It’s always so hard to choose.
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I have a book in which I record, from time to time, the big and small adventures in our family’s life. I mean to write in it every day, just a sentence or two. More often, weeks or even months go by between entries. I try to catch the important stuff, though, when I do sit down to write–milestones and anecdotes from our daughters’ lives, travels we want to remember, loving moments with our extended family. And, of course, what’s happening in the kitchen.
Our family’s book begins with applesauce. It was an October when I started the family journal (abandoning, in the process, my girls’ individual baby books) and we had just turned our three trees worth of apples into a year’s worth of applesauce. So in a way, I think of making applesauce as the beginning of each new year. At this time of year I often flip back through the years contained in my book and marvel at how fast life changes. And how each chapter is even better than the last.
Applesauce, though, is a constant in our lives. Every year we lighten the groaning branches of the apple trees in the fall, piling box after box of apples into the house. We sort the apples, setting aside the unblemished best for eating and sharing. We eat and bake and dry as many apples as we can. And the rest become applesauce for the year ahead.
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I’ll give you a clue about what’s cooking around here….
But first, this: I was just reading about October Unprocessed, a project that has inspired literally thousands of people to take a pledge to eat only unprocessed foods during the month of October. I’d say I’m an avid home cook, but reading about this made me reflect on what it would mean for our family to take that pledge. No Os cereal for the baby. No granola bars for the kids on the go. No MSG-laced almonds at happy hour. (I don’t know if they really have MSG. But probably.) It would be kind of a big deal. Have any of you taken the pledge? Do you think you could?
And hey, what’s cooking in your kitchen this week? Please feel free to leave your seasonal favorites and links in the comments! Here’s the weekly glimpse into my kitchen.
In the Kitchen
Menu 1: Tune in to the Virtual Vegan Potluck on November 1 for a rich and creamy (vegan) roasted celery soup. We had it with homemade beer bread and cabbage and apple salad.
Menu 2: J grilled sardines for maybe our favorite sandwich of all time: crusty bread, swipe of mayo, generous smear of dijon mustard, crunchy lettuce, grilled sardines. Try it. We had them with a cooked-greens salad and a beet-and-orange salad. (There I go again with the many-salads thing. So decadent!)
Menu 3: We made a tomatillo pizza with cilantro pesto (recipe soon!) and had it with a roasted carrot and avocado salad.
Preserving
Today I canned 26 pints of applesauce (which meant four loads in the canner; maybe I’ll do quarts next year) and started a gallon of sauerkraut. Someone remind me to check it in a few weeks, please!
I also dried the leaves from a bunch of celery and made a kind-of-amazing homemade celery salt. So far it’s gone on soup and buttered bread, and I can’t wait to sprinkle it on deviled eggs. What else should I do with it?
On My Plate
How many apples are in a bushel? I think I’ve still got at least that many in the basement. What are your favorite or most unique things to do with apples?
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Epicurean Ramblings made our favorite Healthy Cookies.
Blue Kale Road made chickpeas from scratch and used the broth in a gorgeous-looking Kale and Polenta Stew. I can’t wait to try it. (I also want to make most of the other recipes on that site, and I’ve loved the ones I’ve tried. Check it out.)
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Today J picked the apples from our three backyard trees. It’s been a good year for the apples, and box after box came inside. Red, crisp, sweet. Hundreds of apples. The big girls posed proudly for a photo in front of the pile. The baby held an apple in each hand and seriously applied herself to the task of trading off bites.
Our plan to make applesauce all day went out the window, the boxes went to the cool basement, and now every time I go downstairs the sweet smell of fall wraps around me. One day soon we’ll be making a year’s worth of applesauce, but today we settled for a enjoying just a taste of the season’s bounty in our salad.
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Someone taught my baby to say “stop it.” Life with a seventeen-month-old is undignified enough, I feel, without irate admonitions issuing from the tiny person over every little thing. Like when I try to change her diaper (“Stop it!”). Like when I take a ballpoint pen away (“Stop it!). Like when I insist that her carseat straps be buckled for travel (“No no no no STOP IT!”).
Imagine how she feels, though. She’s the baby in a family of five. We tell her to stop every time she innocently tries to tear a page from a book, or color on the table, or suck on the bottom of a delectable shoe. We may both be saying the same words, but there are days when we’re not exactly speaking the same language. Luckily, I can’t ever get down about it, because at the first sign of sadness this same baby rushes across the room, arms outstretched, yelling “Hug! Hug!” Hopefully she learned that from us, too.
At times like these, comfort food is occasionally in order for the whole family. And is there any comfort food that compares to baked pasta? I guess roasted vegetables, maybe, so I’ve combined the two here to hedge my bets. The children can pick out the cheesy pasta parts and I can console myself with all the eggplant that’s left in pan.
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I’m starting to feel rushed now that summer’s days are numbered. I never told you about my favorite summer cocktails! We haven’t even talked yet about whether to drench tomatoes in brown butter! We’ve hardly grilled together at all, except for a lonely piece of fish and those eggplants. Tune in next summer, friends, because some of those may have to wait.
But this broccoli can’t wait. Besides, broccoli is a vegetable that will come along right into fall with us. And once you taste this grilled broccoli, you’ll be firing up the grill every chance you get, even after summer’s gone.
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