Fronzell’s House of Sweet

My mother Elsie is not timid, and neither is her cooking. She has little formal education, but she had gumption enough to leave the family farm in Texas and come to California to seek a better life. Eventually she settled in Los Angeles, but she kept her home-grown cooking skills and spirit of experimentation.

My mother isn’t afraid to play with the color, texture or flavor of familiar foods. I remember one Christmas when Mom colored the layers of a chocolate cake green, red and blue to the delight of her three daughters. And her Easter creations were as bold in flavor and bright in color as her hot pink and yellow dresses--with matching hat, gloves and stiletto heels, of course.

Fixing good food seemed to be my mother’s destiny, since her mother, Fronzell, and grandmother, Viola, were famous around their part of West Texas for their rich, well-seasoned cooking.

Grandmother Fronzell worked from memory and depended on her senses and the skill of her hands to create memorable meals with whatever ingredients were available--be it chickens from the henhouse or the squirrels and opossums that Grandfather Jeremiah hunted in the woods.

During the Depression, they were tenant farmers in Dawson, Texas, and Grandmother Fronzell often cooked for the owners, the Perkins family, to earn extra money to support their nine children. So not only did the Perkins family enjoy Grandmother Fronzell’s sumptuous country cooking, she also brought home highfalutin innovations from their kitchen, such as fresh green salad and relish trays, what we now call crudites.

Because Mom didn’t like field work, she stayed in the kitchen to help my grandmother prepare dinner on the large wood-burning cast-iron stove for her family (and frequent guests).

Mom laughs when she recalls her early cooking experiences. “I’d shell the peas, snap the green beans or peel potatoes, all of them from my mother’s beautiful garden,” she says. “Or I would sift the flour for one of her desserts; your grandmother made delicious cakes and pies. When she was out working in the fields, I would sneak into the kitchen and try to cook like she did. The first thing I tried making on my own was a chocolate cake when I was 9 or 10 years old. I used a skillet, and it turned out to be a chocolate mess. But I kept trying, and soon I could make cakes and hot biscuits just as good as my mother.”

Easter time was feasting time on the farm. The younger children dyed boiled eggs with laundry bluing or colored them with crayons, while Grandmother Fronzell and the oldest daughters worked all day to prepare an enormous dinner. “Your grandmother would have everything jumpin’,” my mother says.

“She’d make caramel cake, a big white coconut cake, sweet potato and butterscotch pies. And chicken with dressing. That would be the best.”

Mom carried on the tradition of a big Easter bash after she married and settled down in West Los Angeles. In the years when my sisters and I were too young to help, Mom would start baking a week early.

While she baked, she would also rehearse songs for the annual Marvin Avenue PTA Easter show. Mom would practice “Nothing Could Be Finer Than to Be in Carolina” while baking a chocolate satin pie, or she would teach me the words to “Tea for Two” while she frosted a daffodil cake. There was no room in our refrigerator for all these desserts, so she placed the cakes in the spare bedroom with the window open to keep the room cool--and the door locked to keep out three little girls with big sweet tooths.

But the Easter dinner was more sophisticated than what she grew up with in Texas. Chicken and dressing were replaced with leg of lamb rubbed with lots of garlic and black and cayenne peppers or a big clove-scented ham, glistening under a brown sugar glaze.

If we were eating at home, dinner would start with a proper appetizer, deviled eggs made from the dyed eggs that survived the stepping, squishing and throwing of our rowdy Easter egg hunts. Oh, how I loved the smooth, tangy filling in the firm egg-white cups. That would have been enough Easter dinner for me, that and a few slices of Mom’s cake.

On some Easters, our family would pile into the two-toned Mercury (white and orange, like an Orangesicle) and take food over to my Aunt Juanita’s in South-Central L.A. I would romp with my cousins Sharon, BooBoo, Andre and Buggy while the grown-ups sat around playing cards--bid whist, rummy--or a set of dominoes. Ray Charles or Aretha Franklin played on the radio in the background and, because it was the ‘60s, almost everyone smoked--and dropped the ashes into a very realistic rattlesnake ashtray.

The food would be set out on the dining room table buffet-style. Maybe a big pan of creamy macaroni and cheese, potato salad with onion and chunks of dill pickle, corn bread and greens that had simmered for hours. The kids would circle around Mom’s desserts--a yummy yellow cake spread with rich caramel frosting, just like Grandmother Fronzell’s, an orange cake drizzled with pineapple marmalade or a tart lemon icebox pie.

These days, Mom doesn’t cook much anymore; arthritis has slowed her down. So we got together to translate her free-style “pinch of this and drop of that” approach into recipes to pass on. Here are a few of her favorite desserts.

JACKSONVILLE CARAMEL CAKE

It’s important to frost the cake as soon as the frosting is made. If you wait, the frosting will stiffen and become difficult to spread. You might also try keeping the bowl of frosting in a warm water bath to maintain its spreadable consistency.

CARAMEL CAKE

2 cups sifted flour plus extra for dusting pan

1 1/2 cups sugar

3 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup vegetable shortening plus extra for greasing pan

1 cup milk

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

2 eggs

CARAMEL FROSTING

1/2 cup butter

1 cup dark brown sugar, lightly packed

1/4 cup milk

2 to 3 cups sifted powdered sugar

Chopped pecans, optional

CARAMEL CAKE

Sift together 2 cups flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in large bowl. Add 1/2 cup shortening, milk and vanilla extract and beat with electric mixer for 2 minutes on medium speed. Add eggs and beat 2 minutes longer.

Pour batter into 2 (8-inch) round cake pans that have been greased with shortening and dusted with flour. Bake at 350 degrees until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, about 30 minutes. Cool in pans 10 minutes, then turn onto wire racks to cool completely. Cover with Caramel Frosting and sprinkle with chopped pecans.

CARAMEL FROSTING

Melt butter in medium saucepan and stir in brown sugar. Cook and stir over low heat until it foams, 2 minutes. Remove from heat immediately and beat in milk until smooth. Beat in just enough powdered sugar to make mixture spreadable. Frost cake immediately.

12 small servings. Each serving:

481 calories; 410 mg sodium; 58 mg cholesterol; 18 grams fat; 79 grams carbohydrates; 4 grams protein; 0.06 gram fiber.

PINEAPPLE MARMALADE CAKE

CAKE

2 cups flour plus extra for dusting pan

2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup vegetable shortening or butter plus extra for greasing pan

1 1/2 cups sugar

1 tablespoon grated orange peel

3 eggs

2/3 cup milk

2 tablespoons orange juice

PINEAPPLE MARMALADE

1 cup sugar

2 cups water

1 (20-ounce) can crushed pineapple in heavy syrup

2 tablespoons butter

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

CAKE

Sift together 2 cups flour, baking powder and salt in mixing bowl. Set aside.

Beat 2/3 cup shortening in large bowl to soften, about 30 seconds. Add sugar and orange peel and beat 2 minutes. Beat in eggs 1 at a time until well mixed. Continue to beat while alternately adding flour mixture and milk. Add orange juice and beat 1 minute longer.

Pour batter into 2 (9-inch) round cake pans that have been greased with shortening and dusted with flour. Bake at 350 degrees until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, about 30 minutes. Cool in pans for 10 minutes, then turn onto wire racks to cool completely. Spread Pineapple Marmalade on bottom layer, top with second layer and glaze with Pineapple Marmalade on top and sides.

PINEAPPLE MARMALADE

Combine sugar and water in large saucepan. Bring mixture to boil over medium-high heat and swirl pan occasionally until sugar is dissolved. Lower heat and simmer for 10 minutes. Stir in crushed pineapple and continue to simmer until thick and pineapple is translucent and golden. Remove from heat and stir in butter. Let cool 10 minutes then stir in vanilla extract.

8 servings. Each serving:

564 calories; 344 mg sodium; 98 mg cholesterol; 23 grams fat; 86 grams carbohydrates; 6 grams protein; 0.09 gram fiber.

SNAPPY LEMON ICE BOX PIE

Cousin Ruby Walton gave my mother the basic recipe for this pie (which she got from the back of the Eagle Brand sweetened condensed milk can), then Mom made it her own by adding gingersnaps to the crus and making it more tart and slightly less sweet. This recipe doubles easily.

GRAHAM-SNAP

CRUST

10 finely crushed gingersnaps

4 finely crushed graham crackers (whole rectangles)

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter, melted

2 tablespoons sugar

LEMON FILLING

2 eggs, separated

Juice of 3 lemons, strained

1 (14-ounce) can sweetened condensed milk

2 teaspoons grated lemon peel

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar

1/4 cup sugar

GRAHAM-SNAP CRUST

Thoroughly combine gingersnaps, graham crackers, butter and sugar. Press crushed mixture evenly on bottom and sides of 9-inch pie pan. Bake at 375 degrees 4 to 5 minutes. Set aside.

LEMON FILLING

Beat egg yolks for 10 seconds with electric mixer. Continue beating on medium speed and slowly pour in lemon juice. Add sweetened condensed milk and lemon peel and mix well. Pour pie filling into prepared Graham-Snap Crust and set aside.

Beat egg whites, vanilla extract and cream of tartar in clean bowl (to ensure whites fluff) with electric mixer on medium speed until soft peaks form. Increase speed to high and add sugar gradually until sugar is dissolved and whites form stiff, glossy peaks. Spoon over filling and bake at 350 degrees until meringue is golden brown, 10 to 15 minutes. Chill pie at least 4 hours before serving.

8 servings. Each serving:

332 calories; 241 mg sodium; 89 mg cholesterol; 13 grams fat; 50 grams carbohydrates; 7 grams protein; 0.09 gram fiber.