Nary a star twinkled this early morn'. Mid-January usually finds Western Central Florida with glorious heavenly bodies giving me many moments to make a wish upon.
Yes, I still do that. Some folks might call it child-like. I prefer to call it hope. Not too many evening tides go by that I don't wish upon a beckoning glitter.
Perhaps for a child's health. Perhaps for an elderly parent. Sometimes for rain.
Guess what? I got my wish. Pooh Bear would have wrapped his slicker around himself twice to keep Lake Pierce's blustery winds and peltering chilly drops off of his golden fur.
As I attempted to coax Addie, our old German-Shepherd girl, out the lakefront door, our two feral kitties that have adopted us raced in. Addie adamantly was high-tailing it for the comfort of her doggie bed in the front room. "Maybe later" her solemn look seemed to say. She did not see the need to leave her still darkened sanctuary for those winds!
As I started my morning brew, my prayerful thoughts were already starting to focus on my house-mistress chores of the day. Cooking holds soothing moments for me. Just the thought of giving my Kitchenaid mixer a whirl makes me smile like the kitties sitting next to me this still-gray-morning awaiting their saucer of milk.
I started pulling frozen foods squirreled away. Was it last April that we had picked hydroponic strawberries? Oh goodness, it was! Chuckles and I had celebrated our 33 years together at Whidden's strawberry farm acting like two little kids in the candy store. Such easy picking and who couldn't sample these sugary red berries?
I found 3 packages remaining at the bottom of the chest freezer. Could they still be palatable? I hardly thought so until I inspected the zipper-locked freezer bag. No freezer burn! No extra frost on the individually frozen berries! Wahoo!!
Out came my Mama-in-law's favorite cook pot. Martha had made many batches of her fabulous fudge in that pot. Memor of her vegetable beef soup still makes Chuckles' mouth drool. Not water, drool!!
I didn't even thaw the berries. Just set the pot on to slow simmer with natural sugar sparingly sprinkled throughout. The cottage soon smelled like many decades past of a June summer back in Northeastern Ohio. I stirred it with the well-used wooden spoon at a medium heat.
One hour or so later, I would be ready to ladle some of this sugary red sunshine on homemade ice cream.
There was a time not so very long ago that I would never attempted to make ice cream. Until I joined a co-op for organic milk. I had forgotten the cream that would arise from our Holstein cows. Or how Mom had made a sponge type cake with the cream that us kids would run out to the milk house to skim off a couple of cups for the recipe. All she had to say was that she was going to bake this cake and we were out the door with a jar!
Making ice cream with a Kitchenaid ice cream maker is a heck of a lot easier than driving the ole' SUV to the grocery store for a pint of Ben and Jerry's yummy concoction! You can even buy their book, "Ben & Jerry's Homemade Ice Cream & Dessert Book" and by gosh, it tastes like theirs!
So if your rainy days find you as gloomy as those gray skies above you, stir up some easy Red Sunshine sauce and ladle it onto homemade vanilla ice cream. Your smile will become your umbrella!
RED SUNSHINE SAUCE
4 CUPS OF FROZEN STRAWBERRIES
1 CUP OF ORGANIC OR NATURAL SUGAR
Place the strawberries in a fairly good-sized pot. Sprinkle about 3/4 cup of the sugar over the strawberries as they start to cook and the ice melts from the berries. Stir every so often, being careful not to scorch these yums~Continue cooking until the berries thicken to your liking, adding the remaining 1/4 cup of sugar should your palate deem so~
ENJOY!!!
In HIS love, light, and blessings~
Mama T
