Chinese Casserole

Chinese Casserole
contributed by Mrs. Mary West, Salt Lake, Utah
Favorite Recipes of America: Casseroles

Because nothing screams Chinese food like condensed mushroom soup and potato chips, I guess?

Have no illusions, this dish, while delicious, is only "Chinese" in the sense that you can throw any salty, gooey slop into a pot, call it Chinese, and Americans will lap it up.  Culinary mythology holds that that's how Americanized Chinese food got its start - Chinese immigrants, prevented from most jobs due to prejudice, opened up restaurants to cater to hungry miners and laborers and such, and developed sweeter, meatier dishes unknown in China but nonetheless exotic enough to seem exciting to the emerging middle class.

My own mother used to make something akin to egg foo young, which consisted of whatever happened to be lying in the bottom of the crisper drawer, scrambled with eggs, and served with a gelatinous sauce made from soy sauce and corn starch. Yum!

My crack Googling skills have also revealed several casserole recipes in the same vein as this one, which seemed to be popular at Church potlucks during the 60's and 70's.  As you'll see in the video, this one's a winner, so feel free to use or adapt to your heart's content!

1 lb. ground beef
1 pkg. frozen peas, thawed
2 c. finely sliced celery
1 can cream of mushroom or chicken soup
1 med. onion, finely chopped
3 tbsp. evaporated milk (opt.)
1/8 tsp. each pepper and salt
2 c. crumbed potato chips (opt.)

Fry ground beef until brown; place in 2-quart casserole. Place a layer of peas and a layer of celery on top. Mix soup, onion, evaporated milk, pepper and salt. Pour mixture on top of previous layers; top with potato chips. Bake in 375-degree oven for 55 minutes. Serve with soy sauce if desired. Serves 8.

I followed the directions to the letter. It seemed to be done well before 55 minutes was up, so you probably won't need to cook it so long. It does get awfully dried out, I'm wondering in hindsight if the  condensed soup should have been thinned with milk before pouring on top?  Also, there's not nearly enough salt, even with the potato chip topping. So add liberally, or follow the suggestion to serve with soy sauce.

Dr. Husband loved it, as you'll see:

Our Rating: One Screaming Husband!
(all dishes are rated from one to five Screaming Husbands. One Screaming Husband equals a happy home where all problems are solved during cocktail hour. Five Screaming Husbands signals the beginning of divorce proceedings.)

Oh and Hey!

Coming soon: The Twelve Days of Kitschmas! Twelve Recipes in Twelve Days, plus twelve songs from me and Dr. Husband!  You can send recipe ideas AND song requests by commenting below, or send it right to me at the Historic Test Kitchen by December 5, and earn yourself a big fat mention here on the blog! And really, what could be better than that?

Potatoe (sic) Chip Cookies

Potatoe Chip Cookies

Contributed by Mrs. Andrew J. White, Jr., Columbus, Oh.
collection of the author



Were you ever really snacky (for the sake of argument, and to better connect with my presumed audience, let's just say you were stoned) and went to the kitchen to get something to eat, and there were presented with the age-old dilemma of exactly what to eat? I mean, do you go for the cookies, or the potato chips?

Thanks to the wonders of modern cookery, you no longer have to be confronted with this bothersome decision-making.

Because you can have BOTH.

I was flipping through the "Desserts" volume of Favorite Recipes of America, when out fell an ephemeraphile's delight: a pamphlet entitled Special Recipe Collection from the Ladies of the 5th Division Commandery. (You can learn all about the Grand Commandery Knights Templar by clicking here. Be sure you have your sound turned up real loud.)

Not only was it filled with gastronomical wonders, many of which I'll be featuring on this site in weeks to come, but the pamphlet itself was stuffed full of loose index cards with handwritten recipes of treats I dimly remember from my youth, including Special K Fruit Cookies, Lebkuchen, and last week's "Aunt Sue's Chicken".

Also included was this gem, "Potatoe Chip Cookies", which I remember well. Chiefly because:

- improperly crushed potato chips will cause severe gum lacerations, which will immediately have salt rubbed in them, and;

- My grandmother, Mrs. White, would cheerfully urge her obese grandchildren to eat all they wanted, as "there's not much sugar in them."

The recipe seems to have come from the kitchen of "Helen", who didn't know how to spell potato. I'm assuming this would be Mrs. White's friend Helen Rice, who used to don a plastic grass skirt at otherwise-respectable society functions and do a hula dance while lip-synching to "We Are Going to A Huki-lau".

The Recipe:



Ingedients bought for this recipe: NONE!

Ingredients already on hand: I used pre-sifted flour, which seems like cheating somehow, but there you have it.

I used pecans for the nuts, though I suppose any nut would do, I even considered peanuts. The pecans were pre-chopped. I really got off easy this week.

I used Ruffles ridged potato chips - I'm thinking this part is glaringly unhistorical, as I'm sure my grandmother would have used flat, greasy potato chips that were delivered to her house in a tin can. But I'm lazy, and it's what I had on hand.

I used butter instead of margarine, again because it's what I had on hand. It seems more natural, somehow. Plus, butter creamed with sugar is, I'm quite certain, the best smell on the Earth. Ever.

I baked them a little longer than suggested, about 25 minutes, because they weren't browned yet at 20.

What we thought: Again this time, the rules were broken by Husband knowing what I was making ahead of time. He has been eating the cookies for about three days now without saying much, until this morning, when he said "These cookies aren't really very good." And then kept eating. I think he was just saying it so I'd have something to write here.

They're not bad, slightly reminiscent of a pecan sandie, owing of course to the fact that I used pecans. The cookies are VERY crumbly, you almost have to eat them standing over the sink or the trash pail. They certainly wouldn't stand up to a good dunking in milk. If I ever make them again, I may try and come up with a clever way to make them doughier so they hold together better. And some orange zest wouldn't hurt either. Maybe a Hershey's kiss plopped in the middle of each cookie. And some frosting.



Our Rating: One Screaming Husband!

(all dishes are rated from one to five Screaming Husbands. One Screaming Husband equals a happy home where all problems are solved during cocktail hour. Five Screaming Husbands signals the beginning of divorce proceedings.)