Clemmie Brown

Clemmie Brown’s “ticket in to the family gatherings” is her fudge. She got the recipe years ago from Dr. Richardson’s wife. She said it was “on the Hershey’s box way back then, and it is good.”
She carries the fudge to a lot of family reunions and gatherings, and likes to make it for happies at Christmas. She said it’s easy and turned out the first time she tried it, and she’s been making it ever since. It makes five plates full, and “have your plates ready and buttered when you make it.”

The roast recipe is one she developed on her own and adding tomato juice makes the best gravy, she said. This is a dish she takes often to church luncheons at Calhoun City First Baptist Church.
She always cooks the roast in her husband’s (the late Wilbur) grandmother’s (Dora Harrelson Brown) Dutch oven, and she loves to cook in it. She often wonders what all Mrs. Brown cooked in it over the years.

Mrs. Clemmie says she doesn’t make a lot of fancy foods, and she likes Grandmother Brown’s good and simple pancake recipe.  She hardly ever uses cookbooks, but will try some new recipes that a friend says is good. The Cajun Pickle recipe is one that was passed through friends and she described them as delicious.
Country cured ham with hot biscuits is her favorite food and “I like my coffee,” but son Tommy says she’s a chocoholic.

Tommy likes her homemade soup, that they say is like a stew. He calls it his comfort food, and likes it served with sourdough bread. She says all the family likes the soup, too, and the recipe makes a huge boiler, enough that you can freeze some. She likes to freeze hers in pint and a half cartons.

Her children–Tommy, Sherry and Doug– always wanted plain ice cream, so that’s how the ice cream recipe came about, and they always called it snow ice cream. Her meatloaf is a favorite of Jackie and Robert Boland, something she carried to them after he came home from the hospital.
Being the oldest of three girls, she always helped her mother do the cooking, learning to make cornbread, biscuits and creamed potatoes first.

Chocolate Fudge
5 cups sugar
2 sticks margarine or butter
1 large can Pet milk
1-12 oz. pkg. semi-sweet chocolate morsels
1-7 oz. jar marshmallow creme
2 cups chopped pecans
1 tsp. pure vanilla
Melt margarine in large thick boiler. Add sugar and milk. Bring to rolling boil, and boil eight minutes. Remove from heat and add chocolate morsels, marshmallow creme, vanilla and beat. When it begins to thicken, add pecans. Pour on buttered plate to cool.

Cajun Pickles
1 gallon jar Rainbow whole dill pickles (drained well and cut into 1 1/2” hunks)
5 lbs. sugar
1 cup Tarragon vinegar
2 oz. bottle Tabasco
2 or 3 cloves garlic, minced
Mix together one cup Tarragon vinegar, 2 oz. Tabasco and minced garlic. Place layer of hunked pickles back into jar, add layer of sugar, pour in some of vinegar/Tabasco mix. Continue procedure until all pickles, sugar, vinegar mix are back in gallon jar. Seal tightly. Place jar on side and turn jar daily for one week. Ready to eat. Fill small jar and place in refrigerator to crisp before serving.

Meatloaf
1 1/2 lbs. ground chuck
1 cup seasoned bread crumbs
2 eggs, beaten
8 oz. tomatoes
1/4 cup finely chopped onion
1 tsp. prepared mustard
2 tsp. Worcestershire
Splash of Dale’s
Splash of Tony Chachere’s
Beat eggs and add ingredients. Stir. Make loaf and cook at 350° for one hour. Sauce: Mix together 1 Tbsp. brown sugar, 1/4 cup ketchup, 1/2 tsp. mustard. Drizzle over meat.loaf. Bake 15 more minutes.

Roast Beef
Brown a medium roast, battered in flour and salt, in hot oil on both sides. Remove and make regular gravy in oil. Put roast back in pan and add three quartered potatoes, 6 or 8 baby carrots, 1/2 onion sliced and 1/2 cup tomato juice. Pour over top. Cover and bake at 350° for two hours.

Grandmother Brown’s Pancakes
Mix well:
2 eggs, beaten
1-1/2 cups flour
1-1/2 cups milk
1 Tbsp. baking powder
1 Tbsp. sugar
1 Tbsp. Crisco

Homemade Soup/Stew
12 oz. stew beef, cooked tender
Cook chopped potatoes and onion, elbow macaroni, Ramen noodles and seasoning, spaghetti noodles and one Tbsp. brown rice until tender.
Add one can mixed vegetables, 1 can chopped tomatoes, one can English peas, one can green beans.

Homemade Snow Ice Cream
2 cups sugar
1 gallon regular milk
1 tsp. pure vanilla
4 eggs well beaten (put eggs in boiler with a little milk to heat)