Kugel

 

This is the famous kugel from Smitten Kitchen, where Deb Perelman jokes that her mother married her father to get his family recipe. The Engineer and I really liked it, but our kids did not (to be fair, I think they just don’t like kugel in general, and it was nothing against this kugel in particular).

1 pound wide egg noodles
8 eggs
1 ½ cups sugar
2 pounds full-fat lactose-free cottage cheese, creamed or large curd
1 ½ sticks sticks melted unsalted lactose-free butter or margarine
2 teaspoons vanilla
dash of salt
optional: 2 cups canned cherry pie filling (Comstock is specified)

Preheat oven to 350 °F. Parboil the noodles (five to seven minutes).

In a very large bowl, beat eggs until fluffy. Add the sugar gradually, then the cottage cheese, butter, and vanilla. Stir in the drained noodles.

Pour into a 9×13-inch pan. Bake for 1 ½ hours, or until kugel is set (my oven runs hot, and mine was done after 1 hour; Deb Perelman specifies that her oven runs cold and takes almost 2 hours). If using the cherry pie filling as a topping, pour it over at the one-hour mark, then bake it for an additional 30 minutes.