Favorite Missionary Recipes

This page will be more useful to all of our friends who are serving as missionaries in a foreign country.  While we all like to be the hard-core missionary and only eat the indiginous food, it is sometimes fitting to spoil ourselves with a little taste of home.

 

This is a short list of recipes that we have acquired over the years.  Some of them were from our Albania days, and some of them are from our recent Nigeria days.  Most of them should be applicable anywhere, depending on what type of ingredients you might have available. 

 

Feel free to send us an email if you have other good ideas or leave a comment on the guestbook.

 

 

Index of Recipes

  • Easiest & Cheapest Ricotta Cheese in the World!
  • Hot Fudge
  • Sweet & Sour Sauce
  • Vegetable Lo Mein
  • Tomato Soup
  • Flour Tortillas/chips
  • Refried Beans
  • Guacamole
  • Salsa
  • Homemade Ketchup
  • Other Miscellaneous Items we like to cook

Easiest & Cheapest Ricotta Cheese in the World!

 

This cheese can be sprinkled over spaghetti, used on pizza, or mixed with sugar, vanilla, and cream and spread on your French toast, mixed into a fruit salad, or used as a cheesecake substitute.

 

In a large pot combine 6-cups of fresh water and 3-cups of dry milk powder.  Stir to dissolve.  Heat the milk over a medium flame until it is very warm, about 120°.  This is hot to the touch, but not scalding.  Stir in 1/2-cup of plain white vinegar (cider will work too).  Allow to stand for 10 minutes.  There should be a large mass of curds in an amber pool of whey.  If the liquid is still milky, add another 1/4-cup of vinegar.  Stir and stand again for 10 minutes.  Line a strainer with a clean cloth and drain off the whey.  It can be used as the liquid in bread, muffins, biscuits, or pancakes.  Rinse the curds under cool water and store in the fridge.  This recipe makes about 1-1/2 to 2-cups of curds.

 

Hot Fudge (great on banana splits)

  • 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
  • 1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
  • 3/4 cup cocoa
  • 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 can (14 ounces) evaporated milk
  • 1 cup water
  • 2 tablespoons butter
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla

Combine sugar, cocoa, flour, and salt in saucepan. Add milk, water, and butter. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until boiling. Cook 5 minutes longer. Remove hot fudge sauce from heat, cool, then stir in vanilla.

 

 

Sweet & Sour:

  • 1/3 cup white or rice vinegar (Note: rice vinegar gives better results)
  • 4 TB brown sugar
  • 1 TB ketchup (or homemade ketchup)
  • 1 tsp soy sauce (maggi cubes or beef stock for substitute)
  • 2 teaspoons cornstarch mixed with 4 teaspoons water
  • 3 onions chopped
  • 3 green pepper chopped
  • 3 carrots chopped

Sauté the onion, green pepper, and carrots in a skillet.  Mix the vinegar, brown sugar, ketchup, corn starch, and soy sauce together.  Pour into veggies on skillet.  Add Chopped Pineapple.

 

Add chicken or other meat to sauce and pour over white or fried rice.

Vegetable Lo Mein

  • 1 package of spaghetti
  • Chopped cabbage
  • Chopped Onion
  • Chopped Carrots
  • Mushrooms
  • ¼ cup soy sauce (or beef/chicken stock for substitute)
  • Sugar to taste
  • Garlic Powder or chopped fresh garlic to taste

 

Cook Noodles.  Sauté the vegetables in a skillet.  Add soy sauce, sugar, and garlic to veggies.  When thoroughly mixed, add them to the cooked noodles.  Add more soy sauce if necessary.

Tomato Soup:

1 or 2 sautéed onions
1 Can Tomato Paste
1/4 c. flour (optional)
4-5 maggi cubes(or beef/chicken stock)
Fresh or dried leaf oregano, basil, rosemary and thyme to taste
1 cup of mixed powdered milk or 1can of evaporated milk
Salt, pepper, oregano, basil, rosemary, or thyme to taste
Water to desired thickness

Flour Tortillas/chips

  • 5 cups flour
  • ½ cup butter melted (or vegetable oil)
  • 2 ½ tsp salt
  • 1 ¼ cup warm water

 

Mix dough.  Divide into 24 balls.  Let sit for 10 minutes and then roll into thin tortillas.  Cook on both sides in hot skillet with no oil, or for flour tortillas, fill skillet with hot oil and fry the dough.  Let cool and break into bite sized pieces.

 

Refried Beans

  • 5 cups dried pinto beans
  • 4 chopped onions
  • 3 chopped green pepper
  • Salt/Pepper, Cumin, Chili Powder to taste
  • 2-3 full bulbs of garlic
  • Oil, butter, or animal fat (if desired)

 

Boil Beans, drain, and pick out bad ones.  Mix all ingredients into a large pot and boil until the beans are soft.  Keep adding water as it boils off.  Scoop beans with some of the broth into a skillet, cook, and mash with a sturdy spatula or potato masher as the beans cook.  Add broth as necessary to get desired thickness.  Adjust seasonings as desired.

 

 

Guacamole

  • 3-4 ripe avocados
  • 1 small onion, finely chopped
  • 1 full bulb of garlic finely chopped
  • 3-4 tomatoes chopped
  • Salt, pepper, and cumin to taste
  • Lime juice (about ½ of a lime)

 

Mash avocados and mix all ingredients.  Eat on tortillas, rice, or even just by itself.

 

Salsa

  • 1 can tomato paste, add water to desired thickness
  • 4-6 fresh tomatoes, diced
  • 2-3 onions, finely chopped
  • 1-2 full bulbs of fresh garlic, finely chopped
  • Finely chopped jalapeño, chili pepper, or other spicy pepper to taste
  • Jalapeño juice if available
  • Sqeezed juice from a lemon or lime
  • Salt to taste
  • *chopped pineapple, mango, or papaya for a fruity taste

 

Mix all ingredients and if possible, chill for a day or two before using.

 

 

Homemade Ketchup (the following measurements are only estimates, so be careful)

 

Small can of tomato paste

Water to desired thickness

1 tsp sugar (or to taste)

1 tsp vinegar

½ tsp salt (or to taste)

 

Mix all ingredients and let sit for a while.

 

 

Other Miscellaneous Items we like to cook:

Pancakes

French Toast

Cream of Wheat (using Semovita or Semolina in Nigeria)

No-Bake Cookies