug and kiss he headed on his way. Famished from a busy Friday I selfishly indulged myself to the still steaming pizza. What hurt more than the steam burns on the roof of my mouth was Seth’s reaction to my eating. “I wish I could eat, it will be soon though, November first I’m going to the doctor to get checked up.” Letting the pizza slide from my hand back onto the plate I replied, “Seth once you beat this your going to be better off than other boys your age. Your other struggles in life will seem trivial in comparison to this.”“ I know it is just not fair. I just want to be able to eat.” he replied rolling his eyes giving me the 8th grade ado-lescent head shrug. It is not something new Seth has always had the disease. In elementary school he would periodically go to the nurse sick with a fever and stomach pain, or after eating lunch go to the bathroom and throw up. “He could eat pizza from the same place two days in a row. One day he might have a reaction, others he would be fine.” stated his father Seth Bloomquist. Two years ago when I first transferred to Shippensburg Seth was entering sixth grade. At 80 pounds he was small, wiry, and always smiling. Unexpectedly symptoms worsened during the year until symptoms of vomiting, severe stomach aches, fevers, and crying accompanied almost every meal. At one point he was down to 56 pounds, malnourished unable to digest even the simplest of foods. Initially they went to a pediatrician who referred them to a allergist who did blood work to confirm the symptoms were food related. Confirmed that they were food related they began a strict diet aided by medi-cine. His symptoms still occurring his father chose to take him to the Children’s Hospital in Philadelphia where they located the current leading physician on Eosinophilic Esophagitis, Dr.Liacouras. Dr. Liacouras began with more testing for foods he was allergic to, 60 in all, each one coming back positive for a reaction. Shows me his booster club football teams new jerseys, this simple gesture of boyhood pride breaks my heart. “Yeah Jimmy our other defensive back is sick this week, so I might get to play.” “Oh yeah?”, is all that I can squeeze out. “Our team is pretty good this year, and with this tube in Dad doesn’t want me to be playing. It comes out soon though, I’ll have to ask him in the morning when he is home.”

Eosinophilic Esophagitis

Taking a few seconds to compose my emotions, and formulate a response without killing his dreams. “Well homie all you can do is wait and ask your pops. At this point even the moderately severe cases are solved with diet and medication, severe cases likes Seth’s require far more searching. Following the attempt at diet and medication the doctor put Seth on Paul-macore (drink to help get food down), accompanied by another strict diet. Working for only around a month they had to move from the Paulmacore/diet to Prednisone (steroid) where Seth could basically eat whatever he wanted to. Only a temporary solution to give time for his throat to heal because it had narrowed so much from the scarring caused by the EE. His father remember the day they attempted the scope, “They couldn’t get down with a normal scope it was too narrow. So they tried a pediatric scope that was also to big to get down his throat. His throat was scarred with rings that they thought they were in his wind pipe, not his esophagus.” Jack! Seth! Would you two girls stop it. Seth you know if you get hit in the stomach where your tube is your going to be in a world of hurt.” all the while knowing boys will be boys, my suggestions fall on deaf ears. Thinking to myself I’ll give it another 15 seconds before interrupting the tussle with the proposition of cards, a movie, or video games. Thankfully Seth settles on a game of madden, and all the adolescent commotion subsides. While playing I can see his competitive fire, and think what my life would be like if I did not have my health during middle school, and high school. And it dawns on me that even on my worst day, my troubles are miniscule in comparison to this 8th grader with a heart the size of a lion. Once the swelling lessened, and the throat opened up enough to get a scope into the throat so they could perform a biopsy of the esophagus, they took Seth off of the Prednisone and inserted the feeding tube that he currently has. He is required to go back in for a biopsy of the throat every two months, as well as every six months he has to drink barium so that the doctors can analyze his esophagus, and see if he is making prog-ress. For the past two months he has not been able to eat any solid foods, his nourishment coming in cans of formula, mixed and connected to his feeding tube prior to bed. Presently his current results came back non-reactionary to apples, and bananas. At his last visit the doctor put him on a 12-week cycle where he will try five foods, and at the end of the time he has to come back in for another biopsy to see how his esophagus reacted. His father o stated, “We know it won’t come out for years, best case scenario it will be at least his senior year of high school.” A step in the right direction, though realistically the duration of how long he will have the feeding tube in for is undetermined.

Wealth

Sarah Stine has never been someone who is particularly good with her finances. Her and her husband, Kris have lived in the same two bedroom apartment for the past ten years, barely making headway on any sav-ings to invest in a larger living quarters. Their seven year old son, Cody, has had to learn to go without Christ-mas presents since a young age, but last year was the first year that Sarah feared that her small family would have to go without a Christmas meal. Kris has been working in a local factory since he graduated high school in 2001, and Sarah has worked a few years cashiering at the Dollar General that was built a little while back in their small, cozy town of Dover, Pennsylvania. As the holiday season had begun to close in, Sarah took particular notice to one customer who seemed to quickly become a regular at the Dollar General. This particular Customer, Hannah Knight, was very talented in the art of couponing. Hannah would come into the store with only a few dollars in her wallet and leave with a week’s worth of groceries for her family. Sarah became rather fascinated with Ms. Knight and strained to pay careful attention to how Hannah had highlighted the circular and organized her grocery coupons into a binder. For the next few weeks, Sarah would purchase a Sunday paper and bring it home to clip coupons, acting very carefully so that she would not alarm Kris or Cody. Kris was purposefully unaware at the extent of how far the family had fallen into debt, “I knew we were in trouble with our finances, but I didn’t want to admit to how out of control the situation had really become.” Sarah’s efforts yielded very few results. She could not seem to figure out just how to coordi-nate local circulars with the coupons she had clipped, all while planning meals and catching coupon expiration dates. Everything had become rather exasperating for Sarah. “All we were able to manage for a Thanksgiving meal this year was a cold, store-bought rotisserie chicken and off-brand, boxed mash potatoes.” Said Sarah. There was only about a month left until Christmas and Sarah was feeling hopeless. Depression and anxiety were beginning to creep up on her late into the nights, causing exhaustion and lethargy at work during the days. Then she met Hannah. It had been at least two weeks since Sarah had seen her subject of interest, Hannah, come into the Dol-lar General. It was early on a Monday morning, when Sarah was at her wits end, that she had finally worked up the courage to ask Hannah about how she had learned to budget her money. Sarah was very nervous at first. She had rung this customer out several times before, but there had never been any more than a few polite hel-los and goodbyes exchanged. Today Hannah had selected a particularly large amount of groceries and as Sarah began to ring her customer out, she worked up the courage to ask questions.

Sarah started out by acknowledging to Hannah that she had noticed her in the store before and ad-mired her ability to save so much money on groceries. She then began telling Hannah how her family had been struggling and how she was afraid that she might not be able to afford food for a Christmas meal this year.

Sarah Saves the Holidays

Hannah admitted, “I was a bit taken back that this stranger was telling me her whole life story- like really open-ing up to me right there at the cash register.” Hannah was taken aback by this startling news. She was an older woman, in her late sixties, who had begun budgeting grocery money and coupons for her single daughters and her daughter’s two children just a few years prior. She looked at Sarah and couldn’t help but to feel sorry for the young girl. Hannah then did what she wished someone had done for her a few years earlier, she offered to teach Sarah how to properly handle money. Every day for the next three weeks, Sarah and Hannah would get together for an hour after Sarah’s shift and go over the rules for budgeting. “I was pleased to learn that Sarah was already on the right track; purchas-ing Sunday papers and collecting local circulars,” said Hannah. She informed Sarah that there are four main steps to properly couponing.1. Collecting2. Organizing3. Shopping4. Storage

A person must start by collecting circulars and coupons from the Sunday paper. Coupons can also be collected from online sites and manufacturers products. Neighbors are also often willing to give you their Sun-day paper coupons after they’re done with the paper.Then it’s time to begin organizing. Making a list of the groceries you need and then finding corresponding coupons and is a great way to start. Having a coupon binder that is organized alphabetically and by expiration is also a great way to stay structured. Next, a person must do the actual grocery shopping. Have a list ready and know which coupons you will use in advance. Prepare for unforeseen events, such as a store not having a certain product in stock, or a store that has limits on how many of a certain product may be purchased at one time. Allow plenty of time to shop and do not buy excess of products that do not have a long shelf life. Lastly, make room for storage. Set an area, it could be a closet, room, shed, etc., aside to store mer-chandise in. This storage area should remain clean and organized with a first-in, first-out system set in place.Once Sarah began following the rules Hannah set in place, she was able to start saving money. By Christmas, Sarah and Hannah had prepared enough to set out on a trip to the store to purchase food for a holiday meal. Sarah was able to purchase a ham, stuffing, potatoes, green beans, a Marie Calendar’s apple crisp, and even a Welsh’s sparkling grape juice all for under five-dollars. This year, Sarah is much better off. She and Kris have applied the rules of couponing to their other fi-nances and are preparing to purchase their first house together. “We’re excited to finally be able to have some extra money to buy Cody this upcoming Christmas,” exclaimed Sarah.

***Last names were changed in order to ensure privacy of those mentioned in this feature story.***

I love food. I really love it. It’s one of the few things in life that can bring a lot of joy, but also is essential to surviv-al. Food nourishes the body and feeds the soul, meanwhile bringing families and friends together. It connects us with those who we eat with, as well as with those people who work to plant it, raise it, harvest it or slaughter it. In this issue of Mama’s Cookin’ we will be focusing on how important it is to be aware of how food can affect the health of our children and of our families. As the winter season is right around the corner, the staff of Mama’s Cookin’ feel that it is our person responsibility to remind everyone of just how vital it is to eat right and stay healthy to avoid illness and disease. We have also included some tricks and tips to budgeting money for the upcoming hol-iday season. It can be a difficult time of the year when it comes to finances, and I personally think it can’t hurt to be in the know-how for grocery coupon clipping. We’ve spent a great deal of time and energy coming up with the best ways to save money for your holiday meals this season. Turkeys, roasts, mashed potatoes and green beans! We have selected the top holiday recipes for the cornucopias feasts we know you’ve been planning months in advance for. Whether it’s the first time you’re hosting the holiday meal, or the fiftieth time you’re hosting the holiday meal, I know that this issue will have a least one great recipe that you’ll be dying to try. My personal favorite is the Peach Mebla that we have featured as the “dessert of the year.” Remember this while cooking this season; a recipe has no soul. You as the cook must bring soul to the recipe.

Mary SchultzAssociate Editor

Letter From the Editor

Mama's Cookin'http://mschultz1124.wix.com/mamascookin