Farmhouse Kitchen, May 2024
Welcome back to the kitchen, folks! Sunshine is blazing outside, and this month’s column will make sure it’s radiating through your kitchen, too. I’ve been whipping up a whole passel of lemon recipes lately, and I’ve got a classic plus a couple new twists featuring this budget-friendly ingredient.
At the front of the table, we have Easy Lemon Cream Pie. This pie is a lemony twist on my favorite Key lime pie recipe. It’s quick, easy and sure to satisfy that craving for a creamy, tangy dessert. You can jump over to SouthernBite.com to find my Homemade Graham Cracker Crust recipe if you have a little extra time, but feel free to grab a ready-made crust from the grocery if you want to save some steps.
Next up is a layered dessert that’s as pretty as it is delicious. Strawberry Lemon Lush features a vanilla wafer crust topped with layers of sweetened cream cheese, lemon pie filling, fresh strawberries, whipped topping and lemon curd. If there isn’t a special occasion, bringing this dessert will make any gathering special indeed.
I’m always looking for more sheet cakes to add to my collection. Alabama Farmers Federation family member Sara Buck of Sumter County provided the perfect inspiration with her Lemon Icebox Cake, which I swiftly turned into a Lemon Icebox Poke Cake. Her original recipe from the May 2005 Neighbors created a masterful layered cake with a lemon icebox pie filling and a whipped topping frosting, but I just had to put a Southern Bite spin on it. A boxed cake mix is studded with flavor when you poke holes in it, which then allows that decadent lemon filling to soak down inside. Once in the fridge, the flavors are amplified and become an ideal accompaniment for a perfect sunny day.
It is always my hope you find a new family favorite among the recipes I share here. I also hope spending time in the kitchen helps keep you connected to the simpler times we all long for. You know, it often seems our fast-paced world is quickly leaving a lot of traditions behind us, but that doesn’t have to be the case.
I want to encourage you to make time for family meals whenever you can. Host a Sunday supper. Invite your friends to sweet tea and dessert on your back porch. Get up 10 minutes earlier so you can have coffee and conversation with your loved ones before heading off to work. Or ask a grandchild to come over and help you make a new recipe out of the latest issue of Neighbors magazine.
It’s all about being intentional, and when we take the time to do that, small moments can have a big impact on us and those we love most.
Stacey Little