Halloween Dessert Crawl

This Saturday we joined Amy Cao with Food Spotting for a Halloween dessert crawl. One Saturday, five shops and a sugar crackout! To say the least this was fantastic!

Our first stop was The Little Pie Company, for warm pumpkin pie. Second stop was the Sullivan Street Bakery for a torta di yucca and a small jelly doughnut. Third was Holey Cream for doughnut sandwich with pumpkin gelato, yes a doughnut sandwich people! If this wasn't enough sugar we still had two places to go. Next and our forth stop was Amy's Bread for a devils food cake cupcake with orange icing. And last but not least, was Kyotofu for a deconstructed pumpkin cupcake and a little sake mac and cheese for a sugar break.

Amy Cao was such an entertaining host and made the whole trip so much fun. If you haven't seen the Food Spotting app, you must check it out! If you would like to follow in our footsteps, check out the map here. Be prepared for a sugar overload.

Grandma Brinson's Baked Apples

When I was a little kid I spent a lot of time at Grandma and Granddad's house. Granddad was always playing with some gadget and Grandma was either doing a craft or in the kitchen. You always had the good stuff for dinner there, like tater tots, clams casino, twice baked potatoes and baked apples. The best was the baked apples. You never really knew what home tasted like until you have had one of these apples. Every time I have one of these little treats I think of how Grandma would send them home with me while I was in college just to make sure I was taken care of. I guess that is what Grandma's do and why we love them so. 

Grandma Brinson knew how to do it right! We would like to share her baked apple recipe with you. It's simple, and you can freeze these! Hold that thought. Here is how you make them:

Shopping List

- Apples
- Brown sugar 
- Cinnamon
- Butter
- You favorite pie dough recipe

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees.

1. Make your favorite dough recipe. I like this one.

2. Core and peel the apples. 

3. Roll out the dough, and place the apple in the center

4. Stuff the core of the apple with cinnamon, butter and brown sugar in layers. Alternate as you go.

5. Wrap the apple with the dough, trim excess dough.

7. You can make decorations for the top with the extra dough and cookie cutters.

8. Put them in the oven for about 45 minutes to one hour, or freeze them. (If baking frozen apples you might have to add additional baking time.) 

This is great if you have last minute dinner guests. If you freeze them, you can put them in the oven while you eat dinner and then everyone has an individual apple pie by the time you are ready for dessert. 

Thanksgiving: Setting the Table in Silver

Thanksgiving is the holiday where I have a chance to pull out all my fancy pieces. Including our collection of silver. Silver is an interesting study in design and functionality. One of my favorite pieces is the Victorian Ice Cream fork, or as we know it, a spork. That's right, we can't credit Taco Bell with this lovely design piece, but those witty Victorians. If anyone is interested, I would like a set of these for my birthday. They are even engraved with the correct letter! I get very design-nerdy when it comes to silver and hope to bump into my favorite Victorian designers, Christopher Dresser, at a yard sale, perhaps next time I travel to Europe. Maybe I will spot his 1881 toast rack. Just what I need, a toast rack!

Thanksgiving also means polishing over 100 pieces of silver, but I only do it once a year, so I can't complain. It allows me to spend time with my Grandma Orvis, her mother, my Grandma Dewe and William's Grandma Brinson. I think about them and what their life was like while they polished this same silver. Some of the pieces are many generations old and women in those days often valued silver because it was a sign of status. I pick up tiny pieces here and there at antique stores and yard sales. My mom has also given us little sets she find engraved with the letter 'B'.

Collectively silver tells us about history and family. Do you set your table with silver? Which pieces are your favorite?

My Mountain Moon

We took a quick trip this weekend to the Pennsylvania Poconos for my Dad's surprise 60th birthday. The beautiful fall colors, mountains, lakes, hiking and even the moon. Every night the weather was crisp and clear, with vast views down the mountain. After an evening of fantastic food and pumpkin carving the moon gave us a show. This beautiful orb with all its cracks and craters, glowed so bright it was like an evening sun. What a perfect end to a great weekend.

Purple at the Markets

The farmers markets are bursting with all kinds of winter veggies and that means you don't have to settle for the mundane. In fact for all you who like to tread lightly, why not just start at the potatoes and carrots, the purple ones! These veggies have so much effect at the table, adding depth of color and lusciousness. The purple potatoes are purple through and through, that will get someones attention. The carrots on the other hand are a more yellowy color, with a beautiful gradation. Both of these veggies taste as you expect any carrot or potato to taste, but it just adds a bit of interest to the plate. So go crazy and add some color to the fading winter light, and buy local!