If you’ve been invited to Thanksgiving but not asked to contribute, you may still want to bring a gift that isn’t a bottle of wine.

Something like these Sweet & Savory Nut Clusters from QVC’s chef David Venable can be a gift to the hosts be enjoyed later. Package them in a decorative tin or jar.

Or, they can be served with after-dinner coffee by those who are too stuffed for pie.

For any occasion, they can be served with a slice of Gorgonzola as the cheese course, or as a garnish for a green salad along with crumbled Gorgonzola.
 
RECIPE: SWEET & SAVORY NUT CLUSTERS WITH
GORGONZOLA

Ingredients For 8-10 Servings

Preparation

1. PREHEAT the oven to 325°F. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.

2. TOSS the pecans, almonds, walnuts, and pumpkin seeds with the beaten egg white in a large bowl, until coated.

3. COMBINE the brown sugar, sea salt, black pepper, cayenne pepper and rosemary in another bowl and toss with the nuts until evenly coated. Pour in the honey and fold until coated.

4. SPREAD the mixture out on the prepared cookie sheet. Bake for about 20 minutes, or until toasted. Serve as desired.
  

As you cook your way through the holidays, consider saving the shells (whole rinds) of halved, juiced lemons, limes, oranges and grapefruit. You can repurpose them as mini serving bowls—for sides, desserts, condiments and more.

First, use a serrated grapefruit spoon or other implement to scrape out the empty juice sacs—but leave the white pith intact.

Then cut a tiny slice off from what will become the bottom of each “bowl,” so it will sit flat on a plate. Place the empty shells in the freezer; when frozen, store them in freezer bags. Then, for a festive meal, take them out and use them for:

 
Our favorite use is dessert, specifically:

 
For cold foods, you don’t have to wait for the shells to defrost. Scooping sorbet into frozen shells, for example, keeps it from melting more quickly. Check out yesterday’s recipe for Meyer Lemon Sorbet.

 
WHAT TO DO WITH A LEFTOVER HALF LEMON OR LIME

Freeze the entire half, or cut it into quarters.

 
Freeze individual slices.

 
TRIVIA

TOP PHOTO: Fruit salad. Cut the fruit as fine as it needs to be to fit nicely into the shell. Photo courtesy Elegant Affairs Caterers. MIDDLE PHOTO: These are panna cotta, but could as easily be sauces or sides. Photo courtesy Swirls And Spice. BOTTOM PHOTO: Stuffed with rice and topped with salmon caviar. Photo courtesy Qoo’s Life.

The great botanist Carl Linnaeus (1707 – 1778) bestowed the name Hesperideæ to the order the contains the Citrus genus. It’s an allusion to the the Hesperides, nymphs who in Greek and Roman myth guarded a blissful garden of golden apples.

From Sweden, Linnaeus was a botanist, zoologist and physician. He laid the foundations for taxonomy, the modern biological naming system for describing species (taxa in Latin). Many of his writings were in Latin, as was custom among scientists of the time. Latin was a common language among educated Europeans, so no matter what one’s native language, one could read the works of others in Latin.

[1] Quaker’s most popular recipe is for its Vanishing Oatmeal Cookies (photos #1, #2, and #3 © Quaker Oats).

[2] What great-great grandmother would have purchased.

[3] Today’s canister reminds us that oatmeal is a heart-healthy food.

[4] Milled oats, ready for oatmeal and baking (photo © Kelly Cline | iStock Photo).

National Oatmeal Cookie Day is April 30th. You can celebrate by baking Quaker’s famous Vanishing Oatmeal Cookies. The recipe is below.

Enjoy them as a snack, turn them into ice cream sandwiches, serve them as the base of a “rustic” sundae, topped with ice cream and chocolate sauce.

Below:

> America’s favorite oatmeal cookie recipe.

> The history of Quaker Oats and the Vanishing Oatmeal Cookie recipe.

> More ways to use oatmeal cookies.

Elsewhere on The Nibble:

> The history of cookies.

> The history of oats, from prehistory to the present.

> The year’s 44 cookie holidays.

> The different varieties of of cookies: a photo glossary.

> The year’s 44 cookie holidays.

> The year’s 8 oatmeal holidays.

> The year’s 10+ raisin holidays.
 
 
RECIPE: QUAKER VANISHING OATMEAL COOKIES

Prep time is 20 minutes, and cook time is 8 minutes.

Ingredients For 4 Dozen Cookies

 
Preparation

1. PREHEAT the oven to 350°F. In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugars with an electric mixer on medium speed until creamy. Add the eggs and vanilla; beat well. Add the combined flour, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt; mix well. Add the oats and raisins; mix well.

2. DROP the dough by rounded tablespoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets. Bake 8 to 10 minutes or until light golden brown. Cool 1 minute on cookie sheets; remove to a wire rack. Cool completely. Store tightly covered.

3. HIGH ALTITUDE ADJUSTMENT: Increase the flour to 1-3/4 cups and bake as directed.
 
For Bar Cookies

1. PRESS the dough onto the bottom of an ungreased 13 x 9-inch baking pan. Bake 30 to 35 minutes or until light golden brown. Cool completely in the pan on a wire rack.

2. CUT into bars. Store tightly covered. Yield: 24 bars.

Tips From Quaker

One hundred years ago, Quaker introduced the now-iconic cylinder package for Old Fashioned Quaker Oats. The cylindrical package was a first in the industry. While the packaging design has been updated, the round canister can still be found on store shelves today.

The Quaker Mill Company of Ravenna, Ohio, was founded in 1877 by Henry Parsons Crowell, who purchased the bankrupt Quaker Oat Mill Company there.

Canned foods were a hot new trend in 1915, and Crowell noticed the public’s growing appetite for colorful, conveniently sized packaging. He began to sell his oats in distinctive round cardboard cartons. At the time, many groceries, including cereal grains, were sold in bulk from barrels.

Today, The Quaker Oats Company sells more than 350 million pounds of oatmeal annually, and some 120 million canisters are produced at its Cedar Rapids plant. A food conglomerate headquartered in Chicago, it has been owned by PepsiCo since 2001.

Quaker also lays claim as the first to feature a recipe on packaging: Oatmeal Bread, in 1891. In 1908, the brand introduced the first cookie recipe on a package: Oat Cakes.

In 1922, the company introduced Quaker Quick Oats, one of America’s first convenience products. It can be swapped for Quaker Old Fashioned Oats in baking recipes.

In 1966, Quaker Instant Oatmeal pouches debuted to help people keep pace with a busy, on-the-go lifestyle. Cup packaging debuted in 2000, to portable eating even easier. Earlier this year, Quaker launched Quick 3-Minute Steel Cut Oats.

The History Of The Quaker Vanishing Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

As previously noted, the first-ever oatmeal cookie recipe to appear on the company’s package was in 1908: Oat Cakes.

Those first oatmeal cookies were dry and hard with no sweetener—more like crackers than cookies.

The precursor of today’s Vanishing Oatmeal recipe, a sweet oatmeal cookie, appeared on the packages sometime between 1910 and 1917.

After the 1929 stock market crash, when Americans needed a sweet treat, Quaker’s Oat[s] Macaroons appeared, the first oatmeal drop cookie (so-called because spoonfuls of dough were dropped onto cookie sheets and baked—here are the different types of cookies). Like macaroons, they contained almond extract—no raisins (here’s the recipe).

The company has continued to keep up with the times, creating breakfast bars, no-bake bars, and different styles of oatmeal cookies to meet consumer preferences. Here are more historical notes, and a link to all Quaker recipes.

The Vanishing Oatmeal Raisin Cookies recipe, above, remains a consumer favorite. As of 2015, it’s been on the Old Fashioned Oats canister for 20 years.
 

[5] Don’t like raisins? Swap in dried cherries or cranberries. This recipe also includes white chocolate chips (photo © Taste Of Home).
 
 
MORE WAYS TO USE OATMEAL COOKIES

Breakfast/Brunch

 
Baking

 
Desserts

 
Mains

 

[6] Add oatmeal cookies instead of—or in addition to—crackers on a dessert board. (photo: The Nibble).
 

CHECK OUT WHAT’S HAPPENING ON OUR HOME PAGE, THENIBBLE.COM.

You should start seeing Meyer lemons in stores now. The no-pucker lemon’s season is November through March.

A cross between a true lemon and either a sweet orange or a mandarin, Citrus × meyeri was named for Frank Nicholas Meyer, who brought it back from China in 1908. Meyer worked for the U.S. Department of Agriculture as an “agricultural explorer,” traveling the world to find new foods that might be desirable in America.

The Chinese had long been growing the lemon variety in pots, as ornamental trees. Meyer lemon trees thus were planted in California yards, and the fruit was enjoyed by the home owners.

Meyer lemons became a hot food item when they were “rediscovered” by Alice Waters at Chez Panisse in the 1990s. Other chefs and personalities like Martha Stewart began featuring them in recipes; groves were planted and the fruits began to arrive in markets.

The benefit is yours.

Meyer lemons are much sweeter and more flavorful than the Bearss and Lisbon varieties commonly found in American grocery stores (here are the different types of lemons). They have much less acid, which is why the juice is sweeter and brighter.

While they are smaller than the Bearss and Lisbon lemons, they are much juicier with a very thin (and edible) peel, and can even deliver more juice per lemon.

And their fragrance is beguiling.

GROW YOUR OWN MEYER LEMONS

You can buy ornamental dwarf Meyer lemon trees to keep in pots indoors or on the patio. Planted in the ground, they can grow to heights of eight feet. Check out the options at:

 
The trees produce lovely white blossoms before they fruit, and have glossy leaves year-round. Consider one for your own home or for gifting.
 
HOW TO USE MEYER LEMONS

 
Here are 30+ ways we use Meyer lemons, plus a recipe for Meyer Lemon Beurre Blanc. You can also peruse these recipes from Sunset.com.

Perhaps our favorite Meyer lemon recipe:

RECIPE: MEYER LEMON SORBET

Ingredients

 
Preparation

1. ZEST all the lemons and save the extra (it freezes well). You can add it to salad dressings, baked goods, anything.

2. BRING the sugar and the water to a boil in a small saucepan, stirring until the sugar dissolves. Add the lemon juice and zest; stir to combine.

3. POUR the mixture into the canister of a 1-quart ice cream maker. Freeze according to the manufacturer’s instructions (approximately 25-30 minutes). Transfer to a freezer container and freeze for 4 hours or longer.

4. SET the container on the counter to stand for 5 minutes before serving.
  

Make your Thanksgiving dinner a safe one. Photo courtesy ThanksgivingDay2015i.com.

Even if you’ve never had a problem before, check out these food safety tips prior to Turkey Day. They’re courtesy of The Learning Center at State Farm.

1. Keep everything clean.

 
2. Heat foods to the proper temperature.

 
4. Store leftovers safely.