Happy Baracktober!

Hahahahaha! I'm now going to be referring to October as "Baracktober," hope you guys don't mind. ;) Anyway, I've been a little under the weather for the last week. I have a nasty chest cold, and even had a fever for a couple of days. I hadn't had a fever for like ten years! The fever seems to be gone now, but I've got a really nasty-sounding cough that just won't let up. I swear, it looks as if I haven't been doing much cooking in the last week and a half. I have, though. I guess I forgot to take pics, and now I can't even remember what I've made!

So, we're heading off to Canaan Valley this afternoon. Seems as if it's becoming a tradition to celebrate my birthday that way. I love, love, love Canaan Valley so I hope it's a tradition that will continue. I made myself a b-day cake. Gingerbread with a lemon glaze. I used the gingerbread cupcake recipe from The PPK. I multiplied it by 1.5, but probably should've doubled it for a taller cake (I did a bundt cake and baked it at 350 for about 45 min. Don't forget to grease and flour the pan!). I didn't want to frost it, so I used this recipe from Giada DeLaurentis for the glaze.


Last week at some point I made the Pumpkin Baked Ziti from V-con. It was quite tasty. To go with it I made a variation of my old honey-baked lentils. I subbed maple syrup for the honey and also added a chopped carrot. I use red lentils for this, and it has a nice, mush consistency. LOL Really, I think the consistency is great for this particular dish.



This week I wanted to use up the last of my frozen black beans, so I did the Black Beans with Chipotle Sauce from V-con. I tried my hand a vegan cornbread (Skillet Cornbread from V-con), and I have to say that I wasn't disappointed. Just to make sure I went overboard on chipotles, I made some chipotle-glazed green beans. So easy. Just brown up a chopped onion in a skillet, add fresh green beans and cook until they're almost done. Then add the glaze, which is a little brown sugar, a chopped chipotle, a little scoop of the adobo sauce from the canned chipotles, and a splash of water. Turn up the heat before adding so it gets nice and sticky. YUM!

Pasta and Zucchini Cake

A couple weeks ago, Carrie posted about a pasta dish she had made using some of her CSA veggies. It had a maple-dijon sauce, which I thought sounded like something different and delicious. I knew I would have to try that one. I did, and it was fantastic. I doubled the recipe and we had a dinner plus two days of leftovers. YUM!

We've been getting so much zucchini, and I have had a hard time finding a zucchini bread recipe that I love. So, I came across this recipe for zucchini cake. It's actually very much like zucchini bread, but baked in a bundt pan. The chocolate chips give some extra yum-factor. I followed the recipe from The Post Punk Kitchen (authors of VWaV and V-con), but I made the following substitutions: For half the flour, I used whole-wheat pastry. For half the sugar, I used sucanat. For half the oil, I used unsweetened applesauce. This cake is so good. I have to highly recommend it as a really yummy way to use zucchini.


Today is Annelies's first day of first grade. I can't believe my little girl is in first grade. I can't believe that summer break is over. I am, however, looking forward to autumn and all that it brings. Crisp weather, soups and stews, pumpkin bread, football. My favorite season.