The Amish Cook, Week of Sept 30: Homemade Pumpkin Roll

THE AMISH COOK

BY LOVINA EICHER

Sunday morning turned out to be nice and sunny although a bit on the chilly side.  Friends and family attended our church services at Jacob and Emma’s house, in honor of baptismal services being held for Mose, Susan and Elizabeth.  Jacob had two bench wagons there so he would have plenty of benches to set up.  It was a good thing he had prepared.  The big tool shed was filled with people by the time services started at 9 a.m.  People attended from South Holland, Illinois, Hicksville, Ohio, from several towns in Indiana including Grabill, Shipshewana, Middlebury, Berne, LaGrange, and Nappanee, and Hersey and Charlotte Michigan.  There were also people from surrounding church districts in this area.  Taking a rough estimate I would think about 350 were in attendance.  The three young souls were taken into the confession of faith by Bishop Sam Bontrager from Nappanee, Indiana.  Sam would be a great-uncle to Mose.  19 ministers were in attendance as well.  We appreciate all the support and encouragement that was given by being there for these three young people taking such a wonderful step in life.  May God continue to be their guide in everything they do.  And how blessed we are to have a savior such as Jesus Christ who died on the cross for all our sins.

Lunch was served to everyone afterwards.  We served 17 tables of people.  Eight tables were set at a time.  In between, the settings were quickly washed by all the willing helpers so they could be reused.  A lot of the children were fed in the house where Emma had a 12 qt. kettle of chicken noodle soup ready.

On the lunch menu was homemade wheat and white bread (of which Emma had 75 loaves brought in by the church women), bologna, cheese, tomato slices, peanut butter spread, hot pepper butter, dill pickles, freezer pickles, red beets, strawberry jam, butter, coffee, tea and various kinds of cookies.  They were well prepared and had plenty of food for everyone.  It was a lot of work to prepare for a big service like this, which Jacob and Emma and family so willingly did.  After dishes were all washed popcorn was served to anyone still there.  Emma had invited quite a crowd back for supper so some of the people decided to stay all afternoon.

I was taking some of my containers out to the buggy so they would be out of the way when someone came to get me saying daughter Verena is choking on popcorn.  After several of us tried to retrieve the popcorn we noticed she wasn’t choking but she was losing her breath, couldn’t talk or walk.  The EMS was called and she was taken to the hospital.  The EMS men thought at first she could be having a seizure but after treating her for one she still didn’t act different.  After taking some tests and x-rays the Dr. Said she was dehydrated and under a lot of stress which might have led into an anxiety attack when she kind of choked on the popcorn.  After being able to talk, Verena told us her chest starting hurting really bad and she was hardly able to breath so she wanted to go for a drink of water but fell, not being able to help herself anymore.

How blessed we felt to be able to bring her home after they gave her some IV fluids.  Joe and I spent the evening at the hospital.  The children ate supper at Jacob’s.  They had quite a few people there for supper.  Too bad it had to turn out this way that we couldn’t be there, but God’s ways are not our ways.

3 eggs

1 cup sugar

1 teaspoon lemon juice

⅔ cup pumpkin

¾ cup flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

2 teaspoons cinnamon

½ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon ginger

½ teaspoon nutmeg

1 cup pecans (optional)

Confectioners sugar

Whip eggs for 5 minutes. Add sugar, lemon juice and pumpkin. Mix well. Add remaining ingredients except pecans. Grease jelly roll pan. Place waxed paper in jelly roll pan, making sure waxed paper is extended beyond both ends of pan. Pour batter into waxed paper lined jelly roll pan. Cover batter with pecans. Bake at 375 for 15 minutes. When baked, remove from waxed paper immediately and roll in a towel which has been sprinkled with confectioners sugar. Be sure to roll towel and cake together. When cool, unroll and spread with filling.

Filling:

8 ounces of softened cream cheese

½ teaspoon of vanilla

1 cup of confectioners sugar

4 tablespoons margarine

Combine cream cheese, vanilla, confectioners sugar and margarine. Beat until smooth and creamy.