Okay, now that we've established you may not want capers, how about some kapers?
These kapers are courtesy of Tri Kappas Kitchen Kapers (Alpha Rho Chapter of Kappa Kappa Kappa, Inc., 1976). I love that a few of the mushroom caps on the covers (front and back!) are covered with flower-patterned card stock to give them such a '70s homemade vibe. I wasn't able to find another image of the cover, so I'm not sure whether a previous owner added this touch herself, or if the publisher dressed up the mushrooms, but either way, it's awesome.
This detail also suggests that the Kappa Kappa Kappas had their own ways of doing things, and that's borne out by the book itself. For example, when I think of pizza burgers, I generally think of a regular beef burger with pizza sauce and a big, melty slice of mozzarella on top, plus maybe green peppers, pepperoni, olives, onions, mushrooms, or whatever other pizza toppings the cook desires. That's not the Kappa Kappa Kappa way.
Pizza burgers are apparently Spam, hamburger, and Colby cheese ground together, mixed with spaghetti sauce, slathered onto buns, and baked.
I tend to think of quiche Lorraine as pastry filled with a rich custard, bacon, and maybe some Swiss cheese. The Kappa Kappa Kappas don't like futzing around with pie crust or running off to the grocery for cream or specific meats or cheeses, so they use what they have.
That's apparently cans of dinner rolls, sausage, Monterey Jack, and plain old milk with the eggs.
When I think midwest brunch casserole, I think of the layers of white bread, custard, cheese, and sometimes breakfast meat layered into a casserole dish, left in the fridge overnight, and popped into the church oven just before sunrise service starts so Easter brunch will be ready when it's over. That's not the Kappa Kappa Kappa way.
If it's brunch, you need cereal. That means top and bottom layers of Rice Krispies enclosing cheese, sausage, onion, rice, and best of all, a cream of celery custard! (And now I'm having flashbacks of my six-year-old self barfing Rice Krispies everywhere, even though those were not part of a casserole.)
My favorite recipe just might be these little nuggets, which are a thing unto themselves. I'm not sure I've found anything quite like them in my other cookbooks.
Why one should add walnuts to meatloaf mix for stuffed potato meatballs is a bit of a mystery, but that's an interesting addition. Then once the nutty meatballs are fried, they're encased in mashed potatoes, rolled in cheese, brushed with butter, rolled in bread crumbs, wrapped in an authentic Parisian crêpe and a Chicago-style deep dish pizza, rolled in a blueberry pancake, deep fried.... oh, wait. I think I got off track. It's just baked after the bread crumbs, but that's still a lot of layering. Those are some seriously stuffed potato meatballs.
The Kappa Kappa Kappas were apparently so busy rethinking recipes for their Kappa Kitchen Kapers that they never got around to rethinking that maybe they should cut back on giving everything KKK initials. They were just on their own wavelength....
Soggy rice krispy casserole (at least the bottom layer). Definitely not appealing. Some years ago I decided to eat a bowl of rice krispies left over from making treats, and discovered that they are quite disgusting. So are the treats, come to think of it... something about the smell of the butter and marshmallows melting together is very off-putting.
ReplyDeleteI know a lot of people love Krispie treats, but if I'm going to eat sugar and butter, there are waaay tastier vehicles for it. (Treats are probably preferable to Krispies soaked in cream of celery soup, though!)
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