A Thrifty Recipe for Leftover Ham

Little chunks of chicken, turkey, or even ham are perfect for this next meat-stretching sweet and sour recipe. Served over rice, it’s colorful, nutritious, and very inexpensive. Once again, it starts with that basic sauce recipe only this time your liquid is water or fruit juice.

Sweet ‘n’ Sour Chicken (or Ham)

Sauce:

3/4 c sugar 3/4 c water, apple or

1/3 c vinegar cranberry juice

3 TBSP catchup

3 TBSP cornstarch

Add-ins: (These are my choices, yours may vary)

chunks of cooked chicken

carrots, thinly sliced diagonally

celery, thinly sliced diagonally

thin strips of red and/or green pepper

chunk pineapple, small can with juice

water chestnuts

hot red pepper flakes

To make the sauce, combine sugar, vinegar and catchup in a large saucepan. Blend cornstarch into water or juice, add to sugar mixture, cook over medium heat stirring constantly, until thick and clear. Stir in whatever meat and veggies you’ve decided on and heat through.

This is a starting-point recipe... you may like the sauce more or less sweet, thicker or thinner. The juice with the pineapple will thin it somewhat of course. Basically, this versatile recipe can be varied according to what you have on hand and your family’s preferences. Don’t have pineapple? Add some apple chunks, pear pieces or even grapes instead, or omit the fruit altogether. You can use leftover cooked veggies in this although the raw veggies do cook a bit as you heat this while still leaving them nicely crisp. Broccoli and cauliflower are good additions, too. Experiment!
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I discovered this recipe in an old candy cookbook in the early 1970’s, when my kids and I were reading and re-reading the Narnia books. I’m not sure what C. S. Lewis’ vision of this candy was, but in this recipe, Turkish Delight is basically a sturdy, orange-flavored gumdrop rolled in confectioners’ sugar. I especially like this recipe because, unlike so, so many candies, it does not require the use of a candy thermometer.

You may not have the unflavored gelatin (something I find few people cook with anymore), but I've experimented with using Jell-o, and you really do need the plain gelatin. With supervision, this is a kid-making easy recipe.

Turkish Delight

1-ounce envelopes unflavored gelatin
2 cups sugar
1 cup water
pinch salt
1 cup frozen orange juice concentrate, undiluted
1 cup finely chopped nuts
confectioners’ sugar

Combine gelatin and the 2 cups sugar in a large saucepan, mixing well, then add water and the pinch of salt. Cook over low heat, stirring constantly until gelatin and sugar are dissolved. Let simmer for 20 minutes, stirring once in a while. Remove from heat, add orange juice concentrate and mix well. Chill, stirring occasionally, until thickened, then stir in the nuts.

Rinse an 8”x8” pan with cold water, pour in gelatin mixture and chill until firmly set. Unmold (using warm, damp cloth on bottom of upside-down pan to release gelatin) onto a surface coated with confectioners’ sugar, cut into 1” squares, roll in the sugar until well coated. NOW, this makes pretty thick cubes, so I’ve tried putting it in larger pans for thinner, smaller cubes which I like better.

Look at it this way . . . an 8x8 = 64 square inches, a 7x11 = 77 sq in and a 9x13 pan = 117 sq in so that gives you some idea.

Little pieces of Turkish Delight pack nicely into tins from mouth mints, etc. If using larger boxes, put paper between layers to help keep the sugar coating dry.

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