Capital Electric Cooperative director and rancher Sara Vollmer shares favorite family recipes from a cookbook she created for her daughters, “The Food that Grew Me.” Read more about Sara here.
Sara makes a huge batch of the Swedish meatball bake whenever she must feed a hungry ranch crew. She uses shell noodles in her preparation, but any egg noodle will do.
The rhubarb dream bars are truly a dream! You’ll find them at the annual Vollmer Angus Ranch bull sale April 7, alongside other homemade Midwestern ranch delicacies, including brisket (the Vollmers smoke 13 briskets for the sale!), pasta coleslaw, cowboy beans and funeral potatoes.
CRUST:
2 cups flour
¾ cup powdered sugar
1 cup butter
FILLING:
4 large eggs
2 cups sugar
½ cup flour
½ tsp. salt
4-5 cups rhubarb, chopped
In a food processor, pulse together the crust ingredients. (It is powdery.) Press into a 15x10-inch jellyroll pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes. (Crust will be very light colored.)
Beat together eggs, sugar, flour and salt. Fold in rhubarb. Spread filling mixture on hot crust and bake for an additional 40-45 minutes. Cool before cutting.
Recipe by Sara Vollmer, Capital Electric Cooperative
MEATBALLS:
1 lb. ground beef
½ cup breadcrumbs
1 large egg, beaten
½ onion, grated
¼ tsp. nutmeg
½ tsp. garlic powder
1 tsp. kosher salt
½ tsp. freshly ground black pepper
2 T. olive oil
CASSEROLE:
1 cup beef broth
1 pint heavy cream
1 T. Worcestershire sauce
2½ cups small/medium shell noodles or other egg noodles*
Salt and pepper, to taste
Fresh parsley, chopped
Mix together the beef, breadcrumbs, egg, onion, nutmeg, garlic powder, salt and pepper. Scoop mixture out in 1½ tablespoons and roll into balls.
Heat olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Brown meatballs on all sides. Remove to a plate. (They’ll finish cooking in the oven.)
While meatballs cook, boil a large pot of salted water and cook noodles for 2 minutes less than package instructions.
In the skillet the meatballs were seared in, add broth, heavy cream and Worcestershire sauce, scraping any stuck-on bits on the bottom. Season with salt and pepper. Simmer until slightly thicker, about 10 minutes, and remove from heat.
Grease a 9x13-inch baking dish with nonstick spray. Add pasta to dish and nestle meatballs into noodles. Pour sauce evenly over the top. Bake at 375 degrees for 30-40 minutes. Let set 5 minutes before serving with chopped parsley.
*TEST KITCHEN NOTE: Depending on the noodle you use, this amount may need to be adjusted, as heavier noodles yield more volume once cooked. We used a 12-ounce package of extra wide egg noodles, which yielded a balanced meat-to-noodle ratio in the casserole.
Recipe by Sara Vollmer, Capital Electric Cooperative
