No, I haven't given up on my cooking/blogging project! I'm in this for the long haul. I'm almost feeling human again today (and somewhat organized), so today it's Fall Minestrone. I've discovered that if I were a good (i.e. brutally honest) person, I would increase the total number of recipes in TAOSF by 3 since Alice offers 4 distinct, seasonal variations for minestrone. Heck with it. I'm too tired. Human, but tired.
Alice's basic minestrone is a summer version. For dinner tonight, I made the fall variation. I now know about soffritto and sweating the Basic Three (carrots, celery & onions) to develop the flavor base for vegetarian dishes like this. (I'm feeling so smug.) I cooked cranberry beans this afternoon after soaking them overnight. (Another smug.)
But, I'm also taking liberties with Alice's recipes these days. (Mea culpa.) I have no idea what type of squash I used. It's not a butternut. It's something we bought early in October from Dragon Springs Farm in Cambria, my favorite local grower of all sorts of wonderful heirloom winter squashes. I'm using dried herbs. I just don't have a total palette of fresh herbs at my disposal all the time. Sorry. Last, I threw in a leftover dried-up bit of parmesan. It adds a bit of flavor to the soup and is a good way to get some use out of those last bits of parmesan. I read that somewhere.
In the bread machine I made a loaf of light rye to go with the soup. Good grief -- I just realized that with the exception of milk on my cereal this morning and the cheese in (and shredded on top of) the soup, I was a bloody vegan today. Oh yes, I did nosh on a small piece of Edam this afternoon. Does that count? Okay, I was a vegetarian today. That alone is big.
On a political note, I'm amused by the uproar over the Wikileaks leaks. Ambassadors acting as spies? I'm shocked!! The Saudis would love to see the USA cut the head off the Iranian snake? What a surprise!! Is there one thing in all those leaked documents that we didn't already know? I doubt it. By the way, I need to tell you that Clay Aiken is gay. Sorry. It's true.
84 recipes down; 221 recipes to go (plus those other 3 minestrone variations)
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