With its lightly sweet yet rich flavor, Butternut Squash Soup is a real crowd pleaser. I love to serve it as a first course, sometimes spiced up a bit with a swirl of horseradish sour cream. With a salad and some freshly baked bread or homemade herbed crostini, it makes a delightful lunch or gentle…
Butter
Did you know that pioneers made butter on the march using the motion of the wagons to agitate the cream? The scientific process of creating butter includes agitating whole cream until the fragile membranes that surround milk fat are broken, allowing fat droplets to form and join. More churning hastens the separation of cream into…
2012 in Review – Thank You Visitors Near and Far!
The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog. I am so honored to have so many visitors from around the world! Thanks everyone! Here’s an excerpt: 600 people reached the top of Mt. Everest in 2012. This blog got about 5,000 views in 2012. If every person who reached the…
Lesley’s Peppery Popcorn Balls
My daughter-in-law, Lesley, is a creative and talented cook. Her culinary creations contain unique combinations of ingredients that surprise and delight the palate. I happen to know that Lesley’s favorite snack is freshly popped corn topped with pepper, so when I suggested she join me in my kitchen to transform her peppery popcorn into sweet,…
Sweet and Smoky Pumpkin Seeds
Separating pumpkin seeds from their clingy, protective pulp is somewhat tedious and exceptionally messy. Why bother? The results are well worth the effort. You get both a delicious, old-fashioned snack, and the satisfaction that comes from utilizing nature’s bounty to its fullest. These sweet and smoky pumpkin seeds are spiced up with chipotle, then softened…
Smoky Chipotle-Roasted Pumpkin
We often think of pumpkin as a dessert ingredient, just right for pies and muffins. As a member of the squash family, however, pumpkin is also the perfect candidate for simple, savory dishes. In this recipe, harvest pumpkin is seasoned with chipotle, then oven-roasted to a sweet and smoky blend. Serve it as a seasonal…
Mushrooms
Did you know that mushrooms have no chlorophyll, so they don’t need sunshine to grow and thrive? As a fungus, the mushroom lacks ability to use energy from the sun. Instead, it extracts carbohydrates and proteins from decaying, organic matter. Here’s an old Igbo proverb for you: “If you wish to eat a mushroom, you…
Zucchini
Did you know that zucchini plants originated in the Americas thousands of years ago and were re-popularized by Italian immigrants in the last century? Zucchini are summer squash (of the species cucurbita pepo), and are actually fruits, although we treat them as vegetables in the culinary sense. Here in the US, we call these familiar…
End of Summer Sweet Corn Soup
Officially, we still have a few weeks of summer left, but all of us know that Labor Day is the real end of summer. We’ve enjoyed the last blowout barbecue or beach weekend, put away the tiki torches and sand chairs, and are starting to think about donning heavy sweaters and heading to the pumpkin…
Ricotta Cheese
Did you know that ricotta cheese is not a true cheese? Making cheese requires the coagulation of the milk protein casein. Instead, ricotta is made by coagulating albumin and globulin, milk proteins left over in the whey during the process of making (true) cheese. The word ricotta means “re-cooked” in Italian – a great “whey”…
MixerUpper.com 