The I Hate to Cook Book (28 page)

But sometimes, life being what it is, and women being the way we are, you feel that you should make something
yourself
. After all, Ethel made that good cucumber-Roquefort thing or whatever it was, and you can’t get Ethel’s recipe because she’s coming to your party. (Well, you could, but you’d feel sort of silly.)

So you look in your big fat cookbook and find so many complex-sounding affairs, which, as you taste them in your mind, don’t sound worth the trouble, that you shut the book quickly. Then you open this cookbook and find just a few: all carefully selected, made frequently by women who hate to cook as much as you do, and at least a couple of which may well set Ethel right back on her heels.

     BETTY’S COCKTAIL COOKIES     

makes about 40

Mix together

½ cup flour

¼ cup butter

1 jar pimento or Cheddar cheese spread

Now shape it into a neat roll, wrap it in waxed paper, and refrigerate it. When it’s firm, slice it as you would cookies, and bake them at 400˚ for ten minutes. (Don’t bother to grease the pan.)

     5 O’CLOCK BISCUITS     

makes about 20

1 package tube-type refrigerated biscuits

1 can anchovy fillets or smoked oysters and the oil they’re in

Cut the biscuits in half, and top each half with half a fillet of anchovy or a smoked oyster or chunk of same. Fold the biscuits over, and pinch the edges together. Brush the tops with the oil from the fish can, and bake at 450˚ for eight minutes.

     CHEESE WEDGES     

makes about 40

1 package tube-type refrigerated biscuits

cup grated cheese

¼ cup melted butter

Cut each biscuit into four little wedges, roll them in melted butter and grated cheese, then toast them in a 400˚ oven for about twelve minutes.

     PARTY PEG’S CHEESE STICKS     

pastry dough

Parmesan

paprika (optional)

Make your usual pastry recipe—or use a box of good pastry mix—and roll ’er out as far as she’ll go. Sprinkle a lot of Parmesan all over it, fold ’er over once, and roll ’er out again. Repeat this maneuver half a dozen times, using more Parmesan each time, of course. Then cut in strips, sprinkle with paprika, if you like, and bake at 400˚ for about ten minutes.

     CHEESE BALLS     

(This is an every-girl-for-herself sort of thing.)

Combine an 8-ounce package of cream cheese with jars of any processed cheese spreads you like—pimento, blue cheese, et cetera, plus any leftover odds and ends of cheese you have, grated. Then add sherry, grated onion, cream, Worcestershire, and/or whatever else you like, to taste.

Form it into
small
balls, somewhere between a golf ball and a tennis ball, roll them in crushed nuts, and wrap them individually in aluminum foil before you store them in the refrigerator.

These are not to hang on the Christmas tree, they are to bring forth, with crackers, for dropper-inners. Small balls are better than one big one, because they’re gone before they get that gnawed-at look.

     ONION ROUNDS