Fall

We used to have our “color charts” done when I was younger, so we would know which colors to wear and which makeup would flatter our skin tones.

I was ALWAYS an “Autumn”. Truth be told, I loved being in the fall category, but I really hate wearing yellow and orange and brown. SO MUCH.

Colors and makeups aside, fall is far and away my favorite season. Mostly because it means APPLES.

All of the apple orchard trips we can handle (which thrills my children)! Applesauce in the crockpot! Apple pies and canning pie filling!

I love apples, can you tell?

So! Without further ado, I’ve sifted through some of my favorite blogs and found 30 (!!!) different apple recipes for your fall needs.

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I usually stand in the same position at the stove when I’m tending to whatever is bubbling. Weight shifted onto one foot, toes of the other foot tucked into the arch of the standing foot.

I suppose it’s a throwback to 10 years of strict ballet lessons, the kind with high windows in an old building with a scarred hardwood floor and a ballet teacher who pounded that floor with her crystal-knobbed cane in time with the music like a giant strict top-knotted French metronome, who would yell (in French) if you were off beat and she never lost tempo.

But now, I stand at the stove in my kitchen in some sort of 3rd position variation, 20+ years after I hung up my pointe shoes.

I hear someone singing softly from the other room. Carefully approaching notes like they might run away if you hit them too aggressively. They’re making up songs as they clean the living room, and it’s something about a dust bunny and a cat. I can’t quite make it out.

Behind me through the open kitchen window, I hear the neighbors across the alley. They’re playing one last game of cornhole before the weather turns and we have to spend more time indoors.

She’s laughing and he’s telling some splendidly terrible jokes. As usual, I’ll send Wolfgang over to them with some of whatever I’m experiment-cooking when I am all done.

They’re really amazing taste testers, and I’m grateful for the willingness they had in opening their door in the dead of winter last year to their weird new neighbor and a plateful of marshmallows. They also introduced me to the joy of Fluffernutter sandwiches, and my life will never be the same.

Inside the kitchen, fall has arrived.

It smells like pie, but there will be no pie today. (And not because I have not yet mastered the pie crust.)

There will be marshmallows.

Oh, there will be marshmallows.

(For my cold-brew marshmallows, check here. For candy corn marshmallows, check here.)

Print

Pumpkin Pie Marshmallows

Prep Time

15 mins

Cook Time

20 mins

Total Time

35 mins

 

Get a piece of pumpkin pie, but in marshmallow form!

Course: Dessert

Ingredients

• nonstick cooking spray
• 1 cup cold water
• 2 cups white sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2/3 cup light corn syrup
• 2 scoops Vital Proteins grassfed gelatin can also use 3 1/4-oz envelopes of store-bought gelatin
• 1/4 cup pumpkin puree
• 3 tsp pumpkin pie spice

Instructions

1. Pour half of the water into a bowl fitted on your stand mixer. Sprinkle your gelatin over the water and set aside.

2. Get your 9×11 baking dish (I used an 8×10 for thicker marshmallows). Line it with aluminum foil, then spray that foil lightly with baking spray. Set aside.
   

3. Combine the remainder of the water plus the sugar, salt and corn syrup in a medium saucepan over low heat. Stir until sugar dissolves.
   

4. Increase heat to medium, clip a candy thermometer to the side of the pot and WATCH THE POT. Seriously, don’t walk away right now. It can boil up real fast. If it boils up, lift the pot off the heat and decrease your burner a notch.

5. Cook without stirring until syrup reaches 235-240°.
   

6. Start the mixer on low, and pour the syrup in a slow steady stream down the side of the bowl.
   

7. When all syrup is incorporated, increase speed slowly to high.
   

8. While this is beating, get a spatula and a glass of water. 
   
   ALSO - combine the pumpkin and the pie spice in a small bowl.

9. Beat until mixture has tripled in volume, is glossy, thick, and pulls away from the sides of the bowl as you mix. When you pull the beater out of the mix, it should fall in large slow ribbons and be slow to melt back into the bowl.
   

10. Fold in the pumpkin mixture with a spatula until fairly well-incorporated. 

11. Pour mixture into your prepared baking dish. Use your damp spatula to scrape out the bowl and smooth the top. Work fast – this stiffens up QUICK.
    

12. Set aside to set for 4 hours (or overnight).
    

13. Sift together the cornstarch and powdered sugar and spread some of that mixture onto a clean work surface (leave the rest in a bowl). Turn your marshmallows out onto this surface and remove the foil.
    

14. Use a damp knife (that glass of water comes in handy!) and cut into squares in the size of your choosing.
    

15. Toss your squares in the remaining cornstarch/powdered sugar mix and shake off excess.
    

16. Store in an airtight container for up to 10 days, though they probably won’t last that long.

Need to snag yourself some Vital Proteins gelatin? Use my affiliate link here and get a HUGE tub for only $49!

This post was written as a part of the NaBloPoMo, a daily blogging journey I am committing to in November 2017.

I used to date a gentleman whose family had Thanksgiving down to a SCIENCE.

There were spreadsheets and schedules and so much organization involved, it was so impressive! Rendered me almost completely moot for the handful of Thanksgivings we were together…which made me kind of sad.

ANYWAY.

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday, even more than Christmas.

I do have a process I like to go through, but it’s not as exact as my ex’s super-organized family.

How I do Thanksgiving planning: 

• I stock up on Thanksgiving magazines, and pore over them like I did with Seventeen and Lucky magazines when I was in high school. I spread them out all over the floor and start to organize.
• I dogear the pages of everything that looks good, and then go back through them with pink post it notes to mark the dishes that are “viable”. (i.e. if I need 2 ovens simultaneously, it’s not happening. Ditto with deep-fried turkey and anything sous vide.)
• I whittle down the pink post-its to 3-4 sides, 2-3 pies and a turkey recipe. Potatoes are a given, two different types (see menu below).
• I take a nice clean sheet of paper and write out a list of the dishes, including the magazine and issue (or website, or cookbook) where I can find the recipe and the amount of oven time it will take (and if it needs to rest after cooking).
• Then I make my shopping list. I’ll go through, recipe by recipe, and write out each ingredient on a piece of paper, adding everything up.
• I’ll pull out the serving pieces and put a sticky note on each one with the name of the dish they’ll hold.

BOOM.

I would go over my shopping method, but it’s kind of willy nilly and depends on who has the best price on a good brand of turkey, to be perfectly frank.

Menu for Thanksgiving, 2017

1. Turkey. I’ve tried multiple recipes over the years for turkey. I’ve had two turkeys I didn’t know needed to be thawed before cooking. I’ve burned the crap out of at least one turkey.  My favorite is a classic dry brined, oven roasted bird – trying this recipe this year!
2. Rolls. My momma makes her world famous homemade crescent rolls, and this year I’m going to try Parker House Rolls as well. We do love our carbs.
3. Stuffing. This is made in a traditional way, with very few variations. I tried making my own cornbread one year for a new kind of stuffing and was informed I should never do that again because it’s not the same. We cook half of it in the turkey and half of it in the same dish my mother has used since the 70s.
4. Potatoes. Two kinds, never varies except the one year I tried Hasselbeck potatoes and nearly had a riot on my hands. I make my mashed potatoes, where I add cream cheese and sometimes a bit of heavy cream and Maldon (always, NEVER TABLE SALT) and sometimes a little bit of rosemary and just whip all of it together. The second potato is (at least) one casserole dish of “Grandma’s Potatoes”, from my maternal grandmother. Cornflakes on the top, sour cream in the base. It’s delicious.
5. Brussels Sprouts. My whole family loves them, which completely baffles me. I always have hated them. (The sprouts, not my family.) We have tried a couple of recipes, but this one is on the list for this year.
6. Green Bean Casserole. I’m a weirdo who LOVES green beans. We are trying this recipe with mushrooms this year, and I have a feeling I will be eating a butt ton of this by myself. I don’t mind at all.
7. Pies. We are still deciding on these. I’ve put my foot down and said only 3 desserts, because everyone wanted their own pie and there’s no way in the holy Lord’s good green earth that I am making a separate pie for each person. Nope. Did that one year. Right now, we have a chocolate cream pie, a dutch apple or a double crust apple pie, a dual layer pumpkin cheesecake, a pumpkin pie and a mincemeat pie in the request pile.

That’s our Thanksgiving for this year! We will stuff ourselves with food, then lie around on the couches and watch Elf for its scheduled annual viewing.

What are you having for your turkey day? Do you have any traditions?

This post was written as a part of the NaBloPoMo, a daily blogging journey I am committing to in November 2017.

This weekend, some of the bloggers in my circle got a little heated about Reese Witherspoon’s latest speech when she accepted some award. 

She said in her speech something like “women want quality content, ‘not mommy blogs and 14 ways to cook a turkey.'”

Ok then, Reese Witherspoon. I don’t get where you’re coming from, but I might be taking that one out of context. You kind of make sound like a jerk, and I know that’s not your intention.

I can definitely see why some “mommy bloggers” might take offense at you using that odious term in a possibly derogatory manner. I am sure you didn’t mean to insult an entire group of entrepreneurial women who have large audiences on the internet.

But I have two points of information for you:

First off, “mommy bloggers” are total badasses. They’ve built empires from nothing, commanding large payouts for their writing, video and social media savvy. They’re powerhouses. They’re businesswomen, just like you.

Second, turkey is delicious.

Here’s 14 ways I found to cook a turkey:

1. Shove clementines up its bum like Jaime Oliver.
2. Do the Turducken! (Though honestly, this one horrifies me.)
3. Brine that sucker with honey, a la Alton Brown.
4. It might be cold outside, but fire up that BBQ for your gobble gobble!
5. Go whole hog, and wrap it in bacon.
6. Spatchcock it. That’s not a bad word, I promise.
7. Do like Bobby Flay does, roast AND braise it.
8. Another entry for Alton Brown (my personal favorite), with the deep fried turkey.
9. Smoke that turkey with Coca Cola. (For the turkey, not for you.)
10. Sous vide your turkey! (This one is just the breast, though.)
11. Make yourself some turkey jerky.
12. Michael Symon says: stick a beer can up there and roast it.
13. I don’t know how great this one is for your arteries, but mayonnaise-basted sounds interesting.
14. Go plain Jane and just roast it.

I hope Reese Witherspoon keeps making amazing television and movies for a long time.

And if she ever needs to cook a turkey, she knows where to find us “mommy bloggers”.

This post was written as a part of the NaBloPoMo, a daily blogging journey I am committing to in November 2017.

I’m deep into Marshmallow Time.

For the past few years, I’ve spent the end of the calendar year like a mad scientist for charity, covered in marshmallow cream. I make inordinate amounts of marshmallows, and sell them “bake sale style”, with the proceeds going to our local mama’s group and their Giving Tree.

And this year is no exception.

With my kitchen covered in a mixture of powdered sugar, gel food coloring and marshmallow goop, and my friends and family riding proper sugar highs after FIVE test batches of these, I have finally perfected the CANDY CORN MARSHMALLOW.

After much hemming and hawing and an episode where I had to clean yellow marshmallow off the kitchen ceiling, I have boiled it down to the minimal amount of kitchen equipment necessary.

Trust me – I don’t like to do dishes. The fewer number of bowls, the better.

So the basic recipe can be found down at the bottom of this post, but the tricky part you want to know is how to assemble these beauties.

What you need in addition to the basic marshmallow recipe:

• orange and yellow GEL food coloring (NOT THE LIQUID. To get the color saturation you want without altering the composition of the marshmallow, you need the gel coloring. Joann’s and Michael’s both carry it, but I like this type from Americolor.)
• One bowl (in addition to the mixing bowl you’re using to mix the marshmallows)
• Two spatulas (the scraping kind like these, not the flipping kind)

So the actual execution goes something like this:

1. Bring your prepared 9×11 dish over to the bowl area, and get your mise en place ready to rock. You need to move fairly quickly, as the marshmallow starts to set up when you stop mixing.
2. Spoon several spoonfuls of the marshmallow (with no coloring) into the prepared dish. Cover the bottom, and make sure it’s spread out, and all the way up to the edges. This is the white base of your candy corn (the point of the triangle).
3. Here’s where it gets tricky. Divide the remaining mixture up, with about 1/3 going into your extra bowl.
4. Use your gel coloring and color the smaller amount yellow. The larger amount still in the mixer bowl should get colored orange.
5. Make sure you are scraping all the way down to the bottom of the bowl to get the color as homogenous as you can!
6. Orange is your middle layer. Pour the orange into the bowl slowly, starting in the middle and working your way out to the edges. Using your damp spatula, smooth it out the best you can, and smooth it all the way to the edges.
7. Yellow on top! I found that drizzling the yellow on the top is the easiest way to get maximum coverage with minimal mixing of the colors. Again, use a damp spatula to smooth the top.
8. Let sit for at least 4 hours (overnight is best).
9. Turn out onto the prepared surface (as outlined in the recipe below) and cut into thick strips.
10. Cut those strips into triangles and ENJOY!

I always love to see y’all making my recipes on social media, so tag me in your photos!

And ENJOY! <3

This post does contain affiliate links, meaning if you click them to buy something, you do not get charged anything extra but I do get some extra coin to put towards more glitter, more cookie cutters and more books!