Leftover Lunch

There is an absolutely amazing disparity in the amount of food consumed in this house when I am here alone, versus when N is here. He is thoroughly hungry with clock-like regularity: soon after he wakes up, snack time, lunch time, snack time, dinner time, dessert, and snack time to fill the cracks right before bed. If he doesn't eat enough, he won't be able to fall asleep and will have to get up in the middle of the night to make another snack. I, on the other hand, am a good eater when I get down to it. But I might forget about breakfast til 11... Or if I wait too long to make dinner I get too tired to cook, and satisfy myself with a spoonful of peanut butter or something else equally silly.

This has created some confusion with my grocery shopping this summer. N was farming 2 1/2 hours away, and only home on weekends. We'd stock up on food and cook lots of fabulous meals while he was here, and then he'd leave and I'd struggle to eat all the leftovers before they went bad. I find myself in this situation again. N came home for a week, then took off to visit his parents and help them rebuild their house. He made a ton of great food during that week here, and then took off leaving me with bits of leftover cheese, random veggies, and several loaves of bread. I'm trying desperately to eat them all up before I leave for my (NINE DAY!! :) Thanksgiving vacation.

It doesn't help matters that I stopped by the PSU farmer's market on Saturday, and came back loaded with produce and cheese and apple cider. I just couldn't help myself:

Anyway, today I made myself a little lunch with some leftover odds and ends and it turned out quite delicious. An open face "grilled cheese."

Homemade bread that was on the verge of going stale, sauteed onions, a hunk of queso fresco, and an astoundingly delicious sweet-hot pepper sauce made from my homegrown peppers.
I toasted the bread for a couple minutes to start, meanwhile sauteeing the onions in a bit of olive oil. When they were soft, I added the sauce over very low heat to warm up. I then spread this mixture on my bread, topped with the cheese, and stuck it back in the toaster oven to brown. So simple, and so good. I don't think I'd ever really had queso fresco melted before, but I will definitely be doing it again.

Pumpkin Pizza!

As promised, here are the pics of the pumpkin pizza we ate last night. Unfortunately, I did not get a good photo; I was just so excited to eat this delicious pizza!!

It was pumpkin puree mixed with sage and lemon balm, then topped with caramelized onions (with fig balsamic vinegar), roasted fennel and walnuts. OMG SO GOOD.

Cook in the House

There have been many exciting changes going on around here lately:

I became an aunt!

I got a haircut! (and then had a hard time photographing it)

I got engaged!! (and had a hard time photographing it)

And my wonderful fiance finally finished his farm apprenticeship 2 1/2 hours away. It's been a long 6 months of only seeing each other on the weekends, and I'm so excited to have him back home with me. Not least because he is a CIA trained cook. I love that even the small week night dinners he whips up are so delicious.

Last night we ate grilled cheese with a simple salad of butter lettuce with roasted beets, caramelized shallots and a mustard dressing. Yum! And everything in the salad was grown either at the farm at my work or at his.

We've also been dealing with a HUGE cinderella pumpkin I brought home from the farm this week. We roasted it a couple nights ago, and ended up with about 5 quarts of puree!! I ate some of it for breakfast with maple yogurt and pecans. Then we made a pie last night, topped off with some dark brown sugar and walnuts. Tonight, we'll be making pumpkin pizza! I'll try to post some pictures later.