Turkey Time

After the preparation for, and the return from a two week trip to my Father's house in North Carolina, we are back home and planning our Thanksgiving meal just like everyone else. Truth be told, on Thursday we will be having our second Thanksgiving dinner this month.

Driving through St. Louis is nerve wracking enough, but quadruple the amount of cars going over the river and

Fall Colors

Happy Halloween! There is no denying it, fall is here.  There was a good amount of wind blowing through my neighborhood all day.  Most of the trees were already bare, but those that were not, are now.  Saturday night we turn back our clocks and if you are like me, you are wondering how is it possible that tomorrow is November 1st?  Honestly, where did this year go?

Fortunately I love the Fall colors, with so many shades of orange, red and yellow.  Nothing says Fall quite like copper mums. 

Multi-Grain Museli

We've all heard that breakfast is the most important meal of the day.  Here's a quick make-ahead museli that will give you a jump start on your busy day.  I adapted this from a favorite cookbook of mine, Grain Mains, which is loaded with delicious and wonderful whole grain ideas.

 

According to Wikipedia, museli was introduced by the Swiss physician Maximilian Bircher-Benne around 1900 for patients in his hospital where a diet rich in fresh fruit and vegetables was an essential part of therapy.

Saving Heirloom Tomato Seeds

Having grown five varieties of Heirloom tomatoes this summer, I decided to try my hand at saving seeds from each.  Heirloom seeds have a shorter shelf life, but you can acquire new seeds each growing season, so I really don't see that as a problem.  The characteristics of a plant grown from heirloom seeds are true to that of the mother plant, unlike seeds saved from a hybridized plant where there is no assurance of what you'll get.  In the 1940's F1 hybrids were started in order to offer different varieties.  The hybrids had a tougher skin which gave them a longer shelf life, thereby improving the quality of shipped tomatoes.

To collect my seeds, I held one tomato of each variety over a glass container and squeezed the seeds out.  Clockwise from the top left corner: Black Krim, Dr. Wyche's Yellow, Green Zebra, Mortgage Lifter and Cherokee Purple.

End of Summer Eggplant

I have to admit these globe eggplants are a little on the small side.  Together the three of them barely tip the scale at just over one pound.  But it was either pick them or lose them, so I did.  Now what to do with them?

Luckily, I stumbled upon Barbara Kafka's easy and delicious Marinated Eggplant that is cooked in none other than a microwave.  While thinking this is too good to be true, what did I have to loose?

DIY Energy Bars

When it's late afternoon and you haven't quite finished your To Do list, you might want to reach for one of these little beauties.   There is no reason you can't have a container of healthy energy bars on hand, especially when these are so easy to throw together.

Mostly Heirloom Tomato Soup

Just as cooler temperatures are settling in, I came across a basic cream of tomato soup recipe in the Soup & Bread Cookbook by Beatrice Ojakangas and was inspired to create.  As chance would have it, all my semi-ripe and green tomatoes on the vines had to be brought inside to finish ripening due to frost warnings.  But rather than looking at it as 'Darn, my dining room table is covered in unripe tomatoes',  I'm thinking this is a good thing.  I can keep tabs on their ripening progress and plan accordingly.  

The heirlooms I used are Dr. Wyche's Yellow, Cherokee Purple, and Mortgage Lifter, along with Green Zebra and Black Krim which are not pictured.