My friend Kristin of My Life As A Teacup asked me to help blog-sit while she and her Boy take some time to relax in Gettysburg! As some of you long-time readers know, I used to be a food blogger, before I sort of lost that thread and then started blogging about our wedding. Kristin asked all of her guest posters to share their fall favorites, so I decided to dip my toes back into the food world and share some of my favorite fall recipes. I shared my crock pot vegetarian chili, cheddar-chive buttermilk biscuits, and pear bread. Head on over and take a look! Here’s a little preview of what you might find:

{Personal photos}

Head on over to Kristin’s blog to check it out! Thanks again for having me, Kristin!

Last weekend we went and toured the farm where our CSA is coming from. It was so beautiful there, acres upon acres of gorgeous green fields and grass. The smell, the air, the golden sun streaming through the tree branches at 7pm, the sweat on my neck, the prickle of grass in my shoes…all of it reminded me of my grandma’s old house, of summers spent on her porch with cold drinks, of running barefoot through her giant yard, of playing under the maple trees…I felt content at that farm. I’m happiest when there is space around me and fresh air and green grass. I told Jason that someday I want to move out of the city and buy a house in the country. He said I had to mow the lawn, and I said fine. I dream of a big old house out in the country with a huge porch that I can hang flower baskets from and have a rocking chair to sit and read or craft, a wild little garden with azaleas and irises and roses and who knows what else all along the porch, and a bay window in the living room.

Someday.

For now, though, we are cleaning and unpacking and organizing in our current house. We want to move eventually…soon…but don’t have any immediate plans for it. We are just waiting for the perfect new place to come along, instead of rushing and moving into the least bad place we could find on Craigslist in a week. That’s what we did this time, and it has not turned out so well. But we are making the best of it and every time I think there’s no more space for anything, we find something that can be gotten rid of, or consolidated, or stacked just one inch higher, and we make it work.

The windows are all open, the air is fresh and warm, and the sun is out. It will be sunny and hot (90°!) until Wednesday. I plan on taking full advantage of it. Windows open all day every day, dresses, skirts, and lots of iced tea.

For dinner tonight we are having avocado-lemon pesto pasta salad with spinach salads on the side. I drew up a meal plan for this week and so far it’s going quite well. I’ve been feeling not so great physically lately and I realized it’s because I’ve been loading up on junk instead of eating well, plus Jason and I end up just coming home and plonking down in front of our computers and we don’t get that hour or so of quiet time just the two of us to catch up. I wanted all that to change, and so far I’m enjoying it.

This coming Thursday is when our CSA boxes start. I am beyond excited. The meal plans will continue as I’m sure we’ll need them in order to use up all of the veggies we get each week. There is just something so heartening about knowing that no more than a week ago, our food was still on the stem under the sun, and it was picked by kind, hardworking hands (the family who run the farm are such nice people).

I will post the recipe for that avocado pesto tomorrow. And I’m sure there will be many more recipes to come as I cook my way through our mysterious CSA boxes each week! I can’t wait!

I don’t know how long it’s been since I shared a recipe on here! I made these muffins for Easter with Jason’s family. Oddly enough no one ate them because we ate a huge dinner, but I had some for breakfast that day and the next and they are goooooooood.

I made a small batch first because I wasn’t sure of the recipe. I ended up liking them so much that I made a second batch right after, but I realized I was out of honey halfway through the recipe, so I had to improvise. I subbed sugar for the honey and added extra lemon juice, and OJ as needed to moisten it up. Both types were delicious.

The lemon in these is strong. Almost enough to make you pucker a little. If you aren’t a fan of that, cut down on the lemon zest. I also bet these would be good with fresh ginger added in… Mmm.

Honey-Lemon Muffins
Adapted from this recipe.
Makes about 10 muffins per batch.

INGREDIENTS
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1/2 cup + 1T honey
1/3 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup butter, melted
Zest from 1/2 lemon

1. In large bowl, combine flours, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. In separate bowl, combine egg, honey, lemon juice, butter, and lemon peel. Stir into dry ingredients just until moistened.
2. Fill muffin tins 1/2-2/3 full with batter.
3. Bake at 375° for 13-18 minutes or until cake tester in center muffin comes out clean. Cool 5 minutes in pan before moving to wire rack.

Something very exciting just happened — we just bought our first ever CSA share!

CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) is something I’ve wanted to do for a long time. Emily’s mom did this one year a few years back and I remember being at their house once when she came home with their weekly box. Seeing the excitement as they discovered what was in their box, dreamed up meals to make with it, and put the little bouquet of flowers out on the table, was something I envied, and this year it’s finally a feasible option.

Buying local produce is something I’ve strived for since moving to Pittsburgh — every Friday during market season I’d stop by the City-County Building after class to get my groceries. And during the off season I try to buy as much local produce as I can find at the store. It just makes me feel better knowing that my food came from a place I could conceivably go to, and is so much more fresh than things shipped from other parts of the country.

We bought our share from my favorite farm at the market, Dillner Family Farm. Their peaches, plums, and corn are absolutely to die for. And they are essentially organic in every way except the official label — they use sustainable agriculture and “integrated pest management”, which means that they use good bugs to control the bad bugs. They also don’t use chemical weed killer. So we are getting the organic produce without the organic price. They also include goodies from other local farms and bakeries — cheese, preserves, herbs, flowers, bread, and so on. You never know what you’ll get until you pick up your box!

Our first box comes sometime in early June. I am so excited to dig through our box each week, and to plan our meals around what the growing season gives us. Eating seasonally is truly the best way to eat.

Another find from the thrift store yesterday was a 20-photo collage frame that will go on this wall. Yesterday I was at my dad’s scanning old family photos, and I just have to digitally clean up some dust spots on some of them before I get prints made to fill the frame. That’s a project for this week.

Tonight I made slow cooker stew with chickpeas, black beans, onions, carrots, celery, and brown rice. I’ve made it once before and really enjoyed it, and one batch fed me lunch for an entire week and then some. I’ll post the recipe tomorrow. I try to take advantage of soup weather during the cold months, because it really is so easy to make and my favorite thing to take along for lunch (and thanks to Jason’s mom I actually have a proper insulated thermos now too!). Food during the summer is much more labor-intensive and logistically harder to make in bigger batches, so I’m savoring this while I can. I’ve got ingredients to make veggie chili in the slow cooker later in the week too.

Something I just thought of: spaghetti sauce in the slow cooker? I wonder if this is a thing. Jason and I have a favorite way of preparing spaghetti sauce with summer vegetables that involves simmering for an hour on the stove…I wonder if we couldn’t make a really huge batch of it in the slow cooker and freeze the extras? Must remember this for later….