Pumpkin Comfort Food

So now that Thanksgiving's long gone, you might be wondering what to do with all of those cans of pumpkin that you bought when they went on sale for 39 cents.  Is that just me?  Here are two delicious pumpkin ideas that will stave off those pumpkin pie* cravings once pie season has faded.

*Actual pie.  Made from the Thanksgiving 2012 issue of Bon Appetit.  
Delicious, simple to make and doesn't use canned milk.  

DIY Pumpkin latte or pumpkin chai:
If you'd rather not shell out $4 for a pumpkin spice latte, or it's past the limited time season, make your own!

ingredients:

2 Tbsp. canned pumpkin

1/2 C milk

1/2 C black tea or coffee

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

a pinch of nutmeg

1 Tbsp honey

heat milk on the stove or in the microwave.  don't let it boil!  add pumpkin, spices and honey to either a traditional blender or a large enough container to fit an immersion blender. blend and froth for a few seconds until thoroughly mixed.  Enjoy!

Pumpkin oatmeal:  Breakfast that tastes like pumpkin pie... that is actually good for you?  Ok.

ingredients:
1 package instant oatmeal ( I am really enjoying the Mom's Best Chai Spiced or just Mom's Best Plain ) or your favorite hot cereal

2 Tbsp canned pumpkin

1 tsp maple syrup

1-2 Tbsp milk

1/8-1/4 C water

spices* such as :"pumpkin pie seasoning" or your favorite combo of nutmeg, ground ginger, ground cardamom, cinnamon
*I don't use the seasoning when I'm using the Chai Spice oatmeal because it's already seasoned.

Optional:  raisins, nuts, berries, etc.

boil water.
in a bowl, combine oats, pumpkin, maple syrup, milk, and seasoning if using.
slowly add boiling water, pouring over the pumpkin to make it creamy until cereal reaches desired consistency. add optional toppings.  stir then cover for about 3 minutes.
I like to microwave mine for about 20 seconds right before eating it because I like it really hot!  Warning, this is an addicting, sweet and easy breakfast.  I have eaten it several days in a row!

Tastes great with coffee and Bon Appetit magazine!

Peaches!

Peaches are my favorite fruit.  Over my birthday weekend, my husband and I took a road trip to a pick-your-own orchard to pick peaches.  The plan was to get enough peaches to make some jam (a hobby of ours... that oddly enough I haven't written about here yet), some deserts, and just have fresh peaches around to eat.  We love the fun of picking the fruit straight from the farm, where we know exactly where it came from.  A rare phenomenon these days. 

We set out early to make the scenic drive to St. Joseph Missouri.  There weren't any closer orchards that had peaches ready to pick.  We ended up at Schweizer Orchards in the near 100 degree heat in the early afternoon.  Pick-your-own peaches were $1.19 per pound and we planned to pick about 12 pounds.  When we got to the rows and rows of peach trees, we noticed that the air smelled sweetly of peaches.  It was incredible.  Rows were kindly marked with the name of the variety of peaches  and noted with blue ribbons if they were ready for picking. We began to survey the trees and feared that they had already been picked over for the day.  The ripe peaches were few and far between... or too high for us to reach.  Sooner or later we began to fill up our baskets with a few good peaches.  It was hard to resist, so we shared a sun warmed, perfectly ripe peach.  Wow.

After trying a few more rows, we got into the groove and found trees that hadn't been picked much at all.  Ryan developed a method for shaking the branches gently and when peaches began to tumble off, that meant they were ripe.  Though we had to be careful not to mix ours up with the peaches that had fallen to the ground.  There were so many!!  After a sweaty hour we realized that we had filled at least 4 baskets to overflowing and that we should stop... even though we were having fun.  All told, we left he farm with roughly 30 pounds of delicious peaches. 

our peach haul laid out on the table that evening

We made two dozen jars of peach jam... plain delicious peach, honey-peach, and my favorite ginger peach. 

We made this amazing peach cobbler.  And peach ice cream (ridiculously good).

We even mixed the peaches with bacon for this salad (it was so good it was gone before I got a picture).

Just before I sat down to write this, I salvaged the remainder of the peaches (it's been a week since they were picked... some were in bad shape) and sliced them for freezing. 

The day was a wonderful way to spend part of my birthday.  Whether you are going to get bushels of fruit for recipes or just want the experience of seeing fruit in its natural habitat, I highly recommending going to a pick-your-own farm.  Because you are providing the labor, the fruit is generally a lot cheaper than pre-picked fruits from a farmers' market and definitely cheaper than the supermarket.  Find more information about pick your own farms and orchards here. 

I'm Back with a Weekly Menu

I think I'm finally recovered from the jetlaggy weekend induced by my long vacation and long journey home from France. I have much to share about the food and my adventure with Kelsy at Un Jour Un Chef.  But for now, let's get back to basics while I clear my thoughts and take some time to write some nice posts worthy of the amazing time I've had.  It'll be worth the wait. 

It's finally summer and I'm starting to let the available produce from my garden and farmer's market finds as well as the desire to avoid heating up the house with roasting and baking drive my menu...

I've only planned for three nights since somehow Ry and I have found ourselves busy yet again with summer class and tickets to Billy Elliot, and our own theater volunteer projects. We may have to eat on the go, or hopefully grab some leftovers.

Homemade pizza!  Featuring homegrown arugula!!

Veggie Kabobs with a yogurt/dill mint sauce.  I love how inexpensive fresh herbs are at the farmer market...!  They give way to all kind of experiments for me. 

Roasted Chicken with potatoes.  Yes, I just said I didn't want to heat up the house by roasting things, but my Father in law is likely to be dining with us to help Ryan finish a home improvement project and I like to thank him by making a delicious dinner.

AND I realized that I never posted about my roasted chicken... so here it is just a few weeks later than promised... I am on summer vacation after all.  :) Click the "read more" link below... 

Gardening!!

My husband is really into gardening and I am really into cooking, so we are both really looking forward to our second year growing some of our own food. We have plans to can some of the produce and eat it as long as we can (tomato sauce, salsa!!)   Last spring, Ryan transferred our side yard into a beautiful garden. We had a successful run with green onions, tomatoes, peppers and zucchini. For some reason we could not keep a basil plant alive. We experimented with many different vegetables and fruits such as potatoes, beets, carrots, corn, and watermelon.  It was so much fun and I learned a lot about what fruit and vegetables actually go through before they reach the plate. For instance, I had no idea potatoes produced such a large plant above ground! Squash blossoms are so pretty!  What an amazing opportunity for education... for adults and children alike.  We were able to eat fresh out of the garden a lot last summer!   It was so satisfying to go pick something, wash it, prepare it, then eat it!

Our garden, mid-July!

green onions, tiny beets and arugula

one bowl of the many many tomatoes we harvested last year.  fresh tomatoes are one of the best foods in the world. fresh tomato, basil, mozzarella, and olive oil on good toasted bread may be my "desert island food".

This year, we've been planning a lot more vegetables and some new experiments.

We bought our seeds over the weekend.  We got as many organics as possible and many of them were from the  Seed Savers Exchange!  We didn't get everything on our list yesterday, but made a large dent in it. We still need tomato plants, though we are going to experiment with growing from seed too, a jalapeno plant, and brussel sprouts. I'm so excited!!

The garden is ready for Spring!

Our seed haul includes... garlic, shallots and onion starters. flowers to encourage pollination. peas: shell and snap.  green beans. fennel. carrots. zucchini. mixed lettuce. butternut squash! broccoli.  rhubarb.  herbs (including catnip for Jack!)


If you want some inspiration for growing your own food I recommend reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver.

DIY salad dressing

Something about warm weather (we are having a record breaking March in Iowa, it's been 70-80 degrees out for days!)  makes me crave crunchy salad.  That and cleaning out the fridge made me realize I had an abundance of veggies to use.  The other night I made a salad to go with our homemade pizza.

spinach, broccoli, green onions, red peppers and feta!

The giant aisle of salad dressings at the grocery store kind of scares me.  Have you seen it?  There are hundreds of bottles of dressing.  How overwhelming.... so, I make just my own salad dressing as needed.  It's very simple, if you make the initial investment in the ingredients, which will be extremely more cost effective and you will use the ingredients over and over for other things... so don't let that initial investment deter you!

You can find many DIY salad dressing recipes online, and food magazines regularly do articles on salad dressings. In fact, it was even mentioned on The Splendid Table this week. So once you get the hang of it and know what you like (spicy, sweet, acidic, etc.) you can put anything in it.  Here's what I made the other night.  This a pretty standard salad dressing at our house.

ingredients:
2 Tablespoons red wine vinegar (you can use any kind of vinegar balsamic, apple cider, etc.)
1/2-1 teaspoon honey
1/2-1 teaspoon spicy mustard
1 Tablespoon olive oil
salt and pepper to taste

Whisk vinegar, honey and mustard in a  small jar or bowl.
Slowly whisk in the olive oil, drop by drop if possible until mixture thickens.
Make this right before you serve the salad.  If you make it ahead, just whisk again right before serving.  The oil and vinegar will separate.

This amount serves two.  When I make one serving to take with me for lunch, I reduce the Tablespoons to teaspoons and just add a tiny dollop of mustard and honey.  However, I should let you know, that I don't like a lot of dressing on my salad so this may not be enough for you. If you like more, or want to make some to use the next day, just increase the amount, using the same basic ratio.  You will find differing opinions on the vinegar to oil ratios for other recipes online.  This is  what I like... find what you like and go for it!  

this is the tiny jar of dressing I made to  pack with my lunch