Everything about the pumpkin I cooked & pureed today was beautiful, even the stem:


This was probably the most productive Sunday I've ever had. I was actually out of bed & working on papers by 8 this morning. I kept that up for a bit, spent a happy hour knitting on my hat & listening to the radio, went to the grocery store, and then was switching between kitchen and computer for the rest of the day. My upcoming trip to Toronto means I wanted to prepare some good bus snacks and also that I really needed to use up leftovers.

For the bus I toasted pumpkin seeds and made these wholesome banana chocolate breakfast bars. They came out beautifully! If you have a sweet tooth like I do you might want to add just a bit of honey, especially if your bananas aren't yet in that super-sweet super-ripe state. I also think walnuts would've been wonderful, and I'm toying with lots of other ways to modify that recipe in the future. If any of them are great of course I'll let you know.

In the leftover using-up department, I reheated some of last night's crunchy cornmeal and topped it with garlicky sauteed spinach, which was absolutely the perfect thing. Now I'm getting hungry again so it might be time to pick at some other leftovers...

Lentils & Rice.

I very nearly forgot about posting today, oops! I did want to tell you about two great recipes I tried this afternoon, though. I finally tried this honey baked lentils recipe and the results were so, so much better than I could've expected! I used green lentils soaked overnight in water with minced garlic, some ground ginger (we were unfortunately out of ginger root), a generous pinch of allspice, a little honey & a little maple syrup. I love honey in everything & I'd just picked up some wonderful Michigan maple syrup at Eastern Market, so I couldn't decide between the two sweeteners and had to just use a bit of both! I also omitted the onions -- I'm usually the world's biggest onion fan but sometimes I overdo it and want to take a break from them; I happen to be in one of those phases now.

Anyway, I've tried preparing lentils various ways in the past & always had minimal success -- this way is SO much better (and easier, too)! The resulting dish is incredibly flavorful and I'm going to love finishing up the leftovers all week.

I also made baked rice along with the lentils, since it seemed too easy not to try. It came out perfectly! That'll definitely be my go-to rice recipe from here on out, and I look forward to experimenting with it a bit more in the future (and possibly using the leftovers to make butternut squash cakes soon...).

The only sad note is that the pita I was making to go with this deliciousness was a complete failure. I've had great success with the recipe before and I can't figure out what I did wrong this time around. It's driving me a little nuts, actually, but I guess you can't win them all, right?

Hi internet!

Well, I still have no exciting knitting to show you -- I'm slowly plodding along on the same few projects I feel like I've been working on for years. I did just order a sweater's worth of yarn from KnitPicks, though! I'm hoping that'll help inspire me pick up the pace. I'm going to use this pattern but attempt to do it as a top-down raglan to avoid the hell of seaming. We'll see how that goes.

I have been cooking & baking a bit lately, though! I'm trying really hard to make a big dish or two at the beginning of each week so I can take leftovers to school or my internship as needed. It's a better plan than spending tons on eating out every day, anyway. Here are some of the best things I've made recently:

• Broccoli Crunch Salad: I made this this week & it might be my favorite thing. The dressing is unbelievably delicious! There's really not much else to say about this except that it's awesome & you should make it right now. It's even good for you!


• Orzo salad: I kind of made this up after having something similar at a grad party. I feel like it could be even better (and healthier) with some more veggies or something, but so far it goes like this: make some orzo and when it's finished stir in some butter, olive oil, feta cheese, fresh basil, and toasted sliced almonds. The version I had at the party had cherry tomatoes, which seem like a good idea for those of you who are into that kind of thing (I am not, unfortunately). I think I also added some chopped spinach once & that was pretty good. What I really love about this is that it keeps well and tastes fantastic at any temperature.


• Pear bread: I used walnuts instead of pecans, halved the recipe, and made just under a dozen perfect pear muffins. They were moist and flavorful and very, very autumnal. I wish they hadn't all disappeared so quickly!

I do still have a huge backlog of pictures to show you, so here are some of the cute alpacas I met in Illinois when I was there in August:


This one never fails to crack me up.


Look at those eyelashes!


And this is an alpaca named Acorn eating out of my hand -- can you imagine anything more adorable?!
The alpacas at Kickapoo Creek Alpacas were all extremely friendly and not too shy, which I hear is uncommon. I feel very lucky to have spent some time with them & I am still dreaming of maybe having my own someday. I did buy some alpaca yarn, of course, which I'll show off soon!

Culinary Adventures.

Knitting has been going very sloooooowly lately, intentionally. I just don't want to finish my scarf so I'm dragging it out. You all did give me some good ideas on what to do next, though, so thank you! I'm starting to think that maybe I'm being a little silly to insist on something springy next, considering that there are still several inches of snow on the ground & we're supposed to get more today. So I might cast on for some mittens soon, because it looks like I'd certainly have time to use them.

While I haven't been knitting, I've been baking & cooking! That's something I really missed doing in Montana, so you bet I've been taking advantage of kitchen access since getting home. I've made two batches of cookies so far.

Cookie #6: Oatmeal Gingersnaps
Recipe: I found this on a friend's blog that isn't publicly accessible and then I modified it a bit, so here's my version:

1/2 cup butter
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1/4 cup molasses
1 1/2 cup flour
3/4 cup old-fashioned oats
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ground ginger
Pinch allspice
Additional sugar

Cream butter sugar together in large mixing bowl. Beat in egg and molasses. Combine the dry ingredients and gradually add them to the creamed mixture. Roll into 1-inch balls, then roll balls in additional sugar. Place about 2" apart on greased baking sheets. Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes or until set.

* The original recipe called for ground cloves, which I didn't have, but I do think they'd be a nice addition.

Review: You need to make these NOW! Everyone who tasted one loved them. My mom even sent me a text message that said "Cookies stupendous! Magnificent! Freaking good!" They were soft and chewy and gingery and molasses-y and just perfect. They reminded me of the fantastic molasses cookies my friend's extremely talented grandpa makes, and that's saying a lot. The ginger flavor is very strong, by the way, so if you don't consider that a good thing you might want to reduce the amount of ground ginger. Also these keep really well and stay perfectly soft in an airtight container. So, yes, stop reading this and go make some! You won't regret it.

Cookie #7: Black Forest Cookies
Recipe: Black Forest Cookies

Modifications: None made intentionally, but I have a bad habit of skimping on add-ins, and also of not measuring them, so I think I didn't add quite enough walnuts or cranberries to these.

Review: This is a soft, fluffy chocolate cookie filled with walnuts, sweetened dried cranberries, and chocolate chips. The flavors work together beautifully, but the base chocolate cookie is just kinda "meh." Using dark instead of milk chocolate might've improved that, and perhaps I'll try that next time. Also, make sure to use lots of dried fruit & nuts in these, because the cookies that are heavy on those are the really tasty ones.

* * *
Of course I've been making some things aside from cookies, too! Last weekend I made scones for the first time. Dried Cherry Chocolate Chip Scones, to be specific. I skipped the orange peel & almond extract and just used milk with a dash of vinegar for the buttermilk. Having never made scones before, I was nervous about how they'd come out, but they were absolutely delicious! I gave most of them to my mom to take to a potluck at her work, but I saved a bit of dough in the fridge and the next morning had fresh, hot scones for breakfast. Mmm!

I promise I haven't been entirely focused on unhealthy baked goods, though! I made homemade Lara-type bars just the other day and loved them. Have any of you had Lara bars? They're great! Despite my best attempts to eat homemade everything, I tend to make food that isn't really portable, and so before long days at school I usually find myself checking out nutrition bars and the like at the grocery store. Most of them are full of the kind of unpronounceable ingredients that scare me right off, but Lara bars are refreshing in that they only have a handful of ingredients, and all of them are things you've heard of and feel comfortable eating. For the most part, they're just pureed dates with some nuts, spices, or dried fruit mixed in. And did I mention that, on top of all of this, they actually taste really really good? So of course I had to try making a couple on my own! Mine were sloppier than the packaged ones, but otherwise good, and I'll definitely be trying to improvise some cool flavor combinations in the future.

Also, yesterday I made my first tofu scramble. Heidi Swanson at 101cookbooks.com had intrigued me with the idea a couple weeks ago, and once I tried a bite of Brian's curry tofu scramble at the delicious Missoula breakfast joint Food For Thought, I was sold on the concept. Admittedly, I've never really eaten scrambled eggs (yes, seriously), so I don't know how/if a tofu scramble compares to that, I just know that I liked it! I kinda sorta followed the Heidi Swanson recipe but I wanted a spicier version, so I used lots of cayenne pepper, cumin, & turmeric. Then, because we had some, I topped it with crumbled vegetarian "bacon." It was really quick, tasty, satisfying meal, and I'm looking forward to experimenting with the recipe some more. Unfortunately I can't give you anyone else's review of it, because as I was packaging up the leftovers for Mom to take to work, I spilled them all over the floor! Talk about disappointing.

Anyway, I'm sure you were all pretty thoroughly bored with this, so I promise the next post will have some more knitting content and, if we're lucky, maybe some pretty yarn pictures, since Knit A Round is having their winter sale this weekend!

Gifts & Food.

Yikes, again it's been a while since I posted! I have to admit I didn't knit a whole ton this week - first I had finals, then some of my friends came home from school for break, plus there was a snowstorm. So I had hanging out & sledding that needed to get done! But Brian's gift is halfway finished, at least:

The thumb is a little funky (I haaaate doing thumbs!) but I'm overall pretty pleased. I am slightly nervous that they'll be too small for him, but we'll see...

Today I started & finished one ridiculously cute little gift, but it has to stay a secret until after the holidays!

A few days ago I finished my brother's hat, but it seemed too small so I ended up ripping back to before the decreases & picking up again there. I haven't worked on it in a while because ribbing = tedious.

I have been baking a little and cooking a lot, though. Last week my grandma gave me a copy of The New Laurel's Kitchen: A Handbook for Vegetarian Cookery and Nutrition. I am obsessed with this cookbook, guys. I don't even really know why -- so far the recipes aren't really that great, but something about the awesome hippie vibe of the book just puts me in a good mood every time I look at it. And the use of the word "Cookery" in the title! Seriously, what a great word. From it I've made Cranberry Squash (not bad) and "Everybody's Muffins," the very name of which makes me laugh. Those had a good flavor (in a super-healthy whole wheat kind of way) but definitely didn't rise enough & were therefore much too dense. I am a failure as a bread baker, dudes. Nothing that needs to rise ever rises under my watch, no matter what I do or how high my hopes of delicious, rewarding homemade bread are (very high, for the record). I also suck at kneading. One day I will accept these facts and just move next door to a lovely bakery or something, but for now I will probably keep trying...

I also ate brussels sprouts for the first time in my whole life last week! Yeah, my parents had such bad childhood memories of being forced to eat them that they never even tried making me do it. In fact, they're the only food all the tough "I'll eat anything" manly men in my family say they can't stand. But this recipe looked really appealing, so I bought some & gave it a shot. I was nervous about it but they were actually delicious! For the record, I used a bit of pecorino romano (purchased on accident when I'd been looking for parmesan, ugh!) & a lot of mozzarella. Parmesan would've been better but they were still tasty & I'll definitely be using that recipe again soon.

On the less healthy side, I made oatmeal chocolate chip peanut butter cookies last week. They were excellent, if I do say so myself! Or half of them were, anyway. The other half went in the cookie jar right after I tossed some stale mint Milanos. They became infused with the flavor of mint in a way that can only be described as revolting, and so half the cookies were wasted. Lesson learned!

And now I'm thinking that, even though it's late, I probably need to whip up a batch of these because don't they look heavenly? Yes, yes they do!