My Sister, My Family: This is What Matters

Today's post is for me, my sister, my husband, and for anyone who shares a life with others.

My two favorite people in the whole wide world: Dr. Thyme and Sissy. If you've got a sister, you will totally get my post today. If not, well, I am certain there is someone in your life with whom much of the following applies. (Especially for us girls.)

This Week's Thanksgiving Photo Journal: Food, Friends, Family, Bread (Plus A Culinary Academy Chef's Vegan Treat for Me!)

This past month has been, well, NUTS! Seems my to-do, get-to, and re-do list keeps growing and growing. I've eaten my vegan Thanksgiving meal and have a ton of leftovers. (It was only Dr. Thyme and I for the festive, relaxing day.) Did that stop me from cooking for eight hours? NO!

As you might have guessed--I did not head out at two this morning to catch any bargains (or catch the flu for crying out loud--ewww, crowds) but rather slept in so the elves could work on my face. I predicted to Dr. Thyme this morning: Thanksgiving is going to become a day of shopping within the next two years--stores will not close. Hey, I'm not happy about it, but if one retailer opens, you can bet some bookkeeper in another White Ivory Tower is taking note and making the tally marks wondering how much of that "money pie" they missed out on by NOT opening on Thanksgiving. I paid my dues in retail for almost twenty years--I feel for every single retail sales person out there today: I'm sending you my love!

My sister arrived on Saturday! Now, I don't have pictures of my sister and I to share yet because we are both too busy catching up. We will do photos tomorrow when she returns from visiting her friends. Meantime, I have a whole slide show of other goings-on to share. I had a wonderful week filled with massive amounts of food. My sister woke up on Tuesday morning and said, Your house smells like a Panera Bread restaurant. The highest compliment I think I could ever ask for! I cooked non-stop for her. I loved every minute of it! She thinks I am a little "cooking obsessed" but I shared with her that I do need my days off--but how often do I get to cook for her? I wanted every single minute and morsel of food she had to be something I lovingly created just for her. She loved every bit of it!

Then, I had the divine pleasure of spending two days with one of my best friends. We've known each other now almost twenty-five years. We don't advertise this much because that would allow others to "do the math" and figure out how old we really might be. We'll leave it at Almost Fifty for now. Her husband is a former chef who graduated from the San Francisco Culinary Academy. He is my kitchen idol, while his wife remains my kitchen humorist. When we planned our gathering this week and I packed my overnight bag for the visit, I also packed a Trader Joe's cold storage bag of Match Meats Chicken, tofu sour cream and Silk Creamer plus some bananas. (I have to have a banana every morning.) I packed the creamer because I need it for my coffee--mandatory morning beverage. (Thank god they had the Keurig coffee maker--I heart Keurig!) I packed the sour cream because it tastes good on everything. I packed the Match because I just knew I'd catch "H" for bringing my vegan lifestyle into their neck of the woods--where, I will be honest, many-a-folk are cattle raising types and there ain't a whole lot of us vegans around. Let's just say I probably tipped the town over at my arrival increasing the vegan population by 100%. Nonetheless, the chef did NOT disappoint and I got to sit side saddle and be sous chef while he directed the entree. What a thrill!

I have recently fallen in love with a new bread book (well, new to me anyway): My Bread by Jim Lahey. Wow. That's all I can say is: Wow. Get this book if you even have a kernel of desire to be a spoiled rotten bread baker. I didn't think I'd ever step away from the Artisan Bread in Five Minutes book recipes, then I met Jim. If I thought it would not be so crazy to do so, or be a "question the sanity of Kelly" issue--I'd take my frequent flyer miles right now and fly to New York to meet this man of the Sullivan Street Bakery in New York. I still might. Meantime, I have requested that Dr. Thyme visit said bakery on his next trip and pack a loaf away for me in his luggage and also--get an inscribed napkin or something from this Jim because I am a convert and now. . . sort of a bread gawker fan!

Dr. Thyme's photography. He thought the Jim Lahey Bread deserved a more "creative" picture and employed the "sepia" tone button to impress.

Winter Pea, Granny Smith Apple And Potato Soup (Company's Comin': Getting My Festive On!)

My mother's pea soup this is not. Seems to me I recall many pea soups from my childhood, but none quite like this. Flipping through the myriad of cookbooks I own, the apple and pea combo appear more than once. I was intrigued enough to finally give it a go--but with my own twists. Let me be honest, I only had: apples, peas, one onion, some garlic and a few potatoes on hand. I was even out of celery. I am never out of celery! Lucky for me, I have some celery I grew that is just begging to be used--still green. Note to me--plant more celery next year. So in the pitch dark last night, I found myself in my garden feeling for stalks of celery trying not to cut off my own finger.

Sweat-4-Pets Fundraiser Recap/Survival Update (T.V. Interview Link, Too!)

By the time Sunday rolled around, it was all in a higher power's hands. And I mean that literally. First thing you may be wondering is, How did Sweat-4-Pets go? Well, after a month of anticipation--well, make that a year because we begin laying the groundwork for this right after the event. It is truly a labor of love. We had nearly 350 participants--all combined--the walk and the run. Over three hundred people finished the races. I have said this before and will say it again--St. Louis is one of the most generous animal-loving communities in the country!

Pumpkin Ginger Date Breakfast Muffins (Backyard Fall Colors Emerge and My Garden Sage)

These muffins were my first attempt ever at baking with "fresh pumpkin" (sorry Libby's). I'm officially a fresh pumpkin convert from here on out. "Oven, meet Mr. Pumpkin!" Nothing could have been easier--and my house smelled divine! I hate to think of all the pumpkins I let go to "rot" just because I didn't have a clue about the merits of roasting one's own pumpkins. So don't let the idea of "roasting your own pumpkin" for these muffins deter you--trust me--it is totally worth the little effort it takes. We've had these pumpkin ginger date muffins for breakfast every day this week. They were moist and tasty all week long! They also made the perfect little pairing with my pick-me-up-snap-me-out-of-my-coma cup of coffee.

Vegan Peanut Butter Blondies (A Fire and. . . )

I am on my second batch of these peanut butter blondies. I won't lie--they are THAT good! Why a second batch? I had the unfortunate pleasure of sharing the remainder of the first batch with our local firemen. Gee, Kelly, why were you sharing these with firemen? Well, because a neighbor's home caught fire Wednesday morning. Luckily nobody was injured. Luckily I had enough wits about me to run home--make a thermos of hot tea and grabbed my half-eaten pan of the blondies. What the heck else is someone so freaked out by the scare (seeing five fire engines parked along your street will do that) going to do? Especially someone like me who is prone to having extremely poor self management skills in the area of "emergencies". Short of running around like a "screaming meemie" and ringing my hands, I felt I lent just about enough help to keep everyone else aware of "the woman with the thermos of hot tea and blondies" tending to the needs of the victims with hot refills of Tension Tamer. It was awful. One minute all is well. The next, not so much. Like an angel from above, the Red Cross showed up within a few short minutes. They are angels, truly.  

Whole Wheat French Baguette And Last of Garden Greens Soup

I've had soup for dinner four nights this week already. I could eat soup 24/7. It's just that this time of year--soup is called for. Simple soup. And this Garden Greens Soup is the simplest of simple. The days are getting shorter. The light outside is sort of orange--from sunrise to sunset--there is this whole dramatic bronze thing happening. I love it. I wouldn't want to live anywhere else but the Midwest in fall. It's just gorgeous. One drawback is it's hard on the emotions for those of us with light sensitivity--the waning light and all. I have a spot in the house I like to sit in that gives me a direct view of the sunrise. It helps me begin the day on a bit better level. That and my coffee. The cloudy days. . . well, that's another story. 

Vegan Gingerbread Cupcakes with Chocolate Ganache Frosting And Ghosts

Once again I found myself craving "cake"--but not just any old cake. My cookbooks were scattered around the kitchen, pages flipped open here and there. My sort of mad scientist way of going about figuring out what I'd like to bake is nothing but pure chaos. Having moments like these sometimes makes me wish I weren't such a cookbook freak. I have almost too many choices. Nothing seemed to call to me. Until I found a recipe for gingerbread cake. I had not baked a gingerbread cake in forever. I love gingerbread.

Vegan Pecan Pie Bars (Running: Navigating in The Dark of The Morning)

I had a craving for something really "fall-ish" last week and pecan pie came to mind. Since I had just made (and consumed nearly ALL of an apple pie the week prior) I wanted my next confection to be in "pieces" vs. "slices". So I settled on these pecan pie bars. I am so glad I did. Pecan (Pea-Can as we say in these here parts) pie is one of my all time favorite desserts/snacks/treats. I had forgetten how much I loved it until I had these sitting in front of me begging to be consumed. I also happened to have just purchased a grocery store brand 11 x 7 ($7.99) baking pan and miracle-of-miracle--this particular modified recipe called for such pan. Don't ask me why I never had a baking pan this size before--I seem to own every other baking pan size out there. I love the shortbread base--you bake it beforehand. Then you mix the topping with the pecans--it is such a gratifying treat. I like my pies and bars kept in an airtight container in the fridge. If you are thinking of things you might want to make for the holidays--this bar recipe won't disappoint. I think they'd ship well also.   

My Beekeeping Life And Hiking Amongst the Elk to Cure Depression

After an emotionally draining weekend, Dr. Thyme and I decided a hike was in order. I say it was a "draining" weekend because I had a sort of "break" in my emotional side--not uncommon for me as I may have indirectly said, I suffer from the old depression monster or as my clinical help calls it, some sort of mood disorder. I feel it's time to come clean with it on my blog. This way, as I come in and out of here on my blogging--long absences usually tend to be a point at which I am coming to terms with "picking myself up by my bootstraps and moving on"--I can be a little more up front on the matter. I wasn't intending for my blog to be so confessional in its design--I really do want to keep the vegan food stuff part of my main focus. I have journaled in the traditional manner of notebook and pen in the past. I still keep my pens and notebooks handy. But so much of my writing takes place through my blog now (and it takes a pretty big chunk of time to blog--more than I thought it would), I feel it's time to immerse my whole self here and hopefully at the same time, be able to maybe help someone else as I move along in life. You can skip reading this part if you so desire. As I've stated before, this blog is my life, my food, and things I love (or have trouble loving).

Mulligatawny Soup and Hush Puppies (Most Confusing Southern-Speak and "Almost Fall" Colors from My Backyard)

This meal was one of those slow cooker dinners where I could smell the food all day so that by meal time, I was famished and ready to dig in. Something about the Indian spices simmering for ten hours makes for a very fall, very cozy feeling. As you all know, I've got a "top-of-the-line-blonde-hair-green-eyed girl" Indian spice rack now, so whenever the mood strikes for Indian (more often than not), I have all I need at my disposal. I just finished the last of this off last night and it was even better the third time around. I feel with practice and confidence, my Indian dishes are less intimidating and feel less daunting. For example, this dish called for "curry leaves"--no problem! I went right into my freezer and there I had two packages of frozen leaves just waiting for their next appearance. (Curry leaves are abundant in international grocery stores--buy as much as you'd like and don't be afraid of using them in nearly any Indian dish--sort of like you use basil in Italian cooking--place them in the freezer in a zip lock bag.)