I have noticed that when I process (skin, deseed, slice) #ButternutSquash, something from the squash binds to the skin of my hands in a way that doesn't just wash off, and is kind of a drying agent. I got tired of this and so now when I process butternut squash I put on latex gloves. Problem solved!

#LifeHack #Food #Cooking

As the chill of winter descends and the leaves transform into a kaleidoscope of warm hues, there's one comforting tradition that my family eagerly anticipates—the delightful aroma of Butternut Squash Soup filling our home. Join me on a journey through the heart of our kitchen, where the rich, velvety goodness of this soup not only satisfies our taste buds but also wraps us in a cozy, familial embrace. #butternutsquash #soup

https://healthylivingenthusiast.com/butternut-squash-soup/

Yesterday was the second day of 30cm+ of snowfall last week. Made it a productive day of cooking; super soft milk bread, butternut squash and carrots soup and biryani!
#SnowStorm #Ottawa #Cooking #ButternutSquash #Biryani #Homemade #Bread

Hearty and healthy, I immediately fell in love with the combination of ground turkey and butternut squash. It has become my ultimate comfort food combo! #groundturkeyrecipe #butternutsquash #comfortfood #cookingathome

https://littlebitrecipes.com/ground-turkey-and-butternut-squash/?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub

Posted into Fall Recipes Too Good To Pass Up @fall-recipes-too-good-to-pass-up-LisaMarcAurele

Winter Solstice

I hope everyone who celebrates Winter Solstice had a beautiful day! As for James and I, it couldn’t have been more perfect.

As some of you may know, James does all the cooking year-round except for the Winter Solstice when I take over and plan a sometimes rather elaborate meal. This tradition came about because James works in retail and there are many years when he does not get Solstice off from work and is therefore not home to cook a celebratory meal. Sure, we could choose to have our meal on a different day, but for whatever reason, we decided the meal needed to be on the actual Solstice. Since James was not reliably available to cook, I took on the cooking. And, of course, I couldn’t cook just anything.

I usually start going through recipes in the middle of November and come up with a menu by Thanksgiving, which gives us time to get all the ingredients that are sometimes a challenge to find and require some revision. This year, however, ingredients were no problem at all.

Working in an academic library, I generally get a big chunk of time off around Christmas and New Year’s, and this year is no exception. I was even able to take a few extra days on either end. So I began my holiday vacation Friday, which was very important because part of the Solstice menu was sourdough bread that requires two days to make.

I found a great recipe with easy to follow instructions. I am one of the people who, during the pandemic, started a sourdough culture. My starter, Tilda, has been with me since May 1, 2020. I feed her–them–regularly, and they keep happily growing and reproducing. Friday afternoon Tilda obliged me with the starter for a loaf of bread. I made the dough according to instructions, covered the bowl with a damp towel and allowed the critters to do their thing overnight and into mid-morning Saturday.

Then it was time to follow through with the process, the second rise, the baking, and hoping it all turned out ok because I have never made sourdough bread before. This was the result:

The crust was crusty and the inside was soft and chewy. Beginner’s luck?

The bread went along with the simple miso and tofu soup:

There were some minutes of panic when I was ready to make the soup and asked James where the wakame had ended up and he couldn’t find it. He did find it eventually and everything ended up just fine.

After the soup came the main dish, stuffed butternut squash. This one I did some mixing of recipes. The original recipe was for acorn squash, but why buy an acorn squash when I have butternuts I grew in the garden? I had to scoop out a larger hollow in the butternut for the stuffing to fit in, and the squash took a bit longer to roast than an acorn would, but it all came out just fine.

I filled the squash with a wild rice stuffing. The rice stuffing recipe includes apple and walnuts and I didn’t want a sweet stuffing because butternuts are sweet enough already. So I left out the apple and walnuts. Instead, I added spicy crispy chickpeas seasoned with a home-mixed tandoori masala spice blend. Unfortunately, I wrote down the recipe and don’t remember what blog I got it from. The spicy chickpeas played well with the wild rice stuffing and squash and added a nice sort of crouton crunch.

And then for dessert, which we actually had earlier in the afternoon with coffee, snickers cake. My version did not look as fancy as the one in the online recipe, but it still tasted amazing

So much yum!

We ate the all the squash, but there is still stuffing, which with the chickpeas makes its own meal, and soup and bread. And cake of course. Leftovers rock!

If James doesn’t do it first, I’m going to have to try to make another loaf of sourdough bread in a few weeks to see if it was a fluke it turned out so well, or whether I’m actually pretty good an the bread making.

Now I’m on vacation through January 5th. There is garden planning to do, reading, relaxing, knitting, and a few other projects.

My bruises from being doored last weekend are healing up nicely with the help of comfrey salve I made from my garden comfrey last year. And thankfully, no further injuries materialized. My repaired cargo bike should be ready to pick up from the shop tomorrow.

There is always plenty of joy to be had if only I pay attention. This last week there were holiday cards and some surprise gifts. On Thursday we had 5.5 inches/ 14 cm of snow. James and I decided to take public transit instead of putting our lives in danger with bad drivers on unplowed roads. There is much joy sitting on a warm bus and allowing someone else to worry about getting me to my destination. On the way home in the evening, there were so many homes lit up with holiday lights that I had the chance to savor, something I cannot do much of on my bike since I need to pay attention to what is happening on the road.

The juncos, who are themselves a joy with their little round fat bodies, keep visiting the garden to eat amaranth and hyssop seeds. Watching them through the window never fails to make me smile.

And today, the chickens made me laugh. It’s been pretty cold so we haven’t opened the run to let them out into the garden, but today was sunny and just below freezing and I thought perhaps they would like the opportunity for some fresh air. They don’t much like snow, but they will walk down the snowy garden path to the snow-free deck just to be outside. I figured that is what they would do. But when they finally decided to investigate beyond the coop, only Ethel and Sia came out, walked to the top of the stairs from the chicken garden to the main garden, stood there a few minutes looking out over all the snow, decided nope, then turned around and went back inside their warm, dray, straw covered run.

Later in the week will bring a thaw, so perhaps enough snow will melt to entice them out for a walkabout.

Reading

• Book: 44 Poems on Being With Each Other, edited by Pádraig Ó Tuama. Ó Tuama does the On Being Poetry Unbound podcast. I have listened to it before but it isn’t my cuppa. Still, I love reading poetry, and James brought this home when an advance reading copy showed up at work. The poems are great and I found some new to me poets I want to investigate further. However, Ó Tuama makes a small personal introduction to each poem and then follows each peom with 3-4 pages of explication. I very soon gave up reading everything but the poems. It’s not that the other bits were not good, he does a fine, nonacademic job of explaining poetry because he is himself a poet and approaches the poems as a poet and a reader of poetry. But, I don’t need anyone explaining the poems to me, I can do that just fine. I think this book would be great for people who like poetry but are intimidated by it, who feel like they need a friendly assist in learning how to be a poetry reader. So if that sounds like you, then definitely give this book a try.
• Lecture: Writing in the Stupid Age by Anne Haverty. This is the text of a lecture Haverty delivered at the United Arts Club in Dublin in October. She talks about literature, art, culture and AI. It is very good.
• Graphic history: Among Giants: A Brief Hydrological History of the Upper Midwest. A graphic history of the upper Mississippi River and valley. Brief and glacier-ific.
• Map: Indigenous Artists Give Minnesota Map a Makeover. I wouldn’t call it a makeover. I’d call it a map of the land before white colonial settlers stole it and renamed everything.

Quote

“You could say we have been softened up to give ourselves up to AI. Our language is withering into banality, our concentration is wrecked, our respect for our unique capacity for thinking and creating eroded. We have come to take refuge from each other in the machine. As AI learns to do better will we be happy to hand over to it that capacity for thinking and creating, the capacity that gives us much of our sense of purpose and fulfilment? “

~Anne Haverty, Writing in the Stupid Age

Listening

• Nothing of particular interest this week

Watching

• Movie: National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. It’s a classic annual must-see at my house

James’s Kitchen Wizardry

Suspended this week for my Solstice amazingness. He’ll be back at it week, I’m sure.

#butternutSquash #misoSoup #snickersCake #snow #sourdough #WinterSolstice

Made with jerk-style #spices, roasted #butternutsquash, #veggies, and a bit of #cream. This #soup will add a little something, something to your #dinner night routine!

Jerk Butternut Squash Soup
https://thecuriousplate.com/jerk-butternut-squash-soup/

#recipe

Butternut Squash Carbonara with Crispy Garlic from North End Nosh. Sautéed squash adds a flavour bump to the smooth egg and parmesan sauce, oregano and garlic connect well to make a tasty topping. Try this new spin on a traditional Italian dish.
https://northendnosh.weebly.com/butternut-squash-carbonera-with-crispy-garlic.html
Brown Butter Butternut Squash Pasta
https://northendnosh.weebly.com/brown-butter-butternut-squash-pasta.html
#squash #butternutsquash #carbonara

First time baking #cranberries with my #butternutSquash and OH MY! 🤯 😋 YUM! Thanks to whoever it was on here that opened my eyes! Unfortunately I didn't bookmark the post!

Sausage stuffed butternut Squash is a comforting, hearty dish that combines roasted butternut squash's natural sweetness with the savory flavors of sausage, spinach, apple, and nuts. #food #recipe #flipboardusergroup #fediverse #cooking #dinner #butternutsquash #fallrecipes

https://www.giangiskitchen.com/sausage-stuffed-butternut-squash/?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub

Posted into Giangi's Kitchen Recipes @giangi-s-kitchen-recipes-giangiskitchen

I love to use my Air Fryer for making a variety of recipes including this fall favorite, butternut squash bites. #airfryerrecipe #sidedish #fallfavorites #butternutsquash

https://littlebitrecipes.com/air-fryer-butternut-squash/?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub

Posted into Little Bit Recipes @little-bit-recipes-LisaMarcAurele

Roasted Butternut Squash Salad #butternutsquash #saladcreation

https://www.currytrail.in/roasted-butternut-squash-salad/?utm_source=flipboard&utm_medium=activitypub

Posted into Fresh and Delicious Salad Recipes @fresh-and-delicious-salad-recipes-LisaMarcAurele

The month is coming to an end as the warmest September on record, and the state drought monitor has labeled us “abnormally dry.” The garden is looking a little droopy and so am I. It was one of those weeks that, while not insanely busy, was constantly busy and had little down time. James and I both arrived at Friday night a bit shellshocked and zombie-like. The weekend has been restful, but not rejuvenating. The body feels fine, but mentally I long for a stretch of days in which I have nothing planned and nothing that has to be done. I think that’s usually called a vacation? I have a solid two weeks of vacation scheduled for the end of December, and even though it will be here before I know it, it still seems far away.

The warm month has been messing with my seasonal senses. It is clearly autumn—the leaves are turning, the light has changed, the birds are migrating—but it feels like August. I want to put on a sweater and curl up with a pastry, hot drink, and a good book. I just want to be cozy, but the weather is not cooperating. Maybe that’s why I feel so tired, it’s the dissonance between expectation, desire, and reality.

What I have been enjoying this week are the birds. Goldfinches mainly. The hyssop is going to seed and the goldfinches are all over it, chowing down. They are on the tall yellow coneflowers in the front yard too. Such a pleasure to watch and their cheerful chirping is music to my ears, never failing to make me smile.

I have learned some bird hierarchy while watching the water dishes on the deck. The goldfinches will be drinking and a chickadee will swoop in and chase them away. I am surprised by this since chickadees are pretty much the same size as the goldfinches, but they puff up, stick out their chests, and aggressively hop at the finches who then fly away, ceding the water dishes to the chickadee.

But then a couple of sparrows come swooping in and chase off the chickadee.

Waiting in the wings is a little chipmunk. Once the birds have left, the chippy comes up for a quick drink.

Squirrels are still visiting the water too, but they seem to be fewer than in the spring. I see them running around the garden and one of them devoured one of the ripe pumpkins sometime between sunrise when the chickens were let out of the coop and late morning when I went to out to pick it. Perhaps because there is so much critter activity in the garden, the squirrels are not able to dominate it like they did earlier in the season? I’m probably delusional and they are all secretly plotting something that will take me by surprise.

I did get three small pumpkins. These are naked bear pumpkins. The seeds have no hulls—pepitas—but the pumpkin flesh on this variety is also supposedly pretty tasty. I’ll find out after I let them cure for a couple weeks.

The butternuts are also getting ripe. I’ve got three picked and two more on the vines. Not bad! Growing them up a wooden ladder turned out to work really well and I will be doing it again next year. The variety is “North Circle” from North Circle seeds, and is good for shorter growing seasons.

I’m thinking about growing sorghum next year. The amaranth—the eff you plants—I grew a couple years ago thinking I would harvest the seeds for grain, but the seeds turned out to be incredibly tiny and threshing the seed heads and separating seed from chaff is so tedious and time consuming, that I gave up trying to use them for grain. They continue to happily seed themselves around the garden and their leaves make a decent salad green early in the season, but other than that and their amusing middle finger, they are weedy and somewhat of a nuisance. But sorghum, maybe? The grain is larger and I can grow pole beans up a taller variety. To thresh it, one can allegedly put the seed head into a pillow case and beat it with a stick. Presumably since the grain is larger, it is fairly easy to separate it from the chaff? Then there’s the possibility of making syrup from the stalks, but that is secondary at the moment. If you have experience with it, please let me know! I wish I could grow corn, but squirrels make that impossible.

Reading

• Humor: McSweeney’s was kind enough to send me an email reminding me that It’s Decorative Gourd Season Motherfuckers. This never gets old!
• Poem: Dedicated to All Human Beings Who Suffer by Yang Licai
• Blog: The Nine Lies of the Fake Green Fairytale by Jem Bendell. “Our vulnerability to self-deception has been hijacked by the self interests of the rich and powerful, to spin a ‘fake green fairytale’. Their story distracts us from the truth of the damage done, that to come, and what our options might be. Indeed, their fairytale prevents us from rebelling to try to make this a fairer disaster, or a more gentle and just collapse of the societies we live in.”
• Book: On Strike Against God by Joann Russ. This is a republication of a not science fiction novella by Russ. It includes a great introduction, an interesting critical essay afterward, a couple essays by Russ, and a letter from Russ to Marilyn Hacker and a letter from Hacker to Russ talking about On Strike Against God. The novella itself is a bit dated, but remains historically interesting, has some good humor, and lots of literary references. It’s a good and worthwhile “collection” if you are interested in Russ or 1970s lesbian feminism.

Quote

Landscape has a dangerous and deceiving repose, unlike cats or dogs who have eyes with which they can (gulp!) look right at you and sometimes do just that, as if they were persons, looking out of their own consciousness into yours and embarrassing and aweing you. Wild animals are only mobile landscape. Until you learn better, you think that a landscaped world can’t hurt you or please you, you needn’t bother about its soul, you needn’t be wary of its good looks.

Until you learn better.

~Joanna Russ, On Strike Against God, page 51

Listening

• Podcast: The Way Out is In: Bridging Being and Doing. After my busy week this podcast was exactly what I needed to hear. They discuss the practice of being and doing and how being is doing. The takeaway gem for me was the idea that one’s quality of being affects one’s quality of doing. In other words, being is the foundation of doing, and your being has a direct impact on everything you do.

Watching

• Rewatch: Pride and Prejudice. Thirty-five years ago Colin Firth blessed us with a swim in a pond. Oh, and also some fine acting with a fine cast, one of whom had a pair of fine eyes. We watched the first episode Friday night and it remains as delightful as it was the first time I saw it and wore out my VHS tape set and was thrilled when DVDs were invented because I couldn’t wear those out. It’s been ages since I’ve watched it, and now I am looking forward to episode two next Friday night.

James’s Kitchen Wizardry

We bought a pie pumpkin and James cooked it up this weekend, made some pumpkin butter, froze some puree for pumpkin pie later, and roasted the seeds with pumpkin spice. I have all the ingredients for cozy except the weather!

https://astoneintheriver.net/2024/09/29/yearning-for-cozy/

#amaranth #autumn #butternutSquash #chickadees #goldfinches #pumpkins #sorghum #sparrows

I really recommend you start drawing characters on your #butternutsquash friends.

I've been doing it for years and currently there's a #strongman on my windowsill.

#whimsy #drawing #squash

The best reason to #growyourown #butternutsquash is to be able to eat an occasional young one. This one had a close encounter with my #airfryer

The older, beige/orange mature ones will keep all winter for Thai curry and such, but these young ones taste like butter. 🧈 🤔 Curious, huh?

Because they don’t keep for long at this stage, you generally won’t see them in stores.
#mendocinocounty #norcal

Mmmm I make the best salad. Dead simple. Dice and cook some #ButternutSquash and #Beetroot, roughly chop some random leaves, #Tomato, #Cucumber, #BellPepper, pickled #Walnuts, and #Mushroom. Mix it all up with some #PineNuts, #SunflowerSeeds, #Mustard, #Pesto, some of the juice from the walnuts, and tinned #Sweetcorn. Mix thoroughly. That's it. Had it with a #Hake fillet. #cooking #foodstodon

Indulge in the ultimate comfort food with this easy Air Fryer Roasted Butternut Squash Soup recipe. Perfect for those chilly nights! #airfryer #butternutsquash #soup #comfortfood #recipe #cozynights #easyrecipe #fallrecipes #homemade #healthyfood

Find out more: https://kitgiz.com/air-fryer-roasted-butternut-squash-soup/

Looking for a warm, comforting soup that’s a breeze to make? Our Air Fryer Roasted Butternut Squash Soup is the perfect blend

of creamy butternut squash and aromatic spices. Ready in just 30 minutes—ideal for any weeknight dinner.

#airfryerroastedbutternutsquashsoup #butternutsquash #souprecipe #easyrecipes #healthyeating

Read more: https://kitgiz.com/air-fryer-roasted-butternut-squash-soup/