Rum Balls (aka Bourbon Balls)

These are simple and good.  And definitely alcoholic, in case that's an issue.

The original recipe is from my mother, from an old community cookbook she had.  The cookbook is called Cookie Cookery, by the Sisterhood of Congregation Brith Shalom (Houston, TX), published in 1971.  It's a small but very decent collection of recipes for cookies and other small goodies, of the sort that are served at receptions and other gatherings.

I remember my mother making batch after batch of sweets from this little booklet, wrapping and freezing them months before some Big Event was to take place.  She and her friends would defrost and then prepare everything shortly before said big event -- trays and trays of beautiful cookies from her and from her friends.  It was an interesting mix of baking traditions -- traditional Texas in all its multi-ethnic splendor and also the different waves of immigration, Jewish and non-Jewish, into the Houston area.

Anyway.

One of the recipes in there is for Bourbon Balls.  I grew up eating these, often for holidays.  My mother would use whatever booze she had on hand, whether bourbon or rum or something else, as long as the flavors are more or less compatible.  They always turned out well.  Most of the recipes I see online are a bit more complicated.  These are simple but good.

The original recipe uses somewhat vague quantities such as "a box of powdered sugar".  I have no idea what that means, so I make these to taste.  Also, vanilla wafers came in 13 ounce boxes back then.  These days the boxes are 11 ounces.  I suspect that the vanilla wafers didn't use to be such a miracle of modern food science (the modern boxes list lots of additives to give the cookies their characteristic taste and texture), but eh, who knows, and they're simple to use.

The original recipe:

13 oz. box of vanilla wafers

2 cups chopped pecans

1 box (unknown size) powdered sugar

1 cup bourbon

Crush the wafers, mix everything, then roll in powdered sugar. (In other words, basically the method I write out below, except that I'm not sure food processors were a Thing back then.)  Makes 80 bourbon balls.

My version of Bourbon Balls (or Rum Balls):

1 box Vanilla wafers (currently the boxes are 11 oz, which works fine. I used the Safeway generic brand because the ingredient list wasn't as horrifying as the Kroger generic brand or the actual Vanilla Wafer brand.  I'm pretty sure that any kind of cookie is going to work, honestly.  And precise quantities aren't important)

2 cups chopped pecans, give or take a bit

about 1 to 1.5 cups powdered sugar (to taste; I'm using somewhat more than 1 cup these days but the actual quantity is not too important)

about 3/4 cups rum or bourbon  (give or take a bit.  I used Bacardi gold because that's what I have on hand, its flavor is reasonable, and 3/4 cup was sufficient to give it a good scooping texture.)

Crush the vanilla wafers  (I used a food processor).  You should end up with roughly 3 cups of crushed cookies, give or take a bit.  Chop the pecans finer if you want them finer, and add them to the crushed cookies.  Mix the crushed cookies and pecans with the powdered sugar.  Then add enough booze to get the dry ingredients to hold together. It'll start out a bit wetter but will get a little drier as the booze soaks into the dry ingredients.

Take little blobs of the dough and roll them in powdered sugar.

That's it.  Eat them up, yum.

They store pretty well at room temp or in the refrigerator, and they can be frozen, too.  The number of rum balls you get from this obviously depends on the size of the balls you roll.  But it should be at least a few dozen.

I can think of variations with added cocoa/chocolate, spices, different types of booze, different nuts or maybe some dried fruit, and so on.  One of these days I'll make my own cookies for these instead of using store-bought vanilla wafers.  My guess is that a regular sugar cookie or shortbread would work great.  It's probably a good recipe for any kind of old/crisp/stale cookie.  The cookies lose all integrity and just become a nice flavorful mush to soak up the booze and sugar and hold the nuts in place.

Recipe Corner: Red Onion Pickles

We have a recipe for quick-pickled red onions that we like a lot.  I'm adding it here in case the website that hosts it goes poof.  Also, the website that hosts it is kind of annoying, with pop-ups and ads and huge walls of other stuff before you get to the actual recipe.  It does have interesting recommendations and variations and discussions and what-not, so it's not useless, but it's not what I need when I just wanna make a quick batch of red onion pickles.

Of course, there are zillions of recipes and websites with recipes for quick-pickled red onions!  But we know that we like this one, so it has become the House Recipe.  The website with the recipe is here: https://carlsbadcravings.com/pickled-red-onions/

And here it is, in my own words and with my own commentary:

Red Onion Pickles (aka quick pickled red onions)

1 red onion.  This should be thinly sliced crosswise (i.e. as if for use on hamburgers).  I usually cut it in half before slicing rings, to make half-moons instead of full rings.  But that's mostly for better control.  Thin means whatever you want it to mean.  The original recipe recommends 1/8" to 1/4", with the thicker ones taking longer to absorb the pickling liquid.  I don't really measure, but my guess is that we usually do 1/8" or thinner.

1/2 cup apple cider vinegar.  We use plain old grocery store cider vinegar.

1/4 cup red wine vinegar.  The cheap brand from the grocery store actually tastes better in this recipe than more expensive and higher-quality red wine vinegars.

1/4 cup water

1.5 tablespoons sugar

1.5 teaspoons salt.  We usually use table salt (i.e., not kosher salt or other salts that have very different weights per volume).  I don't think it matters if you're using iodized, non-iodized, fine sea salt, etc.

The red onions we usually find around here are very large, so I usually double the recipe amounts for the liquid.  In other words, the total pickling liquid is 2 cups rather than 1 cup.

Put the onion slices in a container (I usually separate out the rings).

Heat the liquid to a simmer, so that the sugar dissolves.  I don't know how important it is to bring the liquid to a high temperature or if the only purpose is to dissolve the sugar.  We usually do this on the stove, but a microwave ought to work, too.

Pour the liquid over the onions.  Let it cool to room temperature (or wait about 30 minutes or so), then cover and refrigerate.

You can eat it right away (after the 30 minutes of cooling) or wait.  The recipe website says it'll be better after a few hours, which is usually when we get to it.  It'll last in the refrigerator for quite a while, definitely on the order of several weeks to a few months.

The website suggests that you can reuse the pickling liquid if it's been less than 3 weeks since you mixed it.   The one time we tried, the stuff we added went bad.  Dunno if the liquid wasn't acid enough after the onions had soaked in it or if it had been longer than 3 weeks or what.  Perhaps it would have worked better if we had re-boiled the pickling liquid to kill any germs in the liquid and/or the new veggies.

Although I'm sure there are many fine variations, the above is so good that we've never had the desire to explore.  Friends tend to like it a lot, too.

Recipe corner: Crockpot shredded chicken

Wow, it's been a while since anyone has posted.  We don't post much about our lives these days.  But this is still a great place to post family recipes.

Lately we've been making this in the crockpot.  It is incredibly simple, quite versatile, and entirely delicious.

Crockpot Shredded Chicken

Take a pound or two of boneless skinless chicken thighs, frozen or unfrozen, anywhere from 1 to 3 lbs, give or take a little.  Put this in the crockpot.

Dump in some tomatoes.  We usually have roasted tomatoes in the freezer so that's what we use.  We'll dump in a baggie of them (pint size, usually, though it's fine to use more or less).  If not, probably a few regular tomatoes or cherry tomatoes would work, if their flavor was good.  Or a can of diced tomatoes, juice and all.  It's probably entire optional if you don't have any tomatoes around at all or if you don't like tomatoes.  There's enough liquid already in the chicken thighs.

Cover and cook on low for 6-12 hours -- towards the higher end for larger quantities and frozen thighs/tomatoes, towards the lower end for smaller quantities and non-frozen thighs/tomatoes.  An hour on high equals two hours on low, and we do sometimes start these on high if the thighs are frozen.  Or we use interludes on high if we're short on time.

When the chicken is tender and falls apart easily, it's done.  Then, put the chicken in a bowl and shred it (a fork or two forks are very helpful for this).  It doesn't have to be 100% shredded -- do it to your preferred texture.  Add enough juice from the crockpot to keep the shredded chicken moist but not soggy.  Season to taste.  We usually add salt and garlic powder, maybe some pepper and a bit of either lime juice or cider vinegar.  We keep it pretty simple so that it will pair well with different kinds of sauces.

If there's still liquid left in the crockpot, turn it into a sauce.  This can probably be done in the crockpot but we usually do it on the stove.  Mix a bit of the liquid with some flour to make a slurry.  Mix the slurry in with the rest of the liquid (that is now in a pot on the stove).  Add seasonings to taste.  We usually take this in a southwestern-ish direction, with salt, garlic powder, a small sploot of lime juice or cider vinegar, ground chiles or chili powder or both, and a pinch of cumin.  But it can go in any direction you prefer.  Bring the sauce to a boil so that it thickens to your liking.  (This means approximately 1 to 2 tablespoons of flour per cup of liquid, usually.)

If there's not enough liquid left to make a sauce, maybe add it to the shredded chicken anyway and hope the chicken doesn't absorb so much that it gets soggy.

We will usually serve the chicken (plus or minus any sauce) as part of a meal with flatbreads or tortillas or rice, or as sandwiches with added barbeque sauce.  Add other condiments and sides to make it as satisfying as you like.  We're fond of red onion pickles, for example.

Small amounts of leftovers that might not be enough for a full second meal make an excellent filling for empanadas or bourekas or turnovers.  Or use it as part of making fried rice or a pilaf or soup or anything else you do with small quantities of leftover meat.

Yes, I know that there are food safety concerns about starting frozen stuff in a crockpot, for fear that the internal temperatures will be in the danger zone for too long.  However, the meat cooks for a long while after the temperatures are hot enough to kill any germs (165F and above).  We don't trust raw chicken anyway, danger zone or not, given the vagaries of the modern food industry.    Also, if I'm going to be home, I run the crockpot on high for a few hours to increase the temps as quickly as possible, whether the chicken is frozen or not.  If I'm not home I don't worry about it, of course -- it'll do fine on low since I might not be home for 10-12 hours anyway.  Defrosting the chicken before cooking is yet another option for people who are sensitive to these things and/or worried.

Although chicken breasts can be used, they're more likely to dry out and get stringy with the long cooking.  Chicken with skin and bones can be used, but deboning would be a pain and you'd have to decide how to handle the soggy skin plus the extra fat in the pan.  I'm sure other types of poultry would work well, too.

This grew out of some of the family's existing recipes for things like pulled pork and shredded brisket.