You ever hear the saying, “when it rains – it pours”? Well, I’m afraid my whole month has been like that. Whenever I felt like I was starting to get a handle on one thing, the rug would be pulled out from underneath me and whoopsy I’m lying flat on my behind. Maybe it had something to do with the Mercury Retrograde we’ve had recently, I don’t know – but whatever it is has kept me from actually making it to the computer to… well, heck, actually it’s kept me from even getting to the CAMERA, to take pictures, to do posts. Some people have expressed concern, and I can honestly say that a lot of what we’ve been dealing with here at home isn’t really public blog material, but I’m hopeful that we’re on an upswing now, so yeah – hopefully things will be better. Apologies again for being such a lame poster lately.

While I’ve been dealing with all my crappiness, the seasons have been marching on by – it was with great pleasure that I spotted the first fresh fava beans at the Farmers Market recently. Shelling Fava beans can be a little time intensive. First you have to remove them from the big outer pods (I didn’t happen to get a picture of them this time), and then they have a second, inner shell that needs to be removed. As a first pass, I like to sit down with several pounds of pods, a big bowl, and the compost bin, in front of the Tee-Vee, and let my hands do the mindless, repetitive task while enjoying some relax-time with Mr. Man and Miss Thing. Sometimes Miss Thing will even help, if she’s feeling generous. For the second round of shelling though, I usually work in the kitchen. First, I take the shelled beans and blanch them for 1-2 minutes (depending on size and age), then drain them to an ice bath. The thin, inner shell, should pop off fairly easily at that point. A pound of Fava Beans in pod can yield a disappointingly small amount of shelled beans though, so I recommend buying atleast 1-2 more pounds than you think you’ll need. I don’t know about you, but fresh favas NEVER go to waste in our house. lol

I’ve really been enjoying the recent sun and warmer weather where we are. Since I’ve been working harder at becoming an early riser, I’ve been able to make more time to head over to the Farmers Market on the weekends, which has led me to order less from Planet Organics or Farm Fresh To You, and has sent me searching in other directions for purchasing eggs, meat and poultry. Recently I became a member of a Poultry products CSA called Soul Food Farms. They offer various chicken products, fresh eggs, and occasionally a small batch, locally produced olive oil (that I used in this salad!). The only downside is the closest pick up location is about twenty to thirty minutes away from me. Boo. It’s been really rewarding – I find myself kind of constantly poking around, looking for the new and interesting, searching for small farms and producers.

Mr. Man and I also went to a lamb butchering demo for Bay Area Bloggers, hosted by Hank Shaw of Honest Food. I found the whole experience very inspiring, and we will soon be attempting the process ourselves, probably with a pig. Not only did we both learn a lot about butchering, Hank’s home-made artichoke hearts were a revelation, and I made some new friends with other bloggers, including Stephanie of Wasabimon!, Luna Raven of Luna’s Kitchen, Jennifer of Foodbat, Biggie of Lunch in a Box, Heather of Heather in SF, Holly of NorCal Cazadora, and Anne of SF Tao of Pao. I also briefly met Elise Bauer of Simply Recipes, who showed up towards the end of the event. It was amazing to be surrounded by so many talented people that I’ve admired for so long. Hopefully, Hank will do more classes in the future.

As I’ve mentioned recently, I’ve been working on incorporating whole grains in to my diet. Whole grains are a great part of any healthy diet, and we were already using them frequently, but as I’ve been trying to lose weight they became especially important. They can be a really great alternative to starchy sides, and pack a great nutritional punch. For me, I have been trying to make everything I put in my body count – ie, no more empty calories, so I’ve been using alternative grains in place of white rice, white flour or potatoes. So when I saw local Wheat Berries from Massa Organics at a recent trip to the farmers market, of course I had to pick some up. Although they look similar to rice, wheat berries are very different in terms of flavor and texture. They are nuttier, with an even chewier texture than is typical in brown rice, and they tend to be much looser and less starchy, making them perfect for grain based salads or as a last minute addition to a soup. Unlike rice though, you want to cook them in extra liquid, similar to beans – I typically use a 4:1 ratio of Liquid to Wheat Berries, and then drain when at desired level of tenderness.

If you’re lucky enough to find it – some Green Garlic is also a great addition to soups and salads. It’s one of my favorite spring harbingers, sweeter and milder than it’s older bulbous brother, I typically use Green Garlic anywhere and everywhere that I would normally use Green Onions. Every time I’ve gone to the farmers market recently, I’ve picked up a bunch or two – sometimes adding to a saute, but usually just sliced and served raw.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup whole Wheat Berries
• 4 cups Stock or Water (I used 2 cups chicken stock, 2 cups water)
• 2 cups Blanched and Shelled Fava Beans
• 1 Stalk Green Garlic; bulb and tender greens, sliced thinly
• 1/4 cup Feta Cheese; crumbled
• 2 tbs Fresh Italian Parsley; finely chopped
• 2 tbs Fine Quality Olive Oil (or to taste)
• 4 tbs White Wine Vinegar (or to taste)
• Kosher Salt (to taste)

Method:

• Rinse and pick over Wheat Berries to remove any dirt or debris
• Place in a Heavy pot with a tight fitting lid (recommend: Dutch Oven)
• Add the Stock/Water and a generous pinch or two of Kosher Salt.
• Cover and bring to a boil
• Reduce heat to a simmer, stirring occasionally until tender (appx 45-60 minutes), adding more liquid as neccessary
• Drain and allow to cool to room temperature
• Stir together the drained Wheat Berries with remaining ingredients, adjust Salt, Vinegar and Olive Oil to taste
• Serve at room temperature

Other Fava Bean recipes by Delementals:

• Bacon and Fava Beans
• Fava and Baby Potato Gratin
• Fava Bean Pancetta Salad

Other Green Garlic recipes by Delementals:

• Green Garlic Yukon Gold Potato Salad
• Green Garlic Farro and Collards Salad
• Green Garlic and Spring Onion Soup
• Broccoli and Green Garlic Quiche

As part of my healthy eating plan, I’ve cut out most of my favorite breakfast foods. I mean, I’m pretty much a sweets breakfast kind of girl. Waffles, muffins, french toast, etc… And yes, pancakes. Which means most days for breakfast, I now have eggs, some kind of grain (like brown rice), and veggie for breakfast. I’ll admit, I’m starting to warm up to the eggs for breakfast thing. I’ve never been much for eggs usually – so it’s a work in progress. But I can see making pancakes like these every so often.

Because I’ve eliminated white flour and sugar from my diet, I had mostly written off most of my favorite breakfast foods. Atleast, I had until I came back from the farmers market last Saturday to Miss Thing having some kind of meltdown because she wanted Mr. Man to take her out for Pancakes. Apparently there’d been this whole thing where she was really in the mood for pancakes, and had been thinking about it all day. The dietary changes have been hard for her to accept – we all have had to make sacrifices. Most days are fine, but this one wasn’t really one of them. She didn’t end up getting her pancakes, through a combination of poor behavior, lack of available breakfast joints (it was 3PM), and my lack of desire to drive further than -/+ a mile. However, the next day as a sort of peace-making enterprise, I decided to get up the next morning and attempt a whole wheat pancake.

What I ended up with turned out to be pretty good. I looked at a few different recipes online, trying to find a recipe that fit my needs – ultimately, I ended up mashing together a few different recipes to come up with my own version. However, these should be considered a first-pass. Don’t get me wrong, they’re pretty good – but Mr. Man and I were talking, we have a few ideas on how to improve them, so there will probably be a Whole Wheat Pancakes Version 2 before long.

For those who are interested in keeping up with my progress, I’ve lost twenty-four pounds, and I think it’s finally starting to get better. I still have to force myself to get on the treadmill in the morning, but once I’m on and going it’s been good, and meals are getting easier. I even went out to eat a couple of times recently. I’m starting to learn where my limits are.  With my restricted carb intake, these pancakes are definitely not an every day event – but as a once in a while treat, it’s nice. They were more satisfying and filling than conventional pancakes. I had them for a ‘dessert’ after a breakfast of eggs, bacon and veggies, and they even went over well with Miss Thing, who usually turns her nose up at whole wheat things.

Making pancakes also gave me the opportunity to play with Agave syrup again. I’m starting to feel a little more confident of Agave. This is only my second attempt at using it, the first time I didn’t have a chance to take pictures, but I adapted a Banana Cake recipe from Whole Grain Baking by King Arthur. It turned out very well – I made it to take to a Diablo Valley Pagans Meet & Greet, and everyone was very surprised that it was ‘healthy’. I have a hankering to try and tackle something chocolate with it next. We’ll see how that turns out.

Back to the pancakes – As you can probably tell from the pictures, the batter for the pancakes came out very thick, making it difficult to pour. Although I liked the convenience of mixing it in the blender, I think next time I might use a ladle or something to get the batter in to the skillet – if only because it was impossible to get nice round-ish pancakes when the batter fell in to the skillet in big globs. lol. The other tip I would share is cook them slower and lower than you would conventional pancakes. I ended up burning a couple because the whole wheat took a little longer to cook than I expected, so the outside was a tad overdone by the time it was done in the middle.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups Whole Wheat Flour
• 4 tsp Baking Powder
• 1/4 tsp Baking Soda
• 1/4 tsp Kosher Salt
• 2 cups Buttermilk
• 2 eggs
• 4 tbls Butter, Melted plus additional for cooking
• 3 tbs Agave Syrup
• 1 tsp Vanilla

Method:

• In a bowl, stir together the dry ingredients
• Place all wet ingredients in blender and bzzz bzzz until combined
• Add the dry ingredients to the blender and whizz until just mixed, batter will be thick and may be lumpy – and you might need to scrape flour mixture down to get it fully combined
• Set aside for about 10 minutes to allow the whole wheat flour to absorb moisture
• Heat a skillet to medium-low. Melt butter in the skillet.
• Pour batter in to hot pan and cook until surface begins to look bubbly all across and is beginning to dry out a little bit, or bottom is golden
• Flip and cook until golden
• Serve with Maple Syrup, Fresh fruit, or Agave Nectar

Tangy and Fresh, this salad is probably one of my favorite dishes I’ve made lately. It has a great flavor, and is easy to make.

I’ve had a jar of Farro sitting in my pantry for a while now. I kept meaning to make it, but I kept forgetting. Finally on Sunday, I managed to make some time to try it, and now I’m kicking myself for waiting so long, because it is really that good. Farro is an ancient grain, considered to be the grain that most others are descended from. It’s kind of a specialty grain, so if you don’t have it available, you can probably use wheat berries or barley, with similar results, but I have to say – I’ve had both before, and Farro has them beat by a long shot. The Flavor is nutty, with such a great texture. I’ve been trying to incorporate more whole grains in to my meals (see here if you’re interested in the backstory), and farro is one of those grains that makes the process so easy, because it tastes so good.

When were in Boston last year, we went to a restaurant called Hungry Mother a couple of times, and it was delish. On the second night I went, they had a Collard Green Salad, the most that I was able to drag out of the server (whether from his lack of knowledge or a disinclination to reveal the chef’s secrets) was that the leaves were blanched and then chopped and tossed with the dressing – which is what inspired me to include them and the chard in this salad. I think it might actually be my new favorite way to make greens. Although it is a little fussy, (I mean, you are standing over a stove dipping leaf after leaf in hot water), the resulting leaves were tender, and less bitter than other cooking methods. I imagine you could do it with more than one leaf at time in a basket or some such, but I wanted each leaf to have some freedom to move around, and honestly – each leaf only needs to blanch for a couple of seconds, so it goes really quickly.

I do have a confession to make though. A week ago, I was an olive-hater. I know, I know… shhhh! I’m so ashamed. I think I had just accepted as established fact that I didn’t like olives, so I never bothered to try them again. And to be fair, I’m still not keen on black olives – especially on pizza. But I’m opening up to the possibility of reds and greens. I had decided to give them a try when Mr. Man made focaccia last week. They had been buried in the pantry for who knows how long, waiting for me to give them a chance to prove themselves. I opened the jar, and tentatively took a little nibble, and decided that I might be able to get used to them.

Although, now as I’m taking little baby steps in to Olive-World, I do need to remember to get pitted when I need pitted… But just in case you’re someone who is not me, and you accidentally got the wrong kind of olives, and found yourself wanting chopped olives for a Farro Salad… you might be interested to know that a Cherry Pitter does a halfway decent job of pitting olives, too. Not that I would know from personal experience or anything. <cough> Ahem. Moving right along. We served this salad this morning for breakfast with some lightly blanched Asparagus from my recent FFTY Box, and a scrambled farm egg, and it was perfect together.

Ingredients:

• 5 cups Water
• 2 cups Whole Farro
• 1 bunch Collard Greens
• 1 bunch Chard
• 1 stalk Green Garlic; finely chopped
• 1/4 cup Coarsely Chopped Mixed Green & Red Olives
• 1 lemon; juiced
• 1/4 cup Good Quality Olive Oil
• Kosher Salt

Method:

• Rinse and pick over Farro
• Place Farro in a heavy pot with a tight fitting lid
• Add Water and several generous pinches of Kosher Salt
• Bring to a Boil, then cover and reduce heat to a simmer
• Cook for 45 minutes or until tender, checking frequently
• Drain and Set aside to cool
• Bring a large pot of well-salted water to a boil
• Blanch each leaf of collard greens and chard by dipping in to the water for 5-10 seconds, or until bright green and tender
• Remove Stem and finely chop Greens
• When the Farro has cooled to room temperature, stir in the Greens, Garlic, and olives until well combined
• Add the Lemon Juice, Olive Oil, and Kosher Salt to taste, stirring together until well combined
• Serve at Room Temperature

I’m slowly but surely starting to get back on with the normal routine of things after the craziness of the last month, which is something of a relief, because I think my head might have ‘sploded if things kept up at the pace they were at. As I mentioned, my friend’s mother died, but the full on crazy didn’t stop there, because shortly afterwards (like – the evening after the memorial) I came down with what can only be described as The Worst Flu Of All Time. ALL TIME.

The flu had me laid up for a week solid, at of course – the worst time possible, since it was the week before Pantheacon. As if I wasn’t already stressed out and nervous, I now need to be rushed and frantic trying to get everything done the couple of days before, because I had been sick. Thankfully, after a couple of long days, I was able to get everything I needed to get done, done, go to Pantheacon and have a (mostly) good time. Amusingly, I did end up attending a seminar entitled “Sacred Seasons, Sacred Meals: Seasonal Food & Sustainability”, and the best thing I can say about it is that it’s inspired me to consider applying to do a seminar next year on Sustainable & Seasonal foods. Who knows if it’ll get accepted… But I think I might have to try, because it was just that bad.

One of the things that I try really hard to do as a general rule is have low-maintenance things cooking in the background while I straighten up around the house, make dinner, or whatever. Roasting a whole squash is one of those easy background processes that after you’ve done it a couple of times – you’ll think to yourself, why did I ever buy canned pumpkin? I mean, it requires next to no babysitting, it’s really hard to mess up, and the results are so easy and delicious. Cooking beans or whole grains for later use is also a good use of down time at home. I’m pretty sure I’ve said it before, but – if you have a couple of hours where you’re going to be at home and can breeze through the kitchen every so often – you can make beans.

In my recent fascination with all things Legume, I picked up these beans at a trip to the bulk-bins. They were simply listed as “Baby Garbanzos/Chana Dal” – which tickled my fancy a little bit, because I love trying out new things, and I’d never heard of Baby Garbanzo beans before. Upon closer inspection and a google search or two, I discovered that they’re really more like split Garbanzo beans. I had half of the pound earmarked for a Hummus, that I haven’t made yet, but for the other half I needed a little inspiration – so I looked around for some ideas and came across this site that waxes eloquent about the wonders of Chana Dal, which is where I came across the inspiration for this soup.

All things considered, if you are like me, and try to keep cooked beans and other conveniences like roasted squash in the fridge, this soup will go together so fast it will make your family’s head spin. 0-to-soup in 15 minutes or so. Not quite as quick as Campbells, sure – but not shabby at all, and much healthier and tastier. Plus, if you like it spicier, you can always kick it up a notch by adding in some extra chili powder, or what have you. The measurements on the spices are rough estimates. I strongly recommend adding spices to taste, because a lot of things can affect the flavor – age of your spices, the particular blend of curry, how hot/spicy/whatever you like it, etc…

Ingredients:

• 1 quart Pureed Butternut Squash*
• 1 quart Cooked Chana Dal in Cooking Liquid**
• 1 quart Stock or Leftover Chana Dal Cooking Liquid
• 1 onion; sliced
• 4 cloves Garlic; coarsely chopped
• 1/4 cup White Wine
• 1/4 cup Brown Rice Vinegar (or to taste)
• 2 tbs Butter
• 1 tbs Grated Ginger
• 1 tbs Curry Powder (or to taste)
• 2 tsp Cumin
• 1 tsp Chili Powder
• 1 tsp Sesame Oil
• 1 tsp Olive Oil
• Kosher Salt

Method:

• Heat the Olive Oil in a large pot over medium heat
• Add the Onions and saute until tender and edges are beginning to turn golden
• Reduce heat and add the coarsely chopped Garlic
• Gently cook for about a minute to heat the garlic thoroughly
• Working in batches, puree the Chana Dal, onions, garlic, and butternut squash together
• Return puree to pot and add the Stock (or leftover Chana Dal Cooking Liquid, if you have it)
• Heat on low, gently, until warmed through
• Stir in the White Wine, Rice Vinegar (to taste), Ginger, Butter and Kosher Salt (to taste)
• In a small bowl, stir together the curry powder, cumin, and chili powder
• Take a spoonful or two of the soup, and stir together with the spice mixture to create a paste, this will help keep the spices from clumping instead of mixing in smoothly
• Add additional soup until paste becomes thinned
• Working to taste, add the thinned paste mixture to the soup until desired spice/heat level is reached
• Remove from Heat and stir in the Sesame Oil
• Serve Immediately

*To make your own Butternut Squash Puree, roast whole butternut squash in a 400° oven until tender. Allow to cool, remove and discard seeds and peel, and puree. One medium Butternut = appx 1 quart puree

**To cook Chana Dal, (or any other bean for that matter) Soak overnight (or atleast a few hours), place in a heavy pot with lid. Add 1 quart or so of stock, a bay leaf, a sprig of rosemary (optional), a sprig of Thyme (optional), and enough water to cover the beans by at least an inch. Bring to a boil, and then reduce to a simmer, once beans begin to soften, add a couple of liberal pinches of kosher salt, and continue cooking, stirring occasionally until cooked to desired tenderness.

When I was growing up, we ate beans occasionally. Mostly from a can, and usually in the form of Soup, Chili or Baked Beans. It wasn’t until recently, however – that I really learned how yummy beans could be. I mean, when I would eat beans in chili, or soup – usually it was the flavor of the seasonings and spices, that carried the dish. Chili powder, tomato sauce, ham, etc… And the beans, ever willing to adapt to different situations, were the quiet partner in the back, soaking up flavors and adding protein. The “wind beneath the wings”, so to speak.

But beans can be more than the nearly-silent and supportive partner – and if you try out these heirloom beans from Rancho Gordo, I’m sure you’ll agree. I was first turned on to Ranch Gordo by this post about heirloom beans on the Kitchn. I told myself I’d make it a point to go out and get some as soon as possible. And I was floored by what I found. Unlike the background singers of my youth, opened from a can and added to other dishes – these beans are so delicious you won’t want to add anything to them, because they shine so brilliantly on their own. And it’s beyond simple to make – I don’t know if I’ll ever want to buy canned beans again. If you have a lazy Saturday afternoon hanging around the house and relaxing, you can have these beans for dinner.

Of course, like any dried bean – it does tend to work better if you soak the beans overnight. However, if you’re like me and you sometimes forget, just soak them for a couple of hours in the morning before cooking, and you should get most of the benefit. The picture above is the Rio Zape beans from Rancho Gordo after soaking and draining, but before cooking. They’ve plumped up a lot, and have this unique striping/swirling pattern that give them a distinctive look. After cooking, the color pattern becomes more subtle, but it’s more than made up for in flavor. I’ve never had anything quite like them, although the closest bean to the Rio Zape would probably be the pinto bean – so  in a pinch you can substitute pintos, but you’ll really be missing out, because these are much better than the pintos I’ve had in the past.

Okay, so I know I’m starting to sound like a star struck fan-girl, but you really do have to go out and give these beans a try. Or, if not these beans, then give making other beans from scratch – because the recipe I’m going to provide is pretty much the same for nearly any variety. I love to make up a batch of beans about once a week, stick them in the fridge, and use them for quick meals during the week. It does take a little bit of a time commitment in terms of someone actually being home, but they are really low on the work & complexity scale. Put in a pot, cover with liquid, simmer until done. It’s literally that simple. You can putter around in the garage, mow the lawn, watch a video, knit a sweater, or whatever else you would normally do during an afternoon at home – just popping in to the kitchen every so often to give the pot a swirl with a spoon and add water if neccessary. Then, when your significant other says “What’s for dinner?” You can dust a little flour on your nose, give them an aggrieved look, and tell them you’ve been laboring for hours making from-scratch beans just for them. Let the kudos come rolling in.

These beans would be suitable in any application where you might normally use Pintos – Chili, Soup, Refried Beans, etc… Although so far, my favorite way by far has been lightly dressed with a little bit of Feta Cheese, a drizzle of some fine quality olive oil, a sprinkle of Kosher Salt, and a thick slab of Mr. Man’s homemade French Bread. We had that for dinner the other night, with a side of sauteed mushrooms and kale from our recent FFTY box, and it was just a perfect and easy weeknight meal.

It was definitely a nice change of pace from our being-lazy-dinners we’ve had so many of lately. LOL – it feels good to be getting back in to the swing of things. We finally beat the video game we’d gotten sucked in to, and now I’m determined to try and get back in the kitchen (and on the website). I have a few things that I’m working on, and eventually I want to post about them, but for now I don’t want to jinx it by talking about it just yet.

Ingredients:

• 1 lb dried Rio Zape Beans (or other Pinto-Style bean)
• 1 quart Stock (I used Scrap Stock, but you can use whatever – even water, since the beans will create their own pot liquor, too)
• 1 sprig of Rosemary
• 1 Sprig of Thyme
• Water
• Kosher Salt
• Feta
• Fine Quality Olive Oil
• Crusty Bread

Method:

• Rinse and pick over beans, discard any debris
• If possible, soak beans overnight (or atleast for a couple of hours)
• Drain and rinse beans until water runs clear
• Pour the beans in to a heavy pot with a tight fitting lid
• Add the stock, rosemary, thyme and enough water to cover the beans by atleast an inch
• Bring to a boil, then cover and reduce heat to a simmer
• Simmer, stirring every once in a while until beans begin to soften – (add more water if neccessary to keep an inch of liquid over the beans)
• Add a couple generous pinches of kosher salt and continue cooking until tender
• Cooking time will vary depending on type/age of bean and desired level of tenderness – cook to taste
• Before Serving, fish out the stems of the rosemary and thyme and discard
• Serving Suggestion: Sprinkle with crumbled feta cheese, drizzle with olive oil, and give it a light sprinkle of kosher salt (if desired) – and use the cooking liquid to dip your bread in!

Update – Used leftover beans to make refried beans – and they were the most awesomest refried beans I’ve ever ever had. Ever.

Well the holidays are over – and I can’t really say that it’s a bad thing. It’s probably been both one of the best and one of the worst holiday seasons ever for me. For the first time I was able to host a celebration with a large group of close friends for the Solstice, and I also got my techy-foodie bankai on with some friends for New Years. (Even if I did feel like a moron next to all the super smart people there)

However, it’s also been the last couple of months of the year, where Mr. Man has been working like crazy trying to meet a pushed up deadline. Sometimes pulling twelve or fourteen hour days at work and essentially pushing aside some of the other activities we might have wanted to do. We’ve spent much of the last couple of weeks decompressing from that – which would account for the (very) delayed holiday January cards… that I still haven’t sent out. Or written up. Or the family pictures that I still need to get done. Or presents that need to be sent out. I know, I suck. The fact that decompressing ended up involving Me, Mr. Man, the couch and us restarting Final fantasy XII from the beginning might also be a factor… Mr. Man and I both tend to get sucked in to video games, pretty much until we beat them. So I’ll try to get those cards out soon, loved ones. Maybe while Mr. Man is grinding for some phatz lootz. lol

So I’d like to claim that I haven’t been posting very much lately due to busy-ness, but the truth is that it’s just the opposite. I haven’t been posting much  because of supreme laziness. I made up a big ol’ batch of soup a few days back which we leftover’d on for couple of days, I dug some things from the freezer that I’d put aside over the summer and we had some quick and easy meals from there, etc… Truth be told there’s been a lot of “Let’s quickly make something easy to eat so we can go back to playing the video game” going on. lol

But I did want to start getting shtuff done, so yesterday I mustered up some gumption and got in the kitchen to try making spätzle. Originally I was thinking of making Gnocchi, but ultimately I decided that would probably be a better … ah… family… activity. Assuming Mr. Man and Miss Thing manage to clear up those ‘scheduling conflicts’ that occur whenever I bring up making gnocchi together. Strangely, they seem to become inexplicably busy and/or occupied whenever I mention it. It’s très bizzarre.

Spaetzle seemed like a simpler one-person project to try out – and I’d been promising Mr. Man that I would make him some homemade Spaetzle for ages. Whenever we go to our favorite German restaurant in the city we always get a big heaping plate of Spaetzle – it’s one of our favorites. Usually served up with a big slice of Schnitzel and some mushroom gravy. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the foresight to put pork or veal on my last Planet Organics order to make a themed meal of it, but I don’t think Mr. Man or Miss Thing will be complaining, because this dish really shined on it’s own merits – no Schnitzel required.

My original plan, to make gnocchi, had stemmed from a desire to use up some Pumpkin Puree that I had leftover from making the Pumpkin and Collard Pasta a while back. Squash gnocchi is particularly common in the fall, and it seemed like it should be a simple enough swap – squash for potatoes. And it’s still on my list, methinks. I’ve managed to develop quite a backlog of squash that needs to be eaten. I imagine Mr. Man and Miss Thing are going to probably get quite full up on it before too long. Somehow I’ve managed to stock pile 3 butternut squash, 1 kabocha squash, 1 spaghetti squash, and several smaller squash. I’m not sure how that happened. Fortunately, they don’t go bad quickly – but that really isn’t an excuse, and I want to use them up and enjoy them – it’s one of the reasons I’ve taken a little bit of a FFTY hiatus the last couple of weeks. I figured not having more perishable produce would motivate me to use up the squash.

When I made the switch to Spaetzle instead of gnocchi, I decided that I still wanted to use the pumpkin puree – so I started looking around to see if anyone else had ever made spaetzle with squash puree before. I came across this post over at Serious Eats for a Squash Spaetzle and used it as kind of a proof of concept. Yes, you can use squash in spaetzle. However, I didn’t really use their recipe – opting instead to make my own, since it didn’t really seem like a complex set of ingredients. I started out by seeing how much squash puree I had, and then working the other ingredients around it. Originally, I thought it would be more complex, but honestly, I think that as long as you don’t throw the entire bowl of batter in to the cooking water at once, it’d be pretty hard to mess these up.

For hardware, you probably already have everything you need – I didn’t use any specialized tools to make them. I used the steaming insert for one of my smaller pans as my colander, because I liked that it had larger holes, but a regular colander would do just as well. Although it was fine with the colander, next time I make spaetzle, I think I’m going to try using my potato ricer. Pushing the batter through the colander resulted in very short, small spaetzle. They were yummy, don’t get me wrong – but I think that if I were to use the ricer I might get something more resembling longer strands. A lot of the recipes I looked at specified using a wooden spoon to press through the colander – which you can use, don’t get me wrong – but I had a much easier time when I switched to my silicone, heat resistant spatula. The batter didn’t stick to it as much, and it was a little easier for me to use. But whatever you have on hand should be fine. In fact, if you don’t have a colander, I saw several posts where people would just flick little dollops of batter straight from a spoon. I don’t really think there’s a ‘wrong’ way to make spaetzle.

If it’s your first time making it, set aside about two hours to get the feel for it. Next time, I think it will go much faster for me since I know a little better what I should be doing, and it won’t take as long. But I also made a pretty big batch. I wanted to have enough for (atleast) two meals. Fresh from the cooking water, the spaetzle were delicious – tossed with a little butter and a light sprinkling of salt, I would say they were highly nom-worthy. However, they really went to the next level when I did a little pan-frying to brown them up a little bit for dinner. They were amazing, and I can see homemade spaetzle making it in to the regular rotation of meals around here, especially with a little practice to cut down on the preparation time. They will also keep for a couple of days in the fridge, so if you need to, you can make them up before hand and then trot them out for guests or something – they’ll be all impressed and give you lots of kudos. Just don’t tell them how easy it is – it’ll be our little secret.

I would also add a couple of things – the pumpkin puree I used was pretty liquidy. Many, if not all, of the spaetzle recipes I saw called for milk. I skipped the milk because I felt like there was enough liquid in my pumpkin puree. If your squash puree is thicker and harder to work with, feel free to add some milk back in a little bit at a time. My batter was like a very thick muffin batter – sticky, and viscous – but holding together well enough to stick to a spoon when lifted out and not terribly drippy. But remember, it’s pretty easy to make up a test batch and add more flour if you want to. It’s a little harder to try and take the flour out if you decide there’s too much.

Spaetzle Ingredients:

• 5 eggs
• 2 and 1/2 cups Pumpkin (or other Squash) Puree
• Appx 3 cups Flour
• 1 tsp Kosher Salt
• softened butter

Spaetzle Method:

• Whisk together the eggs and the Pumpkin Puree until well combined
• Stir in the kosher salt and a scant cup of the flour, whisk to combine
• Continue adding flour, a quarter to half a cup at a time until batter reaches a thick muffin batter consistency. (Sticky, viscous and holding together well when a spoon full is lifted out of the bowl)
• Set batter aside to rest for a few minutes while bringing a large pot of salted water to a rolling boil
• If using, place colander over the pot of boiling water
• Working in batches, press the spaetzle batter through the holes of the colander (if using – alternatively ‘flick’ drops of batter from a spoon in to the water or use a ricer) until the top of the water is full of bobbing spaetzles
• Allow to cook for 30-60 seconds (depending on size) then scoop out the spaetzles and place in a bowl.
• Repeat until all batter has been used up – refreshing cooking water as neccessary.
• When all the spaetzle has been cooked, drain again to remove any excess water, then toss with a little bit of butter
• Refrigerate until ready to use

After I made the spaetzle and chilled it – I had to decide on something to do with it. Bacon was of course, the obvious choice – since everything is better with bacon… Plus I had some thick slices of Fatted Calf bacon that I’d picked up last time I went to the Farmer’s Market. But if you’re anti-bacon, you could just sub the bacon grease for a little butter, and skip it. They’ll still be delicious, I promise. I was also thinking of tossing it with cheese and baking it, but to be honest – it didn’t end up needing it. In fact, it probably would have overwhelmed the spaetzle. Instead, I just did a light sprinkling of cheese on top and baked it just long enough to brown – and it was perfect. Both Mr. Man and Miss Thing also dubbed it a huge success. Miss Thing didn’t even realize it had <gasp> squash in it until I told her. At which point she kind of shrugged and said “So? I can’t taste it.” I think we’re making progress there. Of some kind. Not really sure if that response was on the positive or the negative side though. lol

Spaetzle with Bacon Ingredients:

• 1/2 a batch of Spaetzle (recipe above)
• 3 slices thick cut bacon
• 1 small onion; finely diced
• 3 cloves garlic; minced
• 1 sprig of Rosemary; finely minced
• 1/3 cup shredded Gouda

Spaetzle with Bacon Method:

• Cook the bacon in a large skillet over medium heat until crispy
• Remove bacon to a paper towel to cool
• Pour off all but a teeny bit of bacon grease
• Add the onions and saute until translucent
• Clear a space (or transfer onions to a bowl)  and add the garlic and rosemary
• Heat the garlic and rosemary until fragrant, then add to the onions
• Working in batches if neccessary, lightly brown the spaetzle in residual bacon grease (can add more if pan starts to dry up or spaetzle starts to stick)
• Cut the bacon in to thin ribbons
• Toss spaetzle, bacon, onions and garlic to combine
• Spread in to an oven safe baking dish and sprinkly lightly with shredded gouda
• Place under broiler for 2-5 minutes or until cheese is golden and bubbly
• Serve immediately

You’d think with all this vacation time, I’d have more time to blog than during ‘normal’ times – but unfortunately, that just hasn’t been’t the case. It’s been a super busy few weeks, and I just can’t even begin to wrap my head around the idea that we’re one day away from the 25th of December, a week from the end of the year! Fortunately, I’m hopeful that things will slow down here soon and I’ll be able to spend a little more time in the kitchen. I mean, although I’ve been cooking – I haven’t really had time to do an awful lot of playing around. There’s been more ‘okay, I know this works’ and a lot less ‘hmmmm… let’s try something new!’ Some of that might be due to the fact that I’m just not as inspired by winter leafy greens as I am by summer veggies and fruits, but that just means I’m going to have to work harder!

One upside to the busyness though, is that I’ve really been getting to spend more time with my friends and family. My sisters, particularly – and others too. It’s made realize how much they mean to me, and I’ve been trying to make it a point to spend more of that ‘we’ll get around to it’ time actually, you know… getting around to it. Sadly, I get the feeling that I’m going to have to do some bridge building again with some of my San Francisco friends. My last attempt to set up plans when going in to the city was a phenomenal bust. :-/ My tendency to be a homebody is directly in opposition with being a good friend… lol So I’m trying to be better.

At any rate, when I did have a little time last night to try playing around, I decided to take the opportunity to do something with the pumpkin that I’ve had sitting on my counter for the last month or two. I picked it up at the Farmer’s Market a while back, and kept wanting to do something with it, but didn’t really have the space in the fridge to store the leftover bits until yesterday. Yule had come and gone, and we were working through the remainder of the food from that – and it really seemed like a good time for it. It was a good size pumpkin, too – I probably should have weighed it, but I’d guestimate probably about seven pounds or so. I decided to take half of it, and roast it for puree – which, quite frankly is the easy part. The remaining half a pumpkin, I divided in to wedges and then peeled,  cut in to chunks and roasted. Peeling it was a pain, by the way. I highly recommend futzing around with peeling and stuff like that sometime when you don’t have a family waiting for dinner. It took me a lot longer to get it peeled than I had initially estimated, which made dinner take a little longer than I wanted.

The last time I made a Pasta with Roasted Pumpkin – for the Browned Butter and Lentil Pasta I made last month, I used pumpkin that was leftover from roasting the whole pumpkin, which ended up causing the pumpkin to kind of break down and coat the pasta – like a sauce. It was good, but I was hoping for something that held it’s integrity a little better, creating little morsels of squash goodness. I thought that roasting the pumpkin in chunks rather than whole might allow the pieces to hold together better. And it definitely worked out better, although some of the smaller pieces of pumpkin chunks ended up mushing a little bit, the majority of them held their shape a lot better when tossed with the pasta. I didn’t want an entire half a pumpkin in this pasta though – so for the remaining ¼ or so of roasted pumpkin chunks, I spread them out on to a cookie sheet, froze them, and then vacuum sealed them and saved them for next time.

I was originally thinking of using the collards to make another batch of stuffed collard leaves, but it was getting down towards the end of the week, and I still had a lot of veggies from my FFTY box, so I decided to chop them up and throw them in as well. Somehow, despite all the cooking we’ve been doing, I still had most of my box left. The cottage cheese was suppose to simply be used as snacks/breakfast/etc… However, when I received it in my most recent Planet Organics delivery, I found that the expiry date was for the very next day – so I really needed to use it quickly. I contacted Planet Organics, and they gave me a credit without any hassle – which made me happy, even if I wasn’t thrilled about needing to eat a bunch of cottage cheese right away… lol. Not that it was too great a hardship – we all love Cottage Cheese, however I can still only eat so much in one sitting, and mixing it up a little bit is always a good thing. I still have some left (post-expiry!) that I’m thinking of using in another Lasagna, so we’ll see how that goes. The experience has reminded me that I really do need to write up that post I’ve mentioned to Mr. Man a couple of times comparing Spud!/Planet Organics, I’ll try and write that up soon.

I suppose now that I’m starting to stick winter squash in the freezer though, I should consider pulling out some of my squirreled away summer bounty, such as the roasted tomatoes or the summer squash that I prepped a while back. I’m a little bit of a hoarder – even though I know that we live in a state where winters are blessedly short, I feel just a little bit better knowing that I have a few morsels of favorite summer foods tucked away.  Knowing me, I’ll probably end up pulling out the zucchini from the freezer the week before fresh zucchini ends up in my weekly veggie box. Of course, this leaves my freezer in a perpetually over-flowing state. Something of a vicious cycle. (Or maybe thats delicious cycle. lol!)  At any rate – the sooner we get that chest freezer we keep talking about, the happier a camper I shall be. Hope everyone has a Happy Holidays!

Ingredients:

• 1 lb Peeled, seeded Pumpkin Cut in to 1″ chunk
• 1 lb Whole Wheat Spiral Pasta
• 1 bunch Collard Greens; stems removed and chopped in to thin strips
• 1 cup Small Curd Cottage Cheese
• 1 onion, diced
• 3 cloves Garlic; minced
• 1/4 cup Cider Vinegar
• 3 tbs Butter
• 1 Sprig of Thyme, finely minced
• 1 Sprig Savory, finely minced
• 6 (or so) Sage Leaves, finely minced
• Olive Oil
• Kosher Salt

Method:

• Preheat oven to 350°
• Toss Pumpkin chunks with enough olive oil to coat, and sprinkle liberally with Kosher Salt
• Spread in a single layer on a roasting pan and Roast for 30 minutes, or until tender
• In a large pot of Salted Water, cook the pasta to Al Dente, Drain and set aside
• Melt the Butter in the pot
• Add the onions and Saute over medium heat until translucent and fragrant
• Stir in the garlic, thyme, sage, and savory and heat for 30 seconds or so
• Add the Collard Greens and continue to saute until bright green and tender
• Remove from heat
• Return the Pasta to the pot, along with the roasted pumpkin chunks, cottage cheese, and cider vinegar
• Toss to combine
• Kosher Salt to taste

It has been such an awesome week for me. Although it’s been very busy, I’ve actually been managing to find time to hang out with some of my nearest and dearests over the last few days, with plans to do more. It’s kept me away from the computer a lot – but it feels good to be out there renewing connections and catching up. I’ve found that I will sometimes fall in to that trap of talking to or running in to friends and then saying ‘we should get together soon!’, and then never actually following through on that. So I’ve been trying to be more pro-active about following through, making plans and touching base with the people who are important in my life. And – if you’re reading this, and are wondering why I haven’t contacted you recently – try to remember it’s a work in progress, and maybe contact me instead!

Aside from my blooming social-butterfly-ness, I’ve also been pretty busy around the house – preparing for the holidays, getting the drywall in the den patched up and preparing to paint the remainder of the den (Bright Purple!), dealing with Miss Thing and her new OMG-You-Never-Let-Me-Do-Anything-Ever Attitude. (well, technically, it’s not a new attitude… it’s just been a lot-lot-lot more … ah… active… lately)  and busily procrastinating getting family pictures done (or getting my holiday cards in the mail). I still have some holiday shopping to take care of – because I’m lame like that… lol! But I still have time to get it done. I hope.

In other holiday related news, I lost the fight with Mr. Man and Miss Thing on the whole Holiday-Tree thing, which I’m still pretty disgruntled about. I was hoping to convince Mr. Man and Miss Thing to consider trying out some more Eco Friendly alternatives, but I was outvoted. Both Miss Thing and Mr. Man are convinced that only a green, pine-needle-laden monstrosity will do, despite my best efforts. It’s very disappointing, since I would very much like to put forth our time and effort in to finding and making our own holiday traditions. (Preferably Eco Friendly ones) It’s frustrating to feel so little control over how my holidays are spent and to be the lone voice trying to convince my family to be more eco friendly. <sigh> But I’m not going to let it get me down – I’ll just keep working on ‘em for next year. Maybe if I keep plugging at it, I’ll wear them down.

Part of my new found zeal for environmentalism probably stems from the fact that I’ve been working on reading The Omnivore’s Dilemma, by  Michael Pollan. I mean, I’ve always tried to be green, but I’m going through this book and really developing an appreciation for how far I still need to go. It’s been a real eye-opener, and I feel really lucky to live in an area where it’s easier to support these ideals. At any rate, it’s made me even more appreciative of the services I use to obtain local food, FFTY, Planet Organics, and Spud! All of which have made it much easier for me to make informed choices about where I’m getting food for my family. In spite of the fact that I think I’m going to become heartily sick of apples by the time spring fruits roll around… although perhaps less so with this apple cake recipe.

Initially, I had intended to take this cake over to a friend’s house for dessert, which is why I don’t have any in-process pictures. For one, I was rushing to get it baked, and for two – I figured it would probably be a little tacky to show up with a slice missing out of the cake (lol!).  Unfortunately, the cake hadn’t cooled enough to frost before I had to go, and I ended up having to leave it at home. When I was finally able to frost it and taste it, I realized the lack of in process photos would have to be overlooked, because this cake is pretty darn awesome, and needed to be posted.

To be honest, I basically riffed off of the Carrot Cake recipe I’ve posted about before – with a few modifications. And I think I like this apple version better. Although, if nothing else, it gives me something easy to try and use up the never ending supply of apples I get in the winter from FFTY, since we’re still not really apple fans. (To clarify – apple the fruit, not apple the tech… my next computer will be a mac, darn it! and I’m fairly fond of my iPhone) I’m going to try and come up with an alternative to the pineapple next time, however. I happened to have a couple of cans of pineapple sitting in the bottom of the pantry, but since I don’t really intend to buy any more once those are used up it would probably be a good time to find something different to use. I’m open to suggestions – so far my idea was maybe some kind of combination of buttermilk (for tang) and more apples (for bulk)… thoughts?

Cake Ingredients:

• 3 Cups Flour
• 2 Cups Sugar
• 1 tsp Salt
• 1 tbs Baking Soda
• 1 tsp Ground Ginger
• 1 tsp Cinnamon
• 1 and 1/2 Cups Safflower Oil
• 4 eggs, lightly beaten
• 1 tbs Vanilla Extract
• 1 cup Pecans; chopped
• 2 cups Apple; finely grated
• 1 cup crushed Pineapple
• 2 tbs Brandy
• 2 tbs White Wine
• 1 tbs butter
• 1/4 cup Dried Cranberries

Cake Method:

• Preheat the Oven to 350°
• Butter and Flour two 9″ Round Cake Pans
• Melt the butter in a small skillet over medium heat
• Toss the Pecans in the melted butter and cook until fragrant. Set aside.
• Plump the Cranberries by heating them together with the brandy and white wine. Set aside.
• In to a large bowl, sift together the sugar, flour, baking soda, salt and ground ginger
• Add the oil, eggs, and vanilla and Beat well (batter will be very thick)
• Gently Fold in the Pineapple and apples until batter is moistened
• When combined, stir in the Pecans and Cranberries (including soaking liquid)
• Divide the batter between the two cake pans
• Bake on the middle rack of oven for 45-50 minutes, or until knife inserted in to the center of cake comes out clean
• Cool cake completely before Frosting

Frosting Ingredients:

• 8 oz Cream Cheese, softened
• 6 tbs butter, softened
• 2 and 1/2 cups Powdered Sugar
• 1 tsp Vanilla Extract

Frosting Method:

• Cream together the butter and Cream Cheese
• Beat in the powdered sugar, a little bit at a time, until desired consistency is reached
• Stir in vanilla
• For best spreadability/consistency frost cake immediately

The weather turned cold today – I mean, it had been getting chilly for the last couple of weeks… but today it actually turned cold. I could even see snow off in the distance on Mt. Diablo, and a couple of my sisters reported having snow near their houses or on their way to work… Kinda trippy… I mean, it’s not supposed to snow in California, well – outside of Tahoe it isn’t, anyways – it’s allowed there. That’s far enough away to not be an issue.   You see, I like snow. I like to look at it outside of my window and say “awww… pretty”. But I hate driving in it, walking in it, or touching it in any way.

So enough on the weather – I suppose ya’ll might be wondering why posting has been so light. Well I don’t really have a good excuse for you… during and around thanksgiving, we were busy with that, and I kinda figured there was probably enough people out there blogging all their thanksgiving family recipes, so I decided to focus on just having a nice meal and not stress on getting perfect pictures… then afterwards… well, I guess for the last couple of weeks I just kinda got a little bit lazy and a little bit busy, and we ended up eating out a little more frequently than usual, but hopefully I’m turning the corner and getting back in to the swing of things. I’m starting to work on getting things done around the house – we had the drywall guys out here today, actually – patching up the cracked seams in the rest of the den.

We were kind of toying with the idea of jumping right in to painting and trim right after the patches had finished setting, but after thinking about it a little more, we decided to wait until after Yule. I’m hosting, and I’m not 100% sure that I can get everything done before then – and although I’m sure everyone would understand, I’m just not keen on the idea of having everyone show up and seeing my desk shoved in to the corner of the living room, furniture covered in sheets, in a corner of the den, etc.. know what I mean? Now I’m going to shoot for starting on the painting and trim on Christmas (shhhh… don’t tell Mr. Man). It’ll be a busy few days, but I think if we push hard, we can get the painting and trim done during that time.

Unfortunately, it looks like doing something about that hideous parquet might have to wait. We were discussing getting the floor done, but it looks like it might be out of the budget right now, unless we were willing to compromise a great deal, which I’m not really. I’m going to get a few more bids, and we’ll see where we end up. (cross your fingers for us!) I’d like to get some sort of eco-friendly carpet in there. We talked about hardwood or something a little longer lived – but to be honest, that room is one of the coldest in the house during the winter, and getting a nice warm carpet in there sounds pretty awesome, although I’m a little worried about it getting stained, since we have the coffee machine in the den/bar area by the fireplace… and my hobby area is (eventually) going to live in the den… Anyways, we have some decisions to make on the flooring still, so it might be best to sit on it for a while.

So back to the lasagna – since the weather has started to go colder, when I have been cooking I’ve been opting for more hearty, comfort food things. We had a lovely soup (similar to the Savoy Cannellini Stew) several days this week, since I ended up making a big batch of beans… lol. I thought I was making 1lb, since that was what I ordered from Planet Organics, but I wasn’t paying attention, and I didn’t weigh it – so I think it was a lot more than a pound, because when all was said and done, I ended up with a HUGE pot of beans. Enough to pull off an entire quart to save for later, and STILL be eating beans for most of the week. (Thats what I get for not paying attention…)

The squash was actually leftover from when I made roasted squash puree for Pie on Thanksgiving – between having the beans already cooked in the fridge, and the squash on hand, it was by far one of the quickest lasagna’s I’ve ever put together, and using Fresh Pasta sheets made it go together even faster, since I didn’t need to pre-boil the sheets. Not that I do normally – if fresh pasta isn’t available, I usually cheat and get the no-boil lasagna noodles… pre-boiling lasagna noodles is just not something I’ve felt is worth the hassle. It was a nice little experiment, too – because honestly, I haven’t really explored the world of lasagna outside of the red sauce world, and I’m thinking that has been an oversight I definitely need to fix, because this lasagna was GOOD. If you don’t happen to have pre-cooked beans and squash on hand, you can substitute canned beans and pumpkin puree, it should work almost as well.

When I first started to make it – Miss Thing came over and asked about what I was making, and I told her Lasagna. At first she was all excited (lasagna is a treat), but then she saw me pulling squash and beans out of the fridge and she got… ah… a little unhappy with me. lol – “Ewwwww! You’re ruining it! Don’t put that in there!” etc… But anyways, long story short – she loved it, and had two helpings (and some leftovers again this afternoon for lunch). So there you go – even squash-haters like this lasagna.

Ingredients:

• 1 qt Roasted and Pureed Butternut Squash (or other type of squash)
• 1 qt Cooked Navy Beans (in liquid)
• 1 lb Lasagna Noodles (Fresh pasta recommended)
• 16 oz Small Curd Cottage Cheese
• 12 oz Manchego Cheese; shredded
• 1 large Onion, diced
• 5 cloves Garlic
• 1 sprig Rosemary;
• 1 large sprig Thyme
• 8 Sage Leaves (or so)
• 2 inch Piece of Fresh Ginger; peeled
• 2 tbs Butter
• 1/4 cup White Wine
• 1/4 cup Cider Vinegar
• 1 tsp Cumin
• 1/4 tsp Cayenne Pepper
• Kosher Salt

Method:

• Preheat Oven to 350° and butter a 9″x13″ Baking Pan
• De-stem the thyme and rosemary
• Finely mince together the ginger, rosemary, garlic, sage, and thyme
• Melt the butter in a large skillet over medium heat
• Add the onions, and saute until beginning to turn golden
• Clear a spot in the the center of the pan and add the minced ginger-garlic mixture
• Stir and heat until fragrant (about 30 seconds)
• Clear a spot in the center of the pan again and add about 1/2 the Navy beans
• Smoosh the Navy beans a couple of times with the back of a spoon or a potato masher, then add remaining beans, bean liquid and the squash puree
• Reduce heat to low and stir
• Simmer for 3-5 minutes, then add the Cider Vinegar, White Wine, Cumin, Cayenne Pepper and Kosher Salt (to taste)
• Place a layer of noodles in bottom of pan
• To assemble the lasagna, start with a noodle layer, then a sauce layer, then a cheese layer. Repeat. After the second or third layer (depending on how many layers you are going to have), spread the Cottage Cheese out evenly on top of a layer of noodles, then top with sauce and cheese and atleast one more layer. Cottage cheese layer should be situated as near as possible to the center of the lasagna, and the top should be sauce and shredded cheese
• Bake assembled lasagna in oven for 30-45 minutes, or until cheese is golden and lasagna is heated through

Oh huzzah! It’s the weekend, it’s Saturday, and I’m staring down the barrel at what I’m expecting to be a whole week of sleepy days, since Miss Thing has vacation from school all this week. I’m sure it will go by entirely too fast, but for the moment at least, I’m enjoying it. Although I suppose I should get up marginally early-ish on Thanksgiving proper to start the Turkey… although I technically don’t have to. The couple of people we wanted to invite over had plans already, so it’s looking like it’s just going to be Mr. Man, Myself, and Miss Thing for dinner on Thursday… So we can eat whenever we want, Neener neener!

I still haven’t managed to convince Mr. Man to let me get creative with Thanksgiving Dinner, which makes me a little sad, but I’ve kind of given up now that it’s getting so close to the actual day. I guess I’m just not as big on ‘traditional’ meals as he is (whatever that means). But we should still have a nice holiday meal anyways. It’s hard to believe that it’s already the end of November. This year has just flown by. Pretty soon we’ll be heading in to the new year, and Delementals will celebrate it’s One Year anniversary. But I’m probably getting ahead of myself. For now, I’m just enjoying the fall seasons fruits and veggies and trying to figure out what to get Mr. Man and Miss Thing for holiday gifts. It’s actually even started to get a little chilly lately, which makes me feel a little more in to the season. It’s hard to really get in to the holiday season when it’s still shorts & sandals weather outside, lol.

The last time I placed an order with Spud, they had fresh cranberries, and I’ll be honest – I had some vague notion of maybe using them for thanksgiving, but I hadn’t actually sat down and planned anything out yet – it was mostly a “oooo… they have cranberries!” kind of purchase. I was going to wait to use them, but when rearranging some things I noticed that a couple of them looked a little ah… less than fresh. When I realized that the drawer that contained the oranges was over flowing from my recent FFTY delivery, it seemed like the perfect time to make a Cranberry Orange bread.

I started off with a recipe for Orange Yogurt Bread that I found on a site called Pinch My Salt. I made a few changes though – (aside from adding cranberries, obviously), namely I opted to use Sour Cream instead of Yogurt, because I was out of Yogurt, I swapped out some of the sugar for brown sugar, reduced the total sugar just a little bit and I doubled the batch so that I could have two loaves of bread. The results were pretty incredible. Although, sadly – there wasn’t as much orange flavor as I might have hoped in the finished product, the bread did turn out moist, dense and delicious – almost like a pound cake, really. Next time I think I’d try to maybe double up the orange juice and reduce it – to see if I could get a more concentrated orange flavor (I’d also probably have to reduce the sugar at the point… ) but simply as is, it’s very good – and would be great to make the night before for an easy and quick breakfast (such as oh… I dunno for Thanksgiving?)

Ingredients:

• 1 and 1/3 cups Butter, softened
• 1 and 1/4 cup Sugar; divided
• 1 cup Brown Sugar
• 1 cup Sour Cream
• 1 cup Orange Juice (Fresh squeezed, if you have it)
• 4 eggs
• 5 cups of Flour
• 1 tsp Baking Powder
• 1 tsp Baking Soda
• 1 tsp Kosher Salt
• ½ pound Fresh Cranberries; coarsely chopped

Method:

• Preheat oven to 350°
• Grease two 9″x5″ Loaf pans
• In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and kosher salt and set aside
• Toss the chopped cranberries and 1/4 cup of the sugar together in a small bowl and set aside
• In a large mixing bowl, cream together the Brown Sugar, Sugar and Butter until fluffy
• Add the eggs, one at a time, until well combined
• Mix in the sour cream, and then add the orange juice
• Add the Flour mixture, a little at a time, until just combined (do not over mix)
• Fold in the cranberry mixture
• Divide the batter between the two loaf pans and bake for for 1 hour, or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean
• Cool in pans for a few minutes, and then transfer to wire rack
• Allow to Cool completely before slicing