Fourth of July Goodies

 

Hi friends, if you have a star coookie cutter you can turn plain into fancy for your July 4th goodies that you make.  It doesn't have to be for July 4th only. I love stars so I plan on doing this often. I saw in a magazine where someone cut stars out of watermelon. 

We went to a few picnics this year and I'm sharing with you what I took. I made a tomato basil salad and cut the cheese with a star cookie cutter to place on top of the tomatoes. I made two of these salads. One I cut up the tomatoes and basil mixing it all together because the one crowd was larger 

I made a cherry tart and gave it a flag appearance by cutting stars out of the dough. The recipe came from an old friend. Farmer Dave said it's the same recipe that his mom made so that was a bonus. 

Old Fashioned Cherry Tart 

3 cups flour

1 cup Crisco

2 1/2 t baking powder

1/2 t salt

1/2 cup milk

1/2 cup sugar

3 eggs

1 t vanilla

Mix flour, baking powder, salt and Crisco.

stir wet ingredients into dry ingredients

dough will be sticky ~ you have to work with it

Save 1 cup of dough for lattice top

spread dough on greased 10 x 15 tart pan

cover dough with 2 cans of cherry pie filling

cut and cover cherries with the remaining dough

roll out the remaining dough and here's when you can be creative!

Bake 350 for 25-30 minutes

Here's a few helpful tidbits on the recipe.

I covered my hands in flour as I was patting it down on the pan because it was very sticky.  I saved a cup of the dough for the topping and added 1/4 flour to make it roll out better. 

 I hope you're enjoying your summer! 

                                                         much love, aa