Fare Exchange: Crescent roll dough is a versatile ingredient

Welcome to Fare Exchange and today’s challenges:

In today’s column you will discover a recipe for a Danish made with refrigerated crescent rolls. Anonymous from LaFayette, Ga., sent that recipe and included a request: “Someone told me that there are all kinds of recipes to be made with refrigerated crescent rolls. I would like some recipes that are not sweet, with meat and cheese and vegetable fillings.”

And remember those many requests for chocolate desserts from weeks past

Getting back to refrigerated crescent rolls, J.W. offered the following recipe that calls for them. They seem to be a versatile ingredient in recipes both sweet and savory.

Cream Cheese Danishes

2 tubes crescent roll dough

1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese, softened

cup granulated white sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 tablespoons butter, melted

8 tablespoons light brown sugar

Glaze (recipe below)

Heat oven to 350 degrees. In a medium bowl, combine softened cream cheese with white sugar and vanilla extract. Mixture should be creamy and smooth when finished, like cheesecake batter.

Separate dough into 8 rectangles. Seal perforations.

Using a brush or spoon, spread melted butter all over crescent rolls. Sprinkle each rectangle with about 1 tablespoon brown sugar. Roll up from long side; pinch edges to seal. Holding one end, loosely coil each.

Using your fingers, pat the dough out somewhat to make room for the filling. Pull and stretch, then make a dent in the middle.

Place on a cookie sheet that has been coated with cooking spray. Top each one with about 2 tablespoons cream cheese filling.

Bake for 15 to 18 minutes or until golden brown.

Glaze

cup powdered sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

4 teaspoons milk

Combine in a bowl powdered sugar, vanilla and milk. Stir until smooth and drizzle over each warm Danish.

Note: If you want to prepare a smaller batch, use 1 tube of crescent rolls and save leftover cream cheese filling in the refrigerator in an airtight container. It should last for up to a week.

MORE CUSTARD

The old-fashioned boiled custard conversation turned up again this week, and we can thank Judith Proctor. She wrote: “It took me awhile to find these recipes, but at last here are two honest-to-goodness, very old, real Southern boiled custard recipes. I can’t figure out which of my grandmothers or great aunts wrote these down for me. They all had such beautiful handwriting.”

Proctor is the second person this week who has mentioned what treasures come handwritten from someone’s recipe files. The ones at our house are usually hard-to-read and batter-splattered, so a beautifully handwritten one sounds mighty appealing.

Boiled Custard No. 1

3 whole eggs

1 quart sweet milk

1/2 cup sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

Pinch salt

Beat eggs until light; gradually add sugar. Slowly add milk, which has been scalded.

Put egg and milk mixture in top of a double boiler and cook, stirring constantly, until it coats the spoon. Remove from stove. Add vanilla.

Boiled Custard No. 2

2 cups scalded milk

2 eggs

1/4 cup sugar

1/8 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Beat eggs slightly, add sugar and salt and stir constantly while adding hot milk. Cook in double boiler, stirring until mixture thickens and a coating is formed on the spoon. Remove from stove, add vanilla and serve.

And from Debbie Pataky came also a hint for making the best custard. “If you use Carnation evaporated milk instead of plain old milk, the custard is much better.”

ARTHRITIS HELP

We’ve had a discussion about the value of – and the recipe for – a gin and golden raisins remedy for arthritis. One wife, who prefers to be anonymous, responded with eagerness, hoping for relief from significant osteoarthritis pain for her husband. It’s worth researching further if you think it might be helpful.

Perhaps Mrs. Anonymous is not the only one who wants to know specifics about both raisins and gin. In answer to her request, our correspondent said the raisins must be golden; the gin must contain juniper berries (Gordon’s gin qualifies); and you must eat nine raisins daily. You don’t drink the gin. In fact, it will probably be soaked into the raisins after a week or so when they’re covered with cheesecloth (a substitute cover is a coffee filter).

LOAFING SALMON

Linda Leake of LaFayette, Ga., found a recipe that uses prepared salmon burgers and is made into a mini-loaf.

With the addition of a number of ingredients.

Salmon Burger Loaf

3 frozen salmon burgers, cooked according to package directions

cup panko bread crumbs

cup chopped green onions or chives

2 eggs

cup low-fat milk

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 teaspoon grated lemon zest

teaspoon ground black pepper

Tartar sauce or other sauce of your choice

Cooking spray

Heat oven to 375 degrees. Coat a 5-by-2-inch loaf pan with nonstick cooking spray. Flake salmon burgers and place in a medium bowl. Add bread crumbs, green onions, eggs, milk, olive oil, lemon zest and pepper. Mix well. Press the mixture into the prepared pan.

Bake uncovered for 20 to 25 minutes or until lightly browned and set. Slice and serve with sauce of your choosing.

Makes 2-3 servings.

– Trident Seafoods

JUST A DASH

The topic today is pickles, a most important food group. Debbie Pataky wrote, “After searching everywhere at North Shore Publix, with and without helpers, I finally found the Ba-Tempte pickles in the refrigerated section with other refrigerated pickles that shall not be named, though both are expensive. The bread and butter were my choice, and are very good. But area Dollar Tree stores have Breckenridge bread and butter pickles that are delicious and $1. I still did not find half-done pickles, the ones I crave, like Shapiro’s, though they did have half-sour. I will try them next.”

That’s it for today; come back bearing recipes, please.