Butternut squash soup

IT's FaLL!! Well, not yet. But thanks to a ridiculously hot summer and a statewide drought, butternut squash season has come early and I plan on taking full advantage. I suggest that you do as well. In all honesty, this is one of my favorite meals and one of the best things I make. You should try it.

Butternut Squash Soup w/ Sage and Parmesan

Two medium to medium large butternut squash (peeled, cut in half, seeded and diced into cubes)
1 large yellow onion
6-7 large sage leaves
heaping 1/4 tsp of cayenne pepper + more to garnish soup with
about 1 cup of freshly grated Parmesan cheese
5 cups of stock (I use vegetable stock, but you can use chicken stock. Homemade is best. If you buy veg stock do NOT use a tomato based stock for this soup. Made that mistake once. Kinda ruins it.)

Special equipment: an emulsion hand blender or a regular blender.

I use a dutch oven for most of my soups. Get the d.o. hot and then thinly cover the bottom with olive oil. Throw in the diced onion, stirring every so often so it doesn't get overly brown. You want the onion to be soft so you can probably cook over medium high heat for 6-7 mins. Add salt and pepper (to taste - about 15 grinds of a pepper mill and sea salt grinder. Be aware of how salty your stock is when adding salt at this stage.) Dice the sage leaves and put them in with the onion, stirring regularly for another 2 mins. Put in the stock and bring to a boil. Once it boils, add the diced butternut squash and turn the heat down to a simmer / slight boil. It will look like a lot of squash, but you want the squash to be even to slightly higher than your stock level once in the pot.

After about 15 mins, check the squash. It should be very fork tender and you should be able to pierce through the largest pieces easily with a fork. If this is the case, remove the soup from the burner and use the emulsion hand blender to blend the soup to your desired texture. I like it velvety smooth, other people like it chunky. I'll let you decide. Once it is blended, stir in the cup of Parmesan.  When you're serving give a couple shakes of cayenne pepper to the top of each bowl. Like this:

I serve this soup with crusty whole grain garlic bread and some kind of fruit - usually green grapes.  I don't know why the three things go together, but they work and taste delicious. Grilled cheese is also a good co-pilot or cheese and crackers.

Happy Butternut Squash Soup Season, everyone!

Wasting time

“…I wish I could waste my time without wasting all yourrrrr tiiiiiiime.” She sang along to the lyric, windows down, while it was just starting to rain.

Her arm was stretched out the window, like always. She had an odd habit of watching the side mirror’s reflection of her fingers blowing in the wind while she was driving. Now she watched in the mirror as she put her hand up, palm out, fingers extended so that she could catch passing raindrops from the wind. Looking around her car, she checked to make sure nothing critical was getting wet and decided to continue driving, windows down. A red Malibu passed her on the left and she noticed that they had all of their windows open, too. She felt some form of solidarity.

It was raining hard enough to require windshield wipers, but she didn’t feel satisfied. She looked around the car to make sure there wasn’t anything that couldn’t get really wet, and then she slid back the cover to her sunroof and pushed the button marked “Slide.” As it opened, she caught a glimpse of herself in her rear-view mirror and gave a shrug. She slid her sunglasses off her face and over her hair to help keep her hair tamed with the extra wind… and rain.

The red Malibu rolled its windows up. She laughed.

The light was red. She leaned her head back and looked up out of the sunroof. The raindrops were big and she could see them as they were falling, causing her to squint and blink as each drop landed near her eyes. She knew this rain would pass in a matter of minutes, maybe less, and the heat and humidity of a Southern summer afternoon would quickly take its place. As the light turned green, she took the sunglasses off of her head and shook some of the rain out of her hair. She begrudgingly closed the sunroof as if someone was nagging her to do so while she was left unfulfilled and wanting more. She caught another glimpse of herself in her rear-view mirror and raised her eyebrows as drops of rain were still rolling down her face.

She wasn’t angry anymore. She wasn’t heartbroken either. She questioned for a moment if she was happy. She smiled. She looked at her reflection. Yes, that still felt good and looked normal. Happy? Sure, yes.  If not now, soon. She could be happy soon.

Mt. Kilimanjaro

Here's what "no person ever" starts off saying when they're about to talk about their lifelong dream of climbing a really big ass mountain: I hate exercising. And it's TRUE... But I guess not the whole truth. So here's the reality: swimming, biking, and hiking sounds like a damn good time. It doesn't sound like exercise. Running sounds like exercise. Gyms sound like exercise. Standing in front of machines, "doing reps," sounds like exercise. Having to see people watching themselves workout and flexing in front of mirrors sounds like exercise... or comedy (/tragedy). 

But tell me that I need to condition before going on vacation, and add "swimming, biking, and hiking" to a list of travel preparations, and I. Am. In. I can get behind that. I need to carry a 30 lb pack 50 miles up and down a mountain? I can do that. That works as motivation.  

I decided a few years ago that I wanted to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro, which will from here on be referred to as Kili. It was part of a 5-year travel plan. Australia is in there, and Ireland, too. But some part of my soul really loves Africa, and I feel like my first trip will probably be somewhat life changing. So, why not climb one of the world's seven summits, and have that be my introduction to Africa? Plus, I don't really like the "climbing" part of mountain climbing. So I need a mountain that is big, but walking and hiking steep, not sheered off rock faces steep. I don't mind heights, I just don't trust me on the end of a rope propelling my own body weight up thousands of feet, and I don't imagine I'll ever be climbing Everest. 

So how does one plan a Kili trip? My thought: if the trip is going to be about going to Africa and climbing a mountain, which apparently involves a lot of mental and physical perseverance (though I'm known for not taking anything too seriously), it should probably be about the mountain climbing and then about Africa. 

Step 1 - focus on the climbing.

Step 2 - focus on getting in good enough condition that the climb shouldn't be ridiculously arduous and make me wish for an African death.

Step 3 - what do I need to pack?

Step 4 - how can I climb this mountain and pack as little as possible?

Step 5 - climbing Kili means you go in and out of like 4-5 climates. See Step 4.

Step 6 - who can I talk into this? aka "Who's comin' with me??"

Step 7 - shots? ...a lot of shots. Dammit, Africa.

Step 8 - I don't want to have to completely worry about food and water and tents... must find a guided travel option.

Step 9 - I normally do not require amenities, but some kind of comfort on this climb (in Africa) will probably be required. See Step 8.

Step 10 - after the climb, make it about Africa. I hear the guides expect tips and also ask for used gear from climbers. This is understandable. Bring extras. Schools in the Kili area also receive a lot of supplies and donations from the climbers. Fill extra space in luggage with extra necessities to donate.

See you in 2 or 3 years, Kili. (Please don't kill me.) 

Tomato and Watermelon Salad

This is a little bowl of heaven when all the ingredients are at their freshest... like out of the garden fresh. But... please don't eat this salad if you don't like one of these ingredients. Because every bite tastes like all of the ingredients (to me that means delicious), and thanks to most of the ingredients' palate cleansing properties, each bite tastes fresh and new. So if you aren't a fan of basil or arugula, leave it out. But if you aren't a fan of watermelon or tomato (I'm sad for you), don't eat this.

For one serving:

2 handfuls of cubed tomatoes (beefsteak)

2 handfuls of cubed watermelon (seedless)

2 tbsp of feta

a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

5 small basil leaves (torn into tiny pieces)

5 large arugula leaves (torn into medium sized pieces)

Enjoy!

And an added bit of advice: When your bowl looks like this:

DRINK IT!

Finland - let's talk about food.

It's hard to sum up a 2 week vacation in a few sentences and a few pictures, but here goes.... eeehhh on second thought, let's start with food.

The Food: tasty, not what I expected, they've also moved to more processed foods like Americans (though their packaged food has few ingredients and is all made locally), they have a few traditional staples that show up at almost every meal (like karjalanpiirakka - rice pies that you top with butter, cheese, mustard, eggs, meats, and whatever else you can put on top of them and still fit in your mouth) but even the staples come from a store, for the most part.  Finland is home to the potato, but it's a damn fine tasting potato even if it does come peeled and vacuum wrapped from a store.  

Now my experience is largely dependent on our hosts (my far removed, but much loved cousins). They didn't really care for "traditional foods" aka reindeer, fish, and blood sausage. So the only time we saw these foods were at restaurants. (Yes, I tried reindeer. Smoked reindeer, with sour cream, in a waffle. It was salty like a good Italian meat. I declined to try it when it appeared on our restaurant table in a bit of a bloody pool, cooked quite rare. Couldn't do it. Wasn't drunk enough.)

 Food at the cottage, like that above, was great. Most of it did come from the ground or was very fresh, including homemade Rye bread with every meal. The potatoes were straight out of the ground and washed in the river water... no running water at the cottage... That topic is for another time.

 I was there during Juhannus - the week long country-wide summer vacation - so the fact that there was never ending snacking and drinking, might... *might* have had something to do with that fact. Still, we were sitting down drinking coffee and eating sweets every 3 hours. I was never hungry in Finland. Above is a platter full of pastries at one such "snack time." Not pictured is the ice cream, cookies, and chocolates that were on the same snack table.

 Restaurants in Finland were interesting. I'm glad we had locals with us because they would have confused me endlessly if we didn't have someone to explain that lunch isn't really a full menu, you have a few options, you order at a counter, you either pick up your food from another counter or get your food delivered to your table. You never show receipts for anything, they just believe that you paid and that you're supposed to be there as a paying customer. You get your own water, you have a salad bar and coffee for free with every meal, and three kinds of potato might be served on one plate, but you're guaranteed one kind, every time.

 Above is a "veggie burger" aka deep fried potato patty on a bun. Served with a side of french fries.  Where was this meal when I was at the cottage w/ the outhouse? It would have really been nice to have in my Mission: Constipation arsenal.

 We climbed a mountain / rode a ski lift up a mountain just in time for another snack. Above - waffles with cream and apples and a hot chocolate. Order at the counter, get your water and free coffee, pay for your hot chocolate and waffle, waffle gets delivered (in what appeared to be a sit down restaurant with a waitress).

 ...Snack time! Danishes with cheese and apricots, really freaking delicious, to the left - chocolates filled with chocolate, to the right - some kind of sour cream and herb chip dip. They brought out the sweets and the salty treats during this snack time.  Also pictured, the tiny spoons that they eat everything with. Tiny spoons, tiny plates, and tiny water glasses. The beer was 24 oz., the water glass was about 6 oz. (see below). No that isn't a shot glass, that is a water glass.

 I was joked with for eating reindeer food covered with rabbit food... The pizza was called Jakala, meaning lichen (reindeer food) and the mushrooms, veg, and arugula qualified as rabbit food.

 A breakfast spread. I really did love the way they eat. A table filled with variety, take a few bites of each, eat again (from a similar table filled with food) 3 hours later. They made bacon and eggs for us. ...even had "american" cheese. And in the left corner you can see the karjalanpiirakka (rice pies).

In the states, I don't eat doughnuts. In Finland, I'd be a "typical American" aka fat. Because these poppy seed, sugar covered bits of perfection were everywhere and they were always warm, fragrant, and delicious.

Kiitos ja kippis. 

Couscous w/ Mango Guacamole

So I was watching a pbs cooking show over the weekend and the host was kind of dicky about vegetarian food, claiming that every good vegetarian recipe has cheese because that's the only way they can get them to have flavor. Obviously I'm not actually taking this personal; mainly because I love cheese and veggie food w/ cheese, but here's a recipe that I make w/o cheese and with a ton of flavor that satisfies the most critical of meat (and cheese) fans.

Couscous (whole wheat) with black beans, red bell pepper, cilantro, lime juice, and scallions. (Couscous takes 5 mins... aka perfect when you're hungry and lazy.)  The only thing you cook is the couscous, everything else gets thrown in raw. Check the package for your couscous but mine takes boiling water, mixing in the couscous w/ salt and olive oil, taking off the heat, covering, sitting for 5 mins, then fluffing with a fork.  

1 cup cous cous

1 can of black beans

about 1/3 of a red bell pepper

2 scallions

juice of one lime

handful of cilantro (i love it so i use a lot)

black pepper (i salt the cous cous while it is cooking)

Put the beans and the veg in the couscous after you fluff it up, mix, add lime juice and black pepper.

To go on top of couscous: (also easy... just have to chop)

Mango Guacamole:

1 mango

2 avocados

12-15 cherry tomatoes

2 scallions

2/3 of red bell pepper (whatever you didn't put in the couscous)

juice of 1 lime

handful+ of cilantro

s+p

1-2 tbsp of italian dressing (makes the guac creamy w/o adding much flavor, also keeps the avocado from browning)

To spice it all up i use sriracha (to taste... aka a lot). Mix it all up and eat well.

This is what it looked like as I ate the leftovers with some chips and tomatillo salsa from the Mexican place down the street from my work. See, colorful, even a day later.

Dress up

"Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who's the deadliest of them all?" she asked her reflection. 

She fastened the last few pins and taped her first and third fingers with black mechanical tape. Glancing back in the mirror she decided to add one more band of tape around her forearm. 

"That's going to hurt like a bitch to peel off later," her sister said, walking into the bathroom. 

"Hey, there's money on the line for best costume. You have to admit that this will win. And that is worth a few arm hairs."

"And your top three layers of skin?" Her sister was bemused but teasing. It wasn't the money that she was after. Halloween was like a one woman performance to her sister. This was her only night to shine now that she had matured, or rather, now that she was in her mid-thirties and couldn't play dress up or go to a legal office wearing clothes that she had made for herself. 

"Why don't you ever dress up? It's Halloween. It's the one time of year that normal people like you get to be someone or something else... go wild... have some fun. Be spontaneous!"

"I like looking like me. And if you think about it, as myself I stand out the most in a room filled with costumed people. Did you ever think about that?"

"Ha. That's funny. I think people probably focus more on the sexy nurses and the sluts wrapped in patent leather."

"You know I was being sarcastic," she said, making a "fuck you" face in the mirror and flicking her sister in the back of the neck. 

"I know."

They arrived at the party and one thing was certain: Jess would win best costume. Few people put their heart into Halloween like she did. Of course, the girls at the party were still playing out the horrible trend of Halloween equals Whore-la-ween, which started some time before they were born but had been haunting their generation since the 90s and had no signs of ending anytime soon. They'd just have to wait until the majority of the ladies had babies, got fat and saggy, and stopped showing off the bottom of their ass cheeks to a room half filled with strangers. Lily didn't mind Halloween. She looked forward to the party. The costumes did make her uncomfortable for a number of reasons though. Lily preferred to always look the same, regardless of being on holiday, or a at a baseball game, or on Halloween. She was one of those women that was entirely comfortable in her own skin. Or, maybe it was more like, she was one of those women that looked and portrayed herself as being entirely and effortlessly comfortable in her own skin, but there was more than enough effort involved. Jess was the wild one. Lily was the laid back one. You know the story. Jess became the center of attention at almost any event. Lily found the handful of people that she wanted to talk with and just enjoyed watching the rest of the room interact. 

They parted company early in the evening but Lily was hearing whispers about Jess' costume all night. The number one question was predictable: what is she supposed to be? Lily just laughed. "She's Jess. She's some dark, deadly, wicked character that Jess probably spent months sketching during her down times."

And then, just like that, the night was over. Lily heard someone whistling from the living room. Costume time was wrapping up and it was time to announce this year's winner. Slowly, like a reluctant herd of costumed cattle, everyone headed for the living room. Throughout the night guests voted by writing the best costume, not the costumed person's name, on a piece of paper and placing their vote in a box on the kitchen table. The host, Jonathon, counted up the votes. He got everyone's attention from midway up the staircase and called for Jess and three other guests to come over to the stairs. The group of four looked fatigued. Alcohol mixed with uncomfortable clothing, thick makeup, and ungodly amounts of hair product always led to the Halloween meltdown. Imagine a waning candle, and the puddle of wax surrounding it or Hollywood make-up under hot lights gone really wrong. Lily disliked the end of the night at costume parties for this very reason. Even if a girl started her night out as a sexy waitress, her eye makeup was now running and her blush and lipstick were smeared, someone had spilled something on her, she was limping due to her four-inch heels, nylons had been ripped, and she could now pass for a zombie in the local college production of Dawn of the Dead. 

Lily's focus snapped back to the evening's host. "Biiiig surprise, everyone!" Jonathon said raising an eyebrow to Lily. "The lovely lady in black and red, with the paint, and safety pins, and tape, who was referred to as both scary and sexy, and also a superhero and an assassin... I'm assuming that means Jess... wins best costume. Nice try to everyone else, but you're amateurs at a professional's table tonight."

Jess just bowed and kissed Jonathon on the cheek. She was accepting of the praise, but Lily could tell that she was tired. Playing a character is exhausting. It was time to head home and go to sleep. When she woke up, she would be herself again, until the world demanded another costume.