Ice Cream Kolackies

Last night, it was very Christmasy around here, while I made my favorite Christmas cookies and Joe finished putting together a puzzle (Rosie the Riveter by Norman Rockwell!).  I have made these cookies for three years now, and always have sent them to work with Joe.  They're good stuff, so I thought I would share the recipe and my tips with all of you!

Ahhh, Orchards.

My husband loves applesauce;  I love being able to toss simple healthy things into his lunch.

The solution?  We went to an orchard and picked apples, then turned our bounty into little jelly jars full of yummy applesauce!

We had Fall Harvest Orchard recommended to us by some friends, so we headed over there about a week ago to pick apples and see all the animals!  We saw potbelly pigs & piglets, little kids gathering eggs, a peahen & her chicks (did you know that only males are called "peacocks"?  A female is a "peahen"), goats & longhorn cattle.  We could have picked our own pumpkins, but we decided to head on over to the "U-Pick" section of the apple orchard.  Once we were in, we picked to our hearts' content from many different types of delicious fresh apples.  

When we got home, we got started on transforming the fruits of our labor into winter sustenance.

Simple Applesauce

First, using my *new!* fancy schmancy apple peeler, we cored, peeled, & sliced all the apples.

We chopped them into some smaller pieces and put them all into the biggest pot I own.  It's actually a pan from a meat smoker...but it works!  

I made sure to add 1/3 cup water for every 4 cups of apples in the pan--this keeps it from getting dry or burnt on the bottom of the pan.

I cooked down the apples until they were soft, and then broke out the blender.  But not just any blender, my blast-from-the-past magical blender.

Please appreciate how the green of my counters and backsplash compliment the green rainbow of my magical blender.  

Eggplant Sandwiches

It is that time of year.  In my opinion, the best time of year, when tomatoes and corn just start to ripen, and you've had lettuce and zucchini growing out your ears for a month or so;  the first potato plants are dying off, ready to be dug out, and it's time for BLT's and sweet corn, roasting hot dogs on the fire, and bowls of ice cream (well, when isn't it time for ice cream?)  Awesome.  Well, that time is here, and I'm cherishing it because ironically enough I live clear up North which means I won't have it for long.

But today is a good day, because today I can say that I have had my first eggplant sandwich of the year.

"Say what?"  you say.

And today I am going to share with you a potentially secret family recipe.  I have no idea where my parents got the recipe, but we've made it for years and I've never seen a similar recipe.  It is closest to a portobello Mushroom sandwich, and in fact it would probably work really well to substitute portobellos for the eggplant.  But I can't grow mushrooms, so I prefer to stick with the "garden variety" (Ha!) Eggplant.

Confessions

Do you have things that you're obsessed with?  Or things that, when you see them, you have to buy them?  In Conspiracy Theory Mel Brooks' character has to buy a copy of Catcher in the Rye everytime he sees it.  Now, I'm not calling myself crazy, but I do have a few "Catcher in the Rye" moments.  One of them is in produce.  If I find a type of produce (fruit or vegetable--though fruit tends to be more common) that I have never had, I become incredibly curious.  So unless it costs a fortune, you can be pretty sure it'll end up in my cart.  Or basket.

Case in Point:

Yes, these have crept into our grocery stores recently, and I hopped on that train as soon as I saw one.  They're essentially a strange looking orange, though not quite as tart.  Since this post is titled Confessions, I will confess that I am a cynic and I suspect that the fruit tree breeders made a tragic mistake but decided that they would go ahead and market it as if they meant it to look like an orange hedgeball.  And we, the unsuspecting public, think that it's a magical new fruit (unless we've secretly been wanting to eat hedgeballs...).  Well the verdict is in, and it was pretty good.  Not magnificent, not even terribly special, but good.

Case in Point 2: