The following is a guest post by Rhiannon Carswell
The winter holiday season is filled with music and lights. Colorful wreaths adorn city street posts and mailboxes to the North Pole spring up, waiting for children to fill them with their letters to Santa. Holiday songs infiltrate the radio stations and packages appear beneath tinsel frosted trees. Families gather; they feast. They watch their favorite Christmas movies, quoting lines and basking in nostalgia. For 75 years, It’s a Wonderful Life has been one of those movies.
In celebration of its 75th Anniversary, Insight Editions has released It’s a Wonderful Life: The Official Bailey Family Cookbook. The 127-page book contains more than recipes, though. It includes instructions on how to throw a classic Christmas dinner party, complete with timeline. It hearkens back to a time before cellphones and internet, where dinner invitations were mailed and R.S.V.P.s were requested. The book also contains craft directions for items such as book angles and fabric wreaths.
The book, itself, is a lovely red and gold, with color images of recipes from the book and a black and white photo of George and Mary Bailey. The spine is sturdy and holds up to being left open. Inside, there’s a lovely full length black and white movie still of George and Mary embracing. The Introduction is short and to the point. One of the things I loved about this cookbook is that the bulk of it is dedicated to recipes. The narratives per recipe are brief while still placing the recipes within the movie context. Most recipes are accompanied by full length color photos of the prepared dishes. The recipes are divided into Appetizers, Sides, Entrees, Desserts, Cocktails & Drinks, Christmas Crafts, Vintage Christmas Dinner, and an Index.
Now, for the recipes. The instructions are easy to follow, and the yielded amounts listed were accurate. The page layouts were clean, easy to read, and were consistent throughout the book. Most of the ingredients should be easy to find for most people. There were a couple that might be a little more difficult for people to find, but they are easily substituted for something else. All of the recipes list an active time and a total time to help with timing the dishes.
When choosing recipes to test, I tried to choose at least one recipe from each section. I did not make any of the cocktails or punches due to time and the ingredients I had on hand, but there are several that I’m planning on trying in the future. I prepared the following: Spicy Meatballs with Yogurt Sauce, Home Blessing Salad, Candied Yams, Phonograph Fowl, and Annie’s Mixed-Berry Pie.
Spicy Meatballs with Yogurt Sauce
The meatballs can be made with either ground beef, ground lamb, or a combination of both. For the slice of white bread, I used a slice of sourdough. I really loved the extra flavor the bread gave the meatballs, but they would be delicious with plain white bread, also. The yogurt sauce calls for Greek yogurt, and I would definitely not substitute this. The pomegranate syrup will thin it out slightly, so you’ll want to start with thicker yogurt. The pomegranate syrup was worth the extra effort to reduce the juice. I used white pomegranate seeds to garnish, but red would be just as delicious. The adjika sauce is where I took a little more liberty with the ingredients. My local store didn’t have any fresh red chiles, so I used dried red chilis that I already had and rehydrated them in boiling water. They also didn’t have any fresh basil leaves, so I used dried. Keep in mind that if you’re substituting dried herbs for fresh, the dried herbs have a stronger flavor. The recipe called for sumac, and my local store didn’t have it. I could have gone to the Middle Eastern shop that I like to get some, but I was pressed for time. I happen to have tamarind concentrate already, so I just did a 1::1 substitution with the tamarind. I also doubled the olive oil instead of using walnut oil because walnut oil is expensive, and I would rarely ever use it. I did need to increase the baking time about 10 minutes to suit my particular preference, but the meatballs were cooked all the way through with the listed time. I’ve made this recipe twice so far because my family annihilated the first batch. The recipe makes a lot of adjika, so I didn’t need to make any more of that. You may need to make more pomegranate yogurt, though, depending on how much was used with the first batch.
Home Blessing Salad
This is a panzanella, which I had never made before. For the bread, I used an Italian loaf, but any rustic bread or ciabatta would work. Since I had no fresh basil, I used dried. TIP: If you’re going to use any dried herbs, like I did for the basil, I would recommend adding them to the bread. This turns the bread into seasoned croutons rather than plain. You could definitely add them to the vinaigrette, though, and it would still be delicious. I just like seasoned bread. Other than the dried basil, I made the recipe as written.
Candied Yams
I ended up doubling this recipe, but I didn’t do any ingredient substitutions. I’m not a fan of ginger, so I would normally omit it, but I added it here and it wasn’t overpowering. I’ve never used orange juice with yams before, but it was delicious. I didn’t get an orange flavor, though. Make sure you cut the yams small (the recipe calls for 1-inch pieces). Mine were a little bigger, so I had to increase the cooking time on them to compensate. I had a lot of liquid from doubling the recipe, so next time I would only double the yams and see if I needed extra liquid. It didn’t reduce down to a syrup, but that’s likely a me issue and not an issue with the recipe. It was still delicious, so I’m counting it as a win.
Phonograph Fowl
This was ridiculously good. I used young fryer chicken per the recipe. I would normally use a roasting chicken, but the store didn’t have any. I wasn’t sure how I would like the gremolata because I don’t like rosemary. It tastes like burned Christmas trees. But I added it per the recipe, and it wasn’t an overpowering flavor. I couldn’t find fresh thyme, so I used dried here. I did end up putting some foil loosely over the top of the chicken to prevent overbrowning. I ate all the chicken skin myself, it was that good. I wasn’t about to share it. The chicken stayed moist and was well seasoned. Next time, I will make a gravy from the pan drippings because I like gravy with my chicken, but it was delicious without it.
Annie’s Mixed-Berry Pie
The recipe calls for blueberries, red raspberries, and/or blackberries. I used blueberries only for this. You can also use frozen berries, which I did. That said, even with increasing the cooking time, my pie didn’t set up. I’m pretty sure I overfilled my pie crust, so I will try this again at some point and see if I don’t get better results. This is also the first time I have ever made pie crust. I don’t like pie crust, as a rule. It’s a pie filling delivery system and that’s about it. This was a really good crust, though. It stayed flakey on top, even with the increased baking time. It had a good flavor and wasn’t difficult to make. When making the crust, be sure to have everything as cold as possible, and then don’t over handle it. That’s how you get tough crust that falls apart. Instead of shortening, I used lard. I measured out the lard and popped the measuring cup in the freezer until I was ready for it. I would suggest doing the same with the shortening. The recipe also calls for an egg wash mixed with cream, but I am allergic to eggs, so I didn’t do that. I just brushed the pie top with cream and then sugared it. I didn’t have any sanding sugar, so I just used table sugar. Even though the pie didn’t set up properly, it was really good. I forgot to take a picture of the pie, but I did do the lattice top. Next time I will probably just do a standard two crust pie.
This turned out to be a fantastic meal. There are several other recipes I plan on trying in the future. I was going to make the fig bars, the apple-cranberry sauce, and the garlic mashed potatoes with this meal, but I just didn’t have time. I did make the filling for the fig bars, though, and that was really good. I’ll be finishing up that recipe soon. Most of these recipes should be manageable for most skill levels. There are some recipes I wouldn’t recommend making for people with a beginning skill level. I didn’t make the beverages, but I was happy to see there was a mix of alcoholic and nonalcoholic recipes, so there is something for everyone. It might be possible to make nonalcoholic versions of some of the cocktails, so I might play around with those. Some recipes I can’t try, like the eggnog and the angel food cake, because of my egg allergy, but most of the recipes were either egg-free or the egg could be omitted without any real issues. I’m looking forward to using this cookbook for years to come.
