Looking For A Home-Made Pot Pie Recipe? Marsha Hubler & Her Mennonite Friends Have You Covered!

HOME-MADE POT PIE FROM OUR MENNONITE FRIENDS

By Marsha Hubler

Author of THE LOVES OF SNYDER COUNTY

As the author of the Amish/Mennonite fiction series THE LOVES OF SNYDER COUNTY, I’m fascinated by the lifestyles of the Amish and Mennonites in central Pennsylvania. I have several friends who are Mennonites, some who claim to be “Mid-Atlantic” and others who say they are “Anabaptists.” All these friends are what we English would call progressive or modern Mennonites because they drive cars (all dark colors-mostly black), they have electricity in their homes, and most have cell phones. But all have similar lifestyles and orders of worship. Their dress is traditional with the “kapp” on the women’s drawn-back hair in buns (some kapps are black, others white) and the capes on their dresses, but the dresses can be multi-colored pastels including flowered prints.

Of course, we’re not talking about Old Order Amish or Old Order Mennonite here at all. Old Order folks are the horse and buggy folks, the Plain Folk who have no electricity, cars, or phones. These Ordnungs usually dress in dark clothes, and the men and women often have long sleeves even in the heat of the summer.  The men wear straw hats or black hats with large brims while the women often wear dark colored bonnets over their white kapps when they are outside. The Amish sects like this and the new order Mennonites parted company a long, long time ago and probably will never meet on common ground again.

But back to my Mennonite friends. Recently I visited Brenda and Grace, Mid-Atlantic Mennonite ladies who invited another English gal and me to lunch. My friend and I thought we’d be having a sandwich or a small salad topped off with cottage cheese, but the Mennonite gals surprised us with home-made pot pie with tender shredded pork, corn on the cob, apple sauce, three kinds of canned pickles, and spiced zucchini slices that tasted that spiced apple rings. For dessert, Brenda opened a jar of canned peaches, topped off with that cottage cheese we were expecting on a salad. The meal and fellowship were heavenly, to put it mildly.

Mennonites are known for their hospitality and home cooking. Believe me, my friend and I were given the red carpet treatment by two of these gentle, soft-spoken folks. The pot pie was some of the most delicious I’ve ever had, and it’s a luncheon engagement that I’ll remember for a long time.

Mennonite Pot Pie Recipe

Boil chicken, beef, or pork until soft.

Make pot pie noodles by adding one egg to 1 ½ c. flour and ½ tspn. and mix.

Add approximately ¼ c. water and mix; then form dough into ball.

Roll out with rolling pin, let dough dry for an hour or so.

Slice rolled-out dough into one-inch squares.

Remove boiled meat from large pot full of meat broth.

Cube three raw potatoes.

Add individual pieces of dough to boiling broth with cubed potatoes and keep stirring between the adding of the noodles.

Simmer for about 30 minutes then add meat back into broth and noodles.

Stir every few minutes to prevent noodles from sticking together.

          Marsha has had a background conducive to effective writing. She has a master’s degree in education from Bloomsburg University, Bloomsburg, PA, and has been an educator for over forty years. She had co-founded two private schools, Kreamer Christian Academy, Kreamer, PA, and the Bethesda Prep School, Milton, PA, and had served as teacher/administrator in each. She is presently a PA certified homeschool consultant, working out of her office in her Middleburg home, where she lives with her husband and two dogs.

Marsha has owned horses for over 20 years, therefore knows her horse facts in and out. She also lives in central PA, “Dutch” country, highly populated by the Amish and Mennonite, who have been a valuable first-hand resource for Marsha’s latest project, a series about the Amish and Mennonite folk in the beautiful Susquehanna Valley in central PA.

Marsha is excited that her eight-book “Keystone Stables Series” published by Zonderkidz has become a best seller. She also is quite proud of her last two stand-alone books, RICKIE RIDES TO THE RESCUE and THE SECRET OF WOLF CANYON. She has 13 books in print with her Amish/Mennonite fiction series for ladies entitled “The Loves of Snyder County,” soon to be added to her publishing credentials.

She hears from her fans on a regular basis. Several have said they have started to seriously think about God, and one gal wrote that she was thinking of killing herself until she read one of Marsha’s books.

“That’s the best pay any writer could ever get,” Marsha says. “I write not only to entertain but also to encourage my readers. Every one of my books has a positive outlook on life with solutions to every problem with God’s help.

 Her life verse is 1 Corinthians 15:10a: “But by the grace of God I am what I am …”

Visit her at www.marshahubler.com  or www.horsefactsbymarshahubler.wordpress.com   She loves to hear from her readers of all ages.