Fare Exchange: Add corn pudding to your next holiday table

Good morning, good readers. Here are today's requests: Rummy Bears, slow-cooker turkey breast and your favorite Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner dish.

Gabi W. asked for the recipe for the mysterious Rummy Bears, and N.C.'s request was for a well-seasoned turkey breast that is prepared in a slow cooker.

As you've finished one gracious-plenty meal and are headed toward others, it would be wonderful if you could let us know the favorite dish from your house. At our house we don't really have Thanksgiving recipes, just a menu: turkey, dressing, fresh cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, cauliflower surrounded by limas or edamame, and a big bowl of fresh fruit.

However, Everett Kidder's email got me thinking about a missing ingredient in dinner: corn pudding. There's a comfort food worth copying.

Mr. Kidder wrote of the holidays that no matter when family gathers, "comfort food and tradition reign. I am not allowed to fiddle much with the old tried-and-true."

Enter corn pudding. "One dish that has crept into our traditional lineup the past few years is Shaker Corn Pudding. On a trip through horse country in Kentucky a few years back, my wife and I visited the Shaker Village at Pleasant Hill. The Trustees' House has a restaurant that serves traditional foods with many recipes from 'We Make You Kindly Welcome,' a collection of Shaker dishes by Elizabeth C. Kremer. The following recipe is from that book."

Shaker Corn Pudding

3 tablespoons butter

2 tablespoons sugar

2 tablespoons flour

1 teaspoon salt

3 whole eggs

2 cups corn

1 3/4 cups milk

2 cups corn, fresh or frozen (see note)

Blend butter, sugar, flour and salt. Add eggs, beating well. Stir in corn and milk. Pour ingredients into buttered casserole, and bake 45 minutes at 325 degrees. Stir once halfway through baking. When done, the pudding will be golden brown, and a knife inserted will come out clean.

• About the corn: If using frozen corn, chop a little. Not surprisingly, the fresh corn is tastier.

• Cook's notes: The recipe does not say, but I always use unsalted butter.

The mixture can be made ahead of baking and kept in a jar in the refrigerator. Shake well, and pour into baking dish.

As a leftover, this is wonderful served up with sausage and eggs for breakfast.

Here's a special-occasion dessert that arrived this week from Linda Leake of LaFayette, Ga.

White Chocolate Mousse Pie

Crust:

2 ounces semisweet chocolate

4 ounces toasted almonds, ground

3 tablespoons apricot jam

Line sides and bottom of a 10-inch springform pan with wax paper, and set aside.

To make crust, gently melt semisweet chocolate over warm water in a double boiler. Remove from heat, and stir in almonds. Press chocolate mixture into bottom of pan with the back of a spoon.

Gently heat jam in a small saucepan, and spread a thin layer over the crust. Set aside.

Filling:

14 ounces white chocolate

2 1/4 teaspoons apricot brandy

3 tablespoons hot water

2 1/4 teaspoons unflavored gelatin

6 egg whites

1 3/4 cups 35 percent butterfat cream, whipped

Carefully melt white chocolate over warm water in clean double boiler. Set aside.

Place brandy and water in a mixing bowl, and stir in gelatin until dissolved. In a separate bowl, whip egg whites until stiff but not dry. Fold gelatin mixture into egg whites. When chocolate has cooled to body temperature, fold in egg white mixture. Then fold in whipped cream. Pour into crust. Refrigerate 3 hours before springing from pan.

Topping:

12 ounces dark chocolate

2 1/4 teaspoons butter

1 1/2 teaspoons whipping cream

Place dark chocolate, butter and cream over warm water in a double boiler, and stir until chocolate melts. Drizzle lightly over pie before serving. Serves 12.

Peggy Sult came next with a new twist on sweet potatoes, called Sonker, "not to be confused with classic sweet potato pie. This deep-dish beauty is chock-full of thinly sliced, steamed sweet potatoes."

Sweet Potato Sonker

2 (15-ounce) boxes Pillsbury Just Unroll Pie Crusts

1 large egg, beaten

2 cups apple cider

4 pounds sweet potatoes, peeled, quartered lengthwise and sliced 1/4 inch thick

1 cup (7 ounces) packed light brown sugar

4 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

2 1/2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

2 tablespoons lemon juice

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon, divided

1/2 teaspoon ground allspice

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon granulated sugar

Custard Dip

2 cups whole milk

1/4 cup (1 3/4 ounces) sugar

2 teaspoons cornstarch

1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/8 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

• For the Sonker: Working on lightly floured counter, unroll 2 dough rounds. Brush half of 1 round with egg, and overlap with second round. Roll out dough to 17- by 13-inch rectangle, and fit into 13- by 9-inch baking dish. Cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 30 minutes. Repeat shaping and rolling with remaining 2 dough rounds; reserve beaten egg. Trim dough into rectangle, and cut into 10 (1-inch) strips. Transfer dough strips to parchment-lined rimmed baking sheet, cover with plastic, and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 375 degrees. Bring cider to boil in Dutch oven. Place steamer basket in Dutch oven and fill with sweet potatoes. Reduce heat to medium, and cook, covered, until potatoes are nearly tender, 20 to 30 minutes. Remove and reserve sweet potatoes, leaving cider in pot.

Cook cider over high heat until reduced to 1/2 cup, about 5 minutes. Combine drained sweet potatoes, brown sugar, reduced cider, butter, flour, lemon juice, vanilla, 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, allspice and salt in large bowl. Spread out sweet potato mixture on rimmed baking sheet, and let cool to room temperature, about 20 minutes.

Scrape cooled sweet potato mixture into dough-lined dish, and press into even layer. Brush edges of dough with reserved egg. With long side of dish facing you, lay 4 dough strips lengthwise over sweet potato mixture. Weave remaining 6 strips into lattice pattern. Press dough strips into bottom crust, and trim excess. Fold dough sides inward under lip of baking dish, and crimp with fork.

Combine granulated sugar and remaining 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon in bowl. Brush dough with reserved egg, and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar. Cover with aluminum foil, and bake for 15 minutes. Uncover, and bake until deep golden brown, 55 to 60 minutes, rotating dish halfway through baking. Let sonker cool on wire rack for at least 1 1/2 hours before serving. (Sonker may be refrigerated, covered, for up to 1 day. Bring to room temperature before serving.)

• For the Custard Dip: Bring milk, sugar, cornstarch, cinnamon and salt to simmer in medium saucepan over medium heat. Reduce heat to medium-low, and cook, whisking frequently, until slightly thickened, about 15 minutes. Off heat, add vanilla. Transfer to bowl, and let cool to room temperature, about 30 minutes. Serve with sonker.

• Rounds into rectangles: It takes a big sheet of pie dough to line a 13- by 9-inch baking dish. We make it easy by using store-bought pie crust. Take two rounds, overlap them by half, bind with beaten egg, and roll into a rectangle. Repeat, cutting the second rectangle into strips for the sonker's lattice top.

Brush the overlap area with beaten egg.

Place one dough round on top of the other. Roll the two rounds into a single 17- by 13-inch rectangle.

Just a Dash

Lou LaNieve's favorite company dessert is a number of different flavors of chocolate bars. Open up but don't remove wrappers; pass them around the table in a pretty bowl and let guests break off pieces and taste it all.

"I used 3-ounce bars of Theo brand fair-trade nutcracker brittle, coconut mint, gingerbread spice and peppermint stick," LaNieve says.