Things I did this weekend:
1 - Went to the vegetable stand place on the other side of town and got a bunch of apples (Jonagold and Honeycrisps), plus peppers for chili, delicata squash, avocados, crimson pears, and four big pie pumpkins, because I'm determined to make this the year I'm no longer intimidated by cooking pumpkins from scratch. I make other winter squash all the time (roasted, generally), so why should pumpkin be any different? And these were way cheap. May have to go back for more.
As a bonus, they look decorative while waiting for consumption.
2 - Roasted one of said pumpkins and used half of it (with the peppers) to make pumpkin chili. No, really. The pumpkin flavor isn't super pronounced, but it adds to the texture, and I really liked the slightly quirky spice blend in this recipe. Good thing I like it, 'cause it made a LOT. I froze portions of it, plus will be having it for lunches this week. The avocado cream is tasty, too!
3 - Avoided NaNoWriMo prep. Effectively. Sad, but on the bright side, in the act of procrastinating, I did a bunch of tidying and also came across notes for other stories it'd be nice to work on.
Which makes me wonder if I should write my original idea or something else.
Which allows me to procrastinate further.
4 - Visited friends who have a bunch of apple trees and acquired MORE apples: two big buckets full, which (in theory) will become apple butter. It was POURING rain yesterday, but fortunately stopped long enough to pick during my visit. I did spread the wet apples out on a blanket in the front room to dry when I got home, much to the puzzlement of the cats, who had to be shooed away. Now I just have to find the perfect recipe amongst the thirty bazillion and two available on the interwebs.
My friends also gave me a bunch of cucumbers, chives and green onions, a few potatoes, and a zucchini the size of a small child. No idea what to do with the zucchini the size of a small child.
5 - Visited *other* friends and got to hang out and play mandolin for several hours straight, including LOTS of waltzes. I love waltzes. So that was wonderful. Plus, we had a really good dinner: smoked pork roast (they have a smoker and make it themselves) with potatoes and carrots, a big salad, and apple crisp with ice cream for dessert. It was a very apple centric weekend, now I think of it. Apples and pumpkins.
I do love fall!
