The View From Mrs. Sundberg's Window

We Tried to Sculpt a Sunrise

April 2, 2007

Listened to the show Saturday and it was not bad. It was my one break in the weekend, let me tell you, with Holy Week and all. The kids' vacation started early. They had Friday off and spent it watching movies and doing their homework so they won't have to deal with it later. Saturday was all about lounging around in their bathrobes and big slippers while I dusted and washed windows and cleaned the house in record time. During the show we mixed up a triple batch of sugar cookies for Easter cutouts, and I stayed up late making a grocery list for the big trip Sunday afternoon.

I'm not sure what it is about a holiday that makes people go ballistic at the grocery store. I'm guessing it's the upcoming gatherings with friends and relatives, and the way the table is most always what we gather 'round. You want things to look good, surprise people, even. You don't want people to go hungry. You have your stack of recipes from which you make a list, and once you find a cart, you're on a mission. And so is everyone else around you.

Everything was on sale. Buy one pineapple, get one free. A bunch of asparagus for a dollar. A dozen rolls for a dollar. Eight ounces of cheese for a dollar. Cool Whip and cream soups and stuffing, a dollar each. Ham at fifty-nine cents a pound if you go for the big one, bone and all. Fresh strawberries and eggs, and butter shaped like sheep. Which I did not buy. Nope. Not for four bucks a sheep. At that price, I'll sculpt my own. But I bought just about everything else. I lost my list somewhere in Aisle 5, but by then it didn't matter. There were so many carts and elbows and breasts and bellies nudging me I was lucky to get to the end of the last aisle where there was oxygen, and a friendly man whose nametag read "Donny" wondering whether I was finding what I needed. Sure am, I said. Along with a good deal I don't need.

Like three-and-a-half pounds of cheese. Not counting cream cheese. And bourbon vanilla from Madagascar. And an industrial-sized can of artichoke hearts. Three kinds of ice cream and a frozen apple pie, just in case. Cherry-flavored mustard (for the ham glaze) and four more bags of Easter candy. For the kids, of course. Though I've already plowed my way through one bag which I opened while we were working on the centerpiece. See, I was serious about making my own lamb made of butter. The kids saw it and thought it looked more like a camel, which gave me an idea. An hour later, we were all up to our wrists in butter and what came of that was our own little Easter sculpture garden, with an empty tomb in the middle. We tried to sculpt a sunrise, but that's no easy task. (That's about when I opened the chocolate eggs...) Anyway, looking at it, you get the idea. We titled it "Glory" and it's in a box in the fridge right now where it will stay until Easter Dinner, and won't Mr. Sundberg be surprised. He's always favored real butter. Lucky I picked up five pounds.

Butterscotch Rolls

1 loaf frozen bread dough (or 15 oz. pkg. frozen roll dough)
1 small pkg. butterscotch pudding (the kind you cook, not the instant)
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup butter, melted

Get this recipe going the night before you want to serve the rolls. Grease a bundt or bread pan and fill with pieces of bread dough the size of walnuts. Sprinkle pudding over, then brown sugar, then evenly pour melted butter over the whole shebang. Sprinkle with chopped pecans if desired. Cover and refrigerate overnight. In the morning, let sit on counter until double the size of how it looked before it went into the fridge. Uncover and bake at 325, 30-35 minutes.

This is a good one for days when the kids are sleeping in. Nothing like waking up to the smell of fresh butterscotch rolls.

Enjoy!

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