Autumn muffins done. If anyone local wants to borrow this pan or my pumpkin muffin pan or my pumpkin loaf pan, let me know.
Still a little too harried to bake from scratch
Still a little too harried to bake from scratch (Kev comes back today, yay!), but I’ve found a banana bread mix I really like (yes, I know those are pumpkins, but I have multiple pretty pumpkin molds, no banana molds (haven’t found any pretty ones), and a habitual excess of bananas in our freezer), and that makes it easy. Miss Jones mix (link in comments). Zinnias by neighbor Sera Sera.
I had a lot of leftovers to use up
Impromptu Labor Day brunch with girlfriends. Carollina brought peach cake and Nara Nayar brought some of her amazing dahlias. Going to try to dry them today.
I did omelette bar, mostly because I had a lot of leftovers to use up.
Options:
- Mexican (grilled corn, chicken, sautéed avocado, cherry tomatoes, spiced pork (al pastor), grilled green mango, Mexican cheese blend, spicy tomatillo sauce)
- smoked salmon, chive & onion cream cheese, red onion, sliced tomato, capers
- sautéed mushroms and onions with Swiss
Worked pretty well — I just made them one at a time, and since there were just a few of us, no one had to wait very long.
Also feeling autumnal enough that I made some of the apple-cheddar crescent rolls I usually make in the fall. Those aren’t fancy — just Pillsbury crescent, with an apple sliced in eighths, and a little cheese, bake 15 minutes. I’m entering the season of autumn baking — next week, I’m going to start cooking for the fall Patreon boxes.
Lilac & lime simple syrup
Lilac & lime simple syrup. Delicate sweet + citrus floral flavor, nice with gin and tonic (got to keep that malaria away), would also be nice with seltzer water. I’ll have 9 little bottles at the art fair Saturday.
I meant to make this earlier — by the time I got around to it, most of my purple lilac petals had fallen, so I ended up with mostly pink petals, which made a sort of brown syrup.
Usually, if you add citrus to lilac syrup, it’ll turn purple, but I think the pink is just not strong enough color for that, so I ended up with a sort of melon-y color? Still pretty, though it doesn’t particularly shout ‘lilac’ when you look at it. 🙂
Some recipes recommend adding a few blueberries to get a purple color — I didn’t have any on hand, but maybe I’ll try that next year. This recipe suggests that, for example: https://www.havocinthekitchen.com/lilac-syrup/
They also suggest uses: “Think of fancy cocktails, refreshing lemonades, or over your ice cream. Enjoy with pancakes, crepes, and French toasts. Besides, it would be great as a part of desserts, soak cake, topping for your oatmeal, and a dressing for your fruit salads.”
Sri Lankan-style scrambled eggs
Sri Lankan-style scrambled eggs. Humble, delicious.
Wolfberry Cream Tea Scones
with Wolfberry-Lime Glaze
Okay, so I know that these look weird. I promise you, they are tasty, and not even a little bit moldy, even though they’re kind of grey-blue, which normally might mean something you wouldn’t want to eat. Am I selling it to you yet?
See, I happened across wolfberries (aka black goji berries), and I really wanted to include them in my Autumn Woods treat boxes somehow, so I thought I’d try baking them into scones. They’re superfoods, supposedly, so these are even scones that are somewhat good for you, but yeah – I think I’m going to have to include a note in the treat boxes explaining all this, or my patrons are going to be afraid to eat them.
Not sure I’d make them again – maybe for Halloween? But they really do taste quite nice – the wolfberries lend a lightly fruity flavor to the cream scones. Trust me.
3 c. flour
1 T baking powder
1 t. salt
1/4 c. granulated sugar
2 T wolfberry powder
1 t. vanilla extract
1 1/2 c. heavy cream
For (optional) glaze:
1 c. powdered sugar
2-3 T lime juice
1/2 t. wolfberry powder
1. Preheat oven to 425 F. Spray mini scone pan with Baker’s Joy (or butter and flour pan). (Alternately, you can plan to pat dough out in a circle on a greased baking sheet and cut into wedges.)
2. Whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt, sugar, and 2 T of wolfberry powder.
3. Combine 1 1/2 c. cream with vanilla. Drizzle liquid mixture over the dry ingredients, stirring gently just to combine.
4. Turn out onto a lightly floured board and knead a few times. Cut into 16 equal pieces and press into the cavities of the pan.
5. Bake 14-15 minutes, until starting to brown and cooked all the way through; turn out onto a rack to cool. You can serve them warm as is (nice with butter and preserves), but I like boosting the flavor with a lime-wolfberry glaze.
6. Optional: Combine glaze ingredients in a small bowl, and drizzle with a fork over completely cooled scones.
This Morning, I Cooked a Little
Was trying to convince my father that steel-cut oatmeal was much better than regular oatmeal. Good for his heart health, etc., but also it can be really tasty. I made a big batch and then served it with a few options — I had mine with sautéed onions and green chili, with a fried egg on top — could’ve used a little cheese too, I think, but I didn’t think of it. Pretty good, though I cooked the egg a little too long, so it didn’t do the runny thing when I broke into it, so the overall effect was a little drier than ideal. Ah well — I was distracted chatting.
I also took half the sautéed onions and added chopped apples and sautéed a little longer, plus a tablespoon or two of coconut milk, and that was a great accompaniment both to the oatmeal and to pancakes (my dad wanted me to show our young Sri Lankan guests how to make pancakes, so I dutifully did, although they can make dosas, so I suspect American-style pancakes will hold no mysteries for them). The apples would also have been good with a little shredded cheddar… (Any leftover apples would be great with some roast pork for dinner or in a sandwich…)
There’s a lot of oatmeal left, which I told them could be heated and eaten later in the week, and I tried to convince them to pick up some cashew butter to enjoy with bananas and maybe some chocolate chips, but I don’t know if they’ll take me up on that recommendation. We’ll see!
Perico
I didn’t have a lot of time to cook for the refugees this weekend, so only one experimental new recipe — we’d signed up for breakfast, so I made Venezuelan scrambled eggs, known as perico, cooked with onion, pepper and tomato. Very similar to scrambled eggs I’d make for myself and the family.
It was interesting making it in such large quantities, though. I felt like I was cracking eggs for a ridiculously long time. 
Before They Are Eaten
Enough raspberries harvested today that I *could* make a crisp, but there’s no way that’s going to happen before they all just get eaten — Ben has slathered some on top of the bagel that he’s eating right now.
Morning Glory Mini Muffins
Morning glory mini muffins, mostly using the King Arthur Flour recipe, simplified to take out the things my kids don’t like. I made a double batch and froze half of it. The hope is that having these around will mean that Kavi will actually grab something for breakfast before school. She had one while doing dishes tonight and liked it, so I’m hopeful.
The next question is how long a double-batch will last. I’m betting on two weeks.