Grandma Masters’ Fried Dough and Grandpa’s Four Leaf Clovers

I can remember standing in her kitchen in their house in Ottumwa, waiting patiently with an empty plate, as the dough boiled on the top of the deep pot of oil. I was next!

She stood there at the stove for 2 hours in perfect humor, never slowing, as we kids ate our weight in fried dough. She must have made 30 of them, with no left overs.

A little butter (or was it oleo?) and a little sprinkled powdered sugar from an old tin shaker, and it was perfect. Cinnomon sugar was also a popular option. What did the twins call it? “Shilly shally”?

We learned to go stand in the backyard while devouring the fried dough, so we didn’t get the powdered sugar all over the kitchen.

Grandpa sat at the kitchen table, leaving his post only to join us in the backyard, study the ground for a second, bend over, and stand up with yet another four leaf clover.

We had a passel of kids who studied the ground for an hour, and he found 5 clovers in less than a minute each, right at the feet of each searching kid.

How did he DO that?