Archive for November, 2008
Pumpkin Whoopie Pies
Sorry for the momentary lapse in recipes this week. That’s what happens when the internet service is out at my house, and I spend my entire workday away from the computer, wiring pinecones and greens together for the most elaborate Christmas display you’ll ever see. I have to say the past couple of days (56 hours to be precise, not that I was counting) of life away from cyberspace have really opened my eyes about exactly how addicted to dependent on the digital world I am. Granted, I often go without checking my email and the blog/comments while I’m travelling or on vacation. But at home, I’m bordering on obsessive. Are you that way too? By the end of this recent Web outage, I was actually finding it refreshing to sit and eat my breakfast by the sunny window, rather than the glowing screen. Perhaps I need to wean myself off the cyber juice a bit.
But one thing I can’t do without is writing and creating for this blog. Gosh, I just love it! And having such great readers really is the icing on the cake. Or, in this particular instance, the icing between the pumpkin cookie halves. Dear, dear readers, let me introduce you to Pumpkin Whoopie Pies. Perhaps you’ve already met their counterpart, the traditional chocolate whoopie pie. Or, if you’re from the south, their close cousin, the moon pie. But among the ranks of all the other sandwich cookies, pumpkin woopie pies stand out as the absolute best (in my humble opinion as a pumpkin junkie).
Whoopie pies, for those of you still scratching your heads, consist of two cookie/cakey halves of varying flavors (those that I’ve actually tasted include chocolate, vanilla, carrot, red velvet and, of course, pumpkin) smooshed together using a thick layer of very fluffy sweet-but-not-too-sweet icing in the middle. The consistency of both the icing and the cookie is key to a good whoopie pie. My grandmother is the rock star of the whoopie pie making world and gets hers perfect every single time: moist but airy cookies with a slight crumb and super fluffy icing that gets just the lightest crust on the edges so it doesn’t all squish out on your good blouse when you bite down on the pie.
Natural Inspiration II
More photos from my walks around the garden. These were taken on a gloomy rainy day, and yet it was so colorful when I looked through my lens. Have your mouse hover over a photo if you want to know what the subject is.
Natural Inspiration
I’ve been lucky enough to get paid the past few days to walk around a beautiful garden and take photos of nature’s glory. There is so much inspiration to be had that I needed to share it with you. Here are a few shots for now, and I’ll post some more later.
Grilled Fresh Figs
Simple is best…fresh is best…simple is best…fresh is best…
That’s it, folks. That’s my mantra. The words by which I strive to live. “Simple” and “fresh” seem easy enough words to wrap your head around, don’t they? Why is it then that I find myself wandering around the grocery store aisles, making futile grasps for bags of preprocessed junk. I don’t normally let myself buy any of it (thus the futile grasping), but I most certainly crave it to the point of distraction. How many of you feel the same way? I hope I’m not alone.
Some people have a sweet tooth. Some have a salty tooth. And still others have a savory tooth. Then there’s me. I have all three! And guess what? I found a way to satisfy all my teeth at once with a dish that is simple and fresh! In fact, it’s ridiculously simple.
Make a little marinade with items you probably already have on hand and brush it around some fresh figs strung on fresh rosemary branches. Toss it all on a hot grill pan for a few heavenly moments where you stand over it and suck in all the air you can through your nose so you can get every last molecule of fragrance wafting off it. Mmmmmm…Rosemary Grilled Figs (served with goat cheese, I might add).
Oh, I wish I could take credit for the genius behind this one. I really do. But it was the ancient Greeks, via the New York Times, that brought about this tasty dish. The aroma of the rosemary is really imparted to the figs. They become soft as they grill, and it’s so much fun to pop them off into your mouth, bite down on them, and have the sweetness of the juice and lingering marinade dribble onto your tongue. Grilled figs prove simple and fresh really is best. And I don’t miss the preprocessed junk a bit!
Apple Rhubarb Jam
I’m feeling a bit out of touch with the seasons here this year. Rather than dishing out recipes for winter squash and mustard greens and warm spiced desserts like I was this time last year, I keep coming up with these last few throw backs to warmer months. First it was kiwis and then sweet peppers, and now it’s rhubarb. Yes, rhubarb!
Generally speaking, I’m sure most people would consider rhubarb to be a spring ephemeral, or at least not anything to be had past June. But I’ve recently discovered that’s really not true at all. In fact, it’s at its sweetest in autumn, just when it needs cutting back anyway. There are the big woody stems that should be tossed, but keep any of the slender and pliable ones to throw into such scrumptious treats as Apple Rhubarb Jam.
Rhubarb has been a favorite of mine since I can remember, thanks to the long-lived perennial stand of it in my grandmother’s kitchen garden. It often fell upon me to walk to her house and twist off a few tender stems for one of my mom’s delicious spring-time desserts. I actually got the rhubarb for this recipe from her garden once again on a recent visit.
Gardeners usually put in one or two year-old crowns of rhubarb when getting their patch started. I actually decided to put rhubarb in my own garden this year but wanted to try growing it from seed so I could observe the whole propagation process. So far, my plants are looking young but healthy, having snuggled into their bed for winter. I probably won’t be able to harvest anything from them yet next year but I look forward to plenty of rhubarb in 2010!
Recent Comments