Perfect Pumpkin

My friend Larry invited me out to his backyard to see his amazing vertical gardens. I was in awe. His picnic table displayed a bumper crop of huge neck pumpkins, and I was waxing fondly on the fruit of his labor, when he picked out the what seemed to me to be the largest one and handed it to me...I hardly knew what to say, I should have told him thanks, but to pick me out a smaller one instead, not the prized winner which he should have planned to enter into the the annual farm show competition. I just uttered stunned gratefulness, and carried it out to my car, in my arms like a baby.

I am no stranger to neck pumkin, or to even using mere jack-o-lantern pumpkins for food, but this thing deserved some VIP treatment. It took me a while to figure out just how to do it, but in doing so, I have created a recipe for pie filling which cannot be beat!

I peeled it, scraped out the guts (reserving the seeds for roasting) and chunked it and piled it high into my crock pot one afternoon...adding NO water. I brought it quickly up to temp on the high setting, for about and hour, maybe two, then tuned it low and cooked it overnight. OH key to the story: Later in the evening,as it cooked down a bit, I added Frontier brand pumpkin pie spice blend,tossed it about and popped the lid back on for the overnighter. In the morning it cooked down. It was a wonderful consistency, not watered down like before when I would steam it. The spiced went from the bitter way they come out of the jar, to the wonderful fall aroma. I stirred it and mashed it with a potatoe masher while it was still hot, then I returned the lid, after another hour on low, or keep warm setting, I turned it off, and allowed it to cool all afternoon while the spices continued to permeate the whole batch. Then when cooled, I ran it through the food mill and packed most of it for pies and baking later. I am now perfectly spoiled, and think pumpkin from a can is scary! (nt that I will not use solid pack punkin form a can, but this home made is by far the best!

The pot I had placed under my food mill was getting full, so I stopped while some was not yet milled, perhaps the more fibrous bits....I scraped those into the food processor, added some non-dairy cream cheese, and some sweetener (date or coconut sugar would have been best, I used molasses because that was what I had...and set that blend aside for making a pumpkin cheesecake. Her laziness dumped gluten-free rolled oats, butter, and a little more molasses into the food processor bowl to make a graham cracker crumb-like crust...dropped it into the pan and spread an flattened it, then added the creamy filling...it came out of the spring-form pan like and champ, and I served it for dessert. Mmmm....

Thanks Larry! Your prize-winning pumpkin was not wasted on this family! We will have pies and cookies and all sorts of goodies from it.

Happy Thanksgiving! Happy Harvest!

Chicken Veggie Noodle Soup

2 bone in but skinless all natural chicken breasts
1 medium onion diced
1/2 bunch of celery diced
3-4 carrots diced
2 garlic cloves minced/chopped

boil until the meat is tender
remove the meat to cool for picking off the bones and dicing

while the chicken is cooling,

add a bout a cup of frozen corn...

(the dices of corn and carrot make this easily like veggie chowder...adding the thickener of your choice with a little milk alternative could take this recipe another direction....I WILL try that

spiralize 3 bulky yellow squash...

cut a small head of cauliflower into florets, st aside, rough chop the smaller stumps and throw them into the food processor for a fine chop, then add the florets and pulse until they create "rice"add thise carb-poser veggie shapes into the soup, add the big nest of non-noodles.

Lastly, wash and shake dry a bunch of fresh thyme, strip all the little leaves off the stems...throw the leaves in the soup and the stems in the compost pile...Your soup will be so full of flavor, it will not even need to be salted. If you are sick, the broth is like medicine...this soup is excellent nourishment to feed a cold...in order to get over it.

Illness in this house is wicked and evil and hateful. and I have no further commentary of this soup. I'm sick and tired. This picture does this soup no justice...Life is unfair, sickness is sad reality...it happens, and you also make dumb decisions when sick...So stay home and eat soup.

Smoked Turkey Breast Deli Meat

I received a smoker fro a milestone birthday and have been employing it mainly by smoking salmon, but last week I thought I would try my hand at smoking a boneless skinless turkey breast, and was rewarded richly!

First, I marinated it overnight in cider vinegar, salt, organic cat-sup, brown mustard and honey. Then slow smoked it for a bout 4 or 5 hours over hickory and apple wood. My family was crazy about it.

I am now spoiled, and can never care as much for even the best quality organic packaged kind again! Unbelievably tasty! Cooked to perfection, and not the least bit slimy, and the smokey flavor permeated it thoroughly!

Egg Salad "Good Save"

Today I had not sweet pickle relish for egg-salad, but I did have a few sweet bread and butter pickles at the bottom of a jar of homemade pickles...the last of the cans form downstairs...I chopped them finely, and strained out the celery seed and spices...and there I had some!

Oooo the mustard seeds that have been in brine for months...they add a little bit of texture to the egg salad, and the flavor cannot be beat....Now, will I have to make homemade relish all the time? No, I want to go get a full time job.

I will add more egg salads variation later....but for now, this is enough



Actually I will Not. Charlie Brown did it for me:

https://www.amazon.com/Peanuts-Lunch-Bag-Cook-Book/dp/B0006DWRTI

Charlie Brown suggested adding added bologna in. What kind he meant, I do not know, I mean the red kind from PA

There is Lebanon (PA) Bologna (pronounced baloney)it is peppery and spice, and moist

and there is Sweet Bologna, which is like above, but not peppery, just sweet and salty, and a little bit less moist

and there is double smoked sweet....very sweet and dry, a little like jerky, but not tough, it is almost like candy,
and goes well with Peanut Butter....and sweet gherkin or sliced pickles (but not with egg salad. LOL!
It also goes will with Philly Cream cheese
So, there, go get your Pennsylvania on!


OH, yeah, back to egg salad....stuffed green olives are good and so salty in egg salad


and I think my home smoked salmon would be good flaked into egg salad....I have not posted that recipe yet...another day

Paleo-Palooza

So, I made a triad of paleo staples today.

I made homemade almond milk, and will NEVER prefer the packaged kind again!

For that I took a small empty PB jar and soaked about a cup to a cup and a half for raw almonds overnight, well, I was lazy and it was over tow nights. I drained the water, threw those into the blender, with a couple of dates, and blended until as smooth and white as could be. Then I strained it twice, through finer mesh the 2nd time. placing the milk in a mason jar in the fridge.

The pulp form the dates and almonds, it throw into my dehydrator in a fruit leather tray and dried all day. Once that was done, I throw the rough dry pulp into my food processor and spun it until it was like a whole flour, threw that in a zippy bag and into the freezer for baking or flour-less grain-less pancakes etc...I have seen the pulp made into flour by baking all day in a warm oven, but in the dehydrator, the oils do not become rancid.

Not wanting to wast a half dirty food processor, I ground up some more whole raw almonds and dates, and raw coconut oil in and created some sweet raw almond butter....You can do this with maple syrup too...I try hard not to make it to fatty, so mine is a bit chunky.

Then, unrelated, BUT not wanting to wash my food processor, when I could employ it one more time, I threw the crumbs form the remnants of ricecakes at the bottom of a bag into the processor with spices for crumbling on the top of the fish I'm baking tonight for supper...
and then I did up the dishes.

I am lazy. but because of that, one good food begets another, and I am not wasteful...each ingredient will live up to its fullest potential