Red Box Recipes - Cocoa Ripple Ring!

Today I'd like to share with you a special, down-home recipe from my family's treasured red recipe box!
It's one my Aunt Pauline gave my Mom - probably back in the 1970's when she first got a Bundt pan!

Cocoa Ripple Ring ~

Ingredients -                                                  

Cream together:  1/2 Cup shortening
                            3/4 Cup sugar
                            2 eggs

Sift together:  1-1/2 Cups flour

                       2 teaspoons baking powder 
                       3/4 teaspoon salt

Mix all of the above together alternately with 2/3 Cup milk - beat thoroughly.

Directions ~

Spoon 1/3 of the above mixture into a Bundt pan.  Sprinkle 1/3 Cup instant sweetened cocoa powder & 1/3 chopped nuts (walnuts work well) on top.  Then spoon half the remaining dough on top of the cocoa and nuts, and sprinkle another 1/3 Cup sweetened cocoa and 1/3 Cup nuts on that.  Top with the remaining dough mixture.  Bake at 350 degrees for 35 minutes.

Red Box Recipes - Turkey, Bean, and Dressing Casserole

Here's a family favorite my Aunt Pauline shared with my Mom a few years back - so easy and dee-lish!!  (And you know we looooove "easy" around here!)

Ingredients ~

Prepare one package of dressing according to instructions on the box or bag.  Add celery, raisins and sausage to taste.  Place half the dressing on the bottom of a casserole dish.

Turkey - cut in small pieces and cooked.  (Great use for leftover turkey!)

One can of green beans

One can of mushroom or chicken soup

On top of the layer of dressing place the turkey, then the green beans, the soup (directly from can - no water added), and lastly place the rest of the dressing on top.  Bake at 350 degrees until the dressing is golden brown and done.  Enjoy!

Red Box Recipes - Quick Dessert

This one is sooooo easy, fast, and yummy!  My Aunt Pauline gave it to my Mom - back in 1961!

Quick Dessert ~ 

Ingredients -

1 Can Wilderness Pie Filling - any flavor.

1/2 package white cake mix (dry) patted down

1/4 pound margarine, melted

  Directions -

In a 5" x 8" Pyrex (glass) baking dish, pour in the pie filling.  Pour the white cake mix on top.  Pour the margarine over all.  Bake at 350 degrees til top is golden.

Red Box Recipes - Great Aunt Bertha's Ice Box Cookies

  I just adored my Great Aunt Bertha!  Spent quite a bit of time with her, in her teeny tiny little house, when I was growing up.  She taught me how to make paper doilies, gave me "very grown up" Gardenia scented stationery for my 10th birthday, and introduced me to "Bozo the Clown" on TV!  (Is my age showing just a little here??)  What a sweet, fun, Christian lady she was!

Back in the 1930's, she wrote this recipe down on a little card.  That was in the days before refrigerators - when you had to keep food fresh in an "Ice Box" - that had a big block of ice in the top compartment to keep things cold (for a few days, anyway!)  Then the Ice Man had to replenish your supply - by horse-drawn wagon - old fashioned goodness!

Ice Box Cookies -

Ingredients ~

1/2 Cup shortening
1 Cup brown sugar - "roll out lumps"
1 egg
Cream together and add -

1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon vanilla
1-1/4 Cups flour - more if needed to make roll.
(Sifted together)

Chill overnight, slice, and bake in 350 degree oven.
(Doesn't say for how long - but these are done when the edges are lightly browned.  So you'll have to experiment!)

These were a favorite of mine as a child - and have a lightly sweet, old-fashioned flavor - Mmmmmm!!

Red Box Recipes - Fry Pan Pizza ~

Because you friends are so special to me - and so are these recipes - I'm starting a new "feature" here called "Red Box Recipes".  So what are those?  They are a lot of very special recipes that have been carefully and lovingly stored - on handwritten recipe cards - in a slightly battered, somewhat-falling-apart dear old red box - by my late Mom.  So in a sense - I'm doing this as a tribute to her, too - because she was one fabulous cook!  And my very dearest friend as well as . . .well,  the best Mom a girl ever had!!!!!!  I grew up on these recipes - some of them date back to the 1930's - nothing like some good old-fashioned deliciousness!! 
So here is the first recipe -

Fry Pan Pizza

2 Tablespoons shortening - to grease a cold skillet.

Ingredients -

1-1/2 Cups Bisquick
3/4 Cup Milk
Mix these together, and spread in the skillet.

Top with -
1/2 pound meat
1 small can of mushroom pieces - cut up
1 can tomato paste
Oregano and Romano Cheese on top

Bake 10 - 15 minutes at 325 degrees in skillet, or 25 - 30 minutes on pizza pan in oven.

We had this many times on Saturdays, as a special treat!  I can still see my Mom putting it all together over her electric skillet - good times!!!  Hope you enjoy it, too!