Busy Working Woman's Quick Meal

Hey y'all, I'm Paula Deen, and if anyone knows what it means to be a working woman, it's me

So today, I want to share some of the delicious dishes that have kept me and my boys going through the busiest of times

But first, I want to show you how to make the very most of your local market

And then we'll head home and get going on our no-must, no-fuss corned beef and cabbage

Next, I'm going to bake a shrimp and crab salad that is simple and easy as one, two, three

And finally, the side dish that no Southern family would do without, heavenly hoe cakes

So don't sweat it, gang. No one's going hungry tonight, because the lady is large and in charge

Have you ever had one of those days where you feel like between your schedule

your children's schedule, your husband's schedule, everybody's schedule, you don't have time to get a meal on the table

Well, that's the predicament I found myself in today. And I've come over here to my pantry

and for some reason I've let it get pretty slack. So before I can cook this meal, and it's going to be a quick one

I'm going to have to run down to Trader Joe's. So y'all hop in the car and come with me

I need help today. I need help. Oh, I love these

I just love them, love them, love them, love them. Hey, Paula, how you doing

Hey, Glenn, how are you? I'm very well, thanks. Good to see you

I'm so glad that you saw me. Yes, because I've had a tremendously busy day

I've got so much to do. And if you could help me find my groceries quick, like, so I can get out of here, I'd be ever so grateful

Hey, I'd be happy to do that for you. I need some frozen raspberries. We can do that

Canned shrimp. Got that. And canned crab. No problem at all. We're three for three

Good, good. Why should we start out? Hey, you're right next to the raspberries. You want to start out here

You're kidding. That's great, yes. How about that? We almost got bitten by the raspberries there

These are our frozen raspberries. They're actually frozen right out there, right almost next to the fields

It actually locks in the freshness of them and preserves the vast majority of the nutrients

in the fruit. It's fantastic. So I'm as well off using these as I would be a fresh one

I believe so. Absolutely. Especially for all the recipes, and you don't have to use them right now

You can use a little bit now and use a little bit later. It works out great. That's great

How about two of those? We can definitely do that. We'll get two of those. What else on that list of yours here

Let's see the canned shrimp and the canned crab. And the canned crab, yes. Let's go for it

We've got to go around the corner here. So we've got it right over here

Great. Quick, we'll get you in and out of here. No problem. Right over here, we've got the canned crab meats

This is a great product. This is actually 15% leg meat. This is like the most premium portion of the crab

So it's fantastic. So it's not all claw. No, exactly. It's not all claw

We've got the great leg meat in here, which is fantastic. It's really hard to find that in canned crab

Plus, it'll hold in your pantry. Absolutely, yeah. No problems at all. It's tough to find the expiration date on these guys

That's great. Quick meals. How many of these do you need? Let me have two of those and two of the shrimp

Two of the shrimp. Fantastic. We've got the shrimp for you. Anything else I can get for you

Nope, that's it. I'm going to do something the devil won't do. I'm going to leave you alone

Leave me alone. Fantastic. Thanks for stopping by. Thanks, Glenn. Take care, Paula

Thank goodness for Trader Joe

I don't know what I'd do without him sometimes. And I even managed to find some beautiful purple irises at the store

Aren't they just delicious looking? Today's meal just happens to be one of my son's

all-time favorite meal. I'm gonna cook up a corned beef and cabbage

I want you to look what sweet Michael did for me. Who said he was good for nothing He put the bacon on for me He a hungry man I think don you This dish is gonna be so quick and so simple for us

We've got our bacon cooked, thanks to Michael. And we're gonna quickly just cut up our cabbage, just like this

I'm gonna cut it again. I'm gonna cut it in quarters. And then work from the quarters

I'm going to have supper ready here in no time. It's a very inexpensive meal as well

All right, we've got our cabbage chopped up, and that was easy enough

I've got my grease from my bacon, but I like two different flavors in my cabbage

So in goes some butter. I'm just going to dump that cabbage right in there like that

This is just real, real easy this way, and it's a lot quicker. Now I'm going to add just a little, little bit of water

because cabbage contains so much water, so you don't want to drown your cabbage

I'm going to add a little bit of salt. We're going to add a little bit of pepper

And we're going to give that a stir. Just a quick stir because we want to coat our cabbage in that seasoning

which is butter and bacon grease. And it doesn't take but a minute for cabbage

I like mine with some crispiness to it. I don't like mine cooked down to mush

And while that's cooking, I'm going to jump over to this next pot

And I'm going to start on a dessert sauce for our ice cream, which is going to be super simple

A little butter. I know y'all are surprised. Try not to be

One bag of frozen raspberries. And I've got some jelly, some currant jelly

And I'm going to add about half of that in there. And because I like my desserts to be sweet, I'm going to add just a little sugar, I think, to it

Now while that's heating up, I'm going to come over here. I have a little cornstarch, and I'm going to just add it to the rest of my jelly

And this is going to be our thickening agent. And when that starts to boil, we're just going to add the rest of this jelly into there

and it's going to thicken it right on up. All right, let's step back over here

and check on our cabbage real quick like. And it's ready for me to pop the meat on it

This is the way the corned beef comes, canned like this. And you can find it in your grocery store

next to your tuna fish, the yummy Spam and potted meats, the canned shrimp, the canned crab

It's not a pretentious meat, but don't be so snobby now that you don't try it because it really is good

but it's extra yummy cooked this way. This is so simple. You just break it into chunks just like that

where if we had used a fresh corned beef, we'd be talking about four hours

So this is just really makes eating corned beef and cabbage real, real easy

All right, now I'm going to take this bacon that Michael cooked for me, and I'm just going

to kind of cut it up and chunk it back in the pot

And I mean, I've got supper and it's been 10 minutes. I'm just going to put the lid back on that and let that corned beef heat through and through

In the meantime, our raspberries are boiling over here. So I'm going to add the current jelly that has the cornstarch

Just gonna pour that over in there and let that come to a boil again and get thick

Alright, our raspberry sauce is getting thick on us now. And I'm just gonna add a little orange juice

And while we're having supper, I'm gonna put this aside and stick it in the fridge until we're ready to eat

In the meantime, though, it's only been 10 minutes and my entree is ready

So you know, oh, hear it sizzling. So you know what that means

It's time for me to taste. It's a belly pleaser

Stick around because next I mixing up baked shrimp and crab salad Another five miracle You know these canned meats that you find in your grocery store are just great

What I'm fixing to do now is make that succulent shrimp and crab casserole from canned seafood meats

Can you believe it? So simple. We're going to start with a bell pepper, chopped onion, celery, mayonnaise

and we've got a little Worcestershire sauce, a little salt, A little pepper

I'm just going to mix those up. And then fold in the crab and the shrimp

Just like that. I don't think you can mess this dish up, do you

I mean, you see how simple it is. So that's it. and just dump it right down there in the bowl

So I'm just going to kind of pack that down in there. Just like that

Isn't that pretty? The colors are very spring-like, aren't they? Now I've got some melted butter here

and I've got salting cracker crumbs. So I'm going to butter these

So we're all ready. Makes a great little quick healthy meal. And that's it

It's ready to go in the oven. There's really nothing to cook in it

We're just going to let it get bubbly. And that'll probably take about 35 minutes

And look what I've got ready for us in this other oven

How tasty does that look? Speaking of taste, I think it's time

piping hot shrimp and crab salad

Only minutes to prepare. It's just glorious

And speaking of glorious, Coming up next, I'm going to cook the world-famous hoe cakes just for y'all

You know, I could just talk forever about these hoe cakes. I almost don't even know where to start

There's so many things I have to say about them. We make them every day at the restaurant

and they're so easy to make. It's flour, self-rising cornmeal mix. Make sure you use a mix because it's a blend of flour and meal

We've got a little sugar, a couple of good fresh eggs, A little water, a little oil, and a little buttermilk

So let me tell you the story about how hoecakes got their name. Hundreds of years ago, the field hens would come in from the farm

and they would have a fire outside and they would cook their hoe cakes on the clean blade of a hoe

Unbelievable. I think that's so ingenious. Now, when you're mixing these up

some people like real fat hoe cakes. Some people like a thinner hoe cake

I happen to like them kind of middle ways. So you'll have to just play around with your batter

and decide which thickness you like. But let's try this one right now

I got my pan getting hot and believe it or not I cook these in clarified margarine Y write that down now

That's margarine, not butter. You won't hear me say that very often

but I like to use margarine because it doesn't burn as badly as butter

And I'm going to just ladle enough of that clarified margarine So we're going to make sure our pan is good and hot and just right

All right, it looks like our pan's about to get ready. Let's see

You'll want to make sure that your pan is good and hot. And see, you've got to have enough seasoning in your pan for those hoe cakes to fry in

or otherwise you would have more of a pancake. So I'm going to add just a little bit more margarine

All right, so we'll do another scoop. All right, let's see what this first one looks like

These bring back a lot of memories to people. I had a young lady in the restaurant one day

and there were tears glistening in her eyes. And she said, Paula, I just want to thank you so much for this meal today

She said I could close my eyes at one point and see my grandmother in her kitchen

and all of the family sitting at the table eating these hoe cakes

that I thought I would never taste again. So I was so glad that I was able to bring them back to her

just for a little while with a very simple meal. Jamie and Bobby's favorite way to eat these hoe cakes

is right out of the pan, just covered in homemade pimento cheese

So you see there is no limit to a hoe cake. All right, I think these are about ready to come up

I think these little guys are ready to be tasted while they're piping hot

And I'll tell you like my daddy used to tell me, do as I say, do not as I do

You might want to skip this step. I like to eat one with syrup

Oh, I never, ever get tired of them. If I'm able, when we come back

I'm going to put some raspberry sauce on some ice cream. Just a couple of quick suggestions for you

When you're shopping for your bacon, you might want to try different kinds

You can always choose from Canadian bacon, which is delicious. And then you've got thick sliced cured bacon

But I do love the black pepper bacon. It's so good. But I think my favorite bacon of all is the slab bacon that has a rind on it

But you'll have to get your butcher to cut that for you. You will never with a knife get it cut like it should be

And let me show you all an easy way to make lardunes, which is nothing but diced bacon that's been blanched and fried

It's great on top of eggs or salads. use your kitchen scissors

Makes it so, so easy. You're through in a jiff. And for those really, really busy nights

when you want to make that shrimp and crab casserole, put it in a disposable dish

feed everybody off a paper plate, and you're out of there. I hope the next time y'all have one of those crazy, crazy days

that maybe you'll remember one of the recipes that I made today, the shrimp and crab bake or the corned beef and cabbage

or the hoe cakes or this scrumptious raspberry sauce for your ice cream

I hope that you'll think about them, and if you try them, I think you'll agree with me that this dinner is a winner

So until next time, best dishes from my kitchen to yours