3 Favorite Recipes for this Autumn

Each season of the year has a different taste for me and a different set of favorite recipes. I make them every year, sometimes with variations.

Spring tastes of young vegetables and Easter cakes, Summer of rhubarb pies, cherries and butter beans, and Winter has all those amazing spiced cookies, mulled wine and the Polish "ryba w galarecie" (fish in jelly - way better than it sounds).

But Autumn, oh Autumn! I think taste-wise it is my favorite season of the year. The spices, the pumpkins, the squashes, the plums, the apples...ohhhh boy.

Et billede slået op af Maria Lind (@mariafurya) den 23. Aug 2015 kl. 5:58 PDT

These year, my favorite Autumn recipe collection has been extended by the following 3 recipes:

1. Pumpkin Truffles

A yummy vegan dessert that's an essence of Autumn. I added peanut butter to my version (what doesn't taste better with peanut butter, eh?).

Et billede slået op af Maria Lind (@mariafurya) den 14. Nov 2015 kl. 2:28 PST

2. Butternut Squash Muffins

This is a Jamie Oliver recipe from his 30-minutes-meals series. They take me a bit longer to make but they are super easy and a big hit with friends and family.

Et billede slået op af Maria Lind (@mariafurya) den 25. Okt 2015 kl. 7:05 PDT

3. Roasted Cauliflower, Leak and Carrot Soup

Delicious, hearty and warming creamy soup for the cold Autumn evenings. Perfect for the vegetarians but if you are meat inclined, add some crunch bacon, shrimps or even chicken - yummy!

And as a bonus, I have started baking my sourdough bread again. I heart Autumn! 

Fancy Eating

So my life has been totally upside down the last month and I had (and still have) to deal with a lot of stress. For me one of the day to do that is to spend quality time preparing and eating good food. Taking this extra few minutes preparing a delicious and beautiful lunch gives me the chance to occupy my mind...and just do something that makes me happy. Not to mention the joy of actually sitting down and eating that.

So today I had French bread with olive oil, Italian ham, goat cheese and cocktail tomatoes on a bed of rocket leaves. And for desert I had delicious plums (did I mention I really like autumn?).

Do pay attention to my new table napkins I recently finished making. I made only two but I am thinking of adding 2 more to the set.

I know the colors are a bit off but there is really very little sun here nowadays and I don't have professional equipment for taking photos in poor lighting.

Celebrating Autumn: Pumpkin Buns

Don't they just look delicious? I baked these pumpkin buns yesterday and, despite it being my first time, they came out quite nice. They are very soft and airy inside and they have this amazing aroma of cardamom (even though I added much more cinnamon and clove). They taste fantastic with smelly soft cheeses and gruyère although I must say I like them with apple and ginger jam as well.
The only disadvantage is that the pumpkin taste is completely lost in them...pity. Anyway, I found the recipe here - well of cooking and baking inspirations! I promise to translate it for you in the next few days so stay tuned.

Celebrating Autumn: Colors

Colors are God's way to help us deal with the gloom of autumn. Below are some colorful inspirations from today morning's walk in the park. Enjoy!

Celebrating Autumn: And What if I Get Ill

It is hard to celebrate or enjoy autumn if you have to do it from your bed with a sore throat, headache and 40C degree fever. In the capricious autumnal weather it is easy to catch a cold. Luckily, nature provides us as well with a lot of natural remedies and immune system boosters. Today 3 ideas of how to go through the fall using your own kitchen stock.

The Terrible Mixture

What for:
Sore throat, general cold and muscle soreness. Garlic has the qualities of natural antibiotics and can kill germs! Ginger and honey smooth the aching throat and lemon provides your system with C vitamin.

Ingredients:
1. garlic
2. ginger root
3. honey
4. lemon

How-To:
1. Chop garlic and ginger
2. Pour hot water over it and let it brew for 5 minutes
3. Add lemon and honey
4. Drink while warm

Onion Milk

What for:
Does wonders for sore throat.

Ingredients:
1. onion
2. milk

How-To:
1. Peal onion and cut it to several pieces
2. Boil the onion in milk
3. Drink milk while hot
4. You can add honey to sweeten the drink

Zombie Elixir

What For:
Kills the germs and makes sure your cold won't develop.

Ingredients:
1. 40% vodka (any kind, the taste really shouldn't be your main concern)
2. 250g of garlic

How-To:
1. Chop garlic
2. Pour alcohol over choped garlic and keep it in closed jars for two weeks. The jars should be kept in warm place, possibly in the sun.
3. After two weeks throw away the garlic and keep the alcohol (it will reach the color of muddy kiwi juice...yummy)
Hint: don't use jars or bottle you actually like - you won't be able to get rid of the garlic smell.
4. When you feel a cold is coming on drink 10 drops of elixir in a glass of water before every meal.

Remember: the remedies work and can support your immune system in fighting the head cold but they are not a substitute for medical advice in case of prolonged illness.

Celebrating Autumn: And All That Jam...

So I live near this botanical garden, which is in fact a big park, and no one pick up the apples from the trees in there ... anyway, long story short: I had a few spare apples on my hands. I am not the biggest fan of jams, jellies, marmalades etc. but the apples were a bit too sour to eat them like just like that - so jam it is. The recipe below was taken from Polish newspaper but then considerably modified and adjusted by me.

The recipe for Spicy Apple and Ginger Jam (For roughly1,5l of jam):

Ingredients:
1kg apples
300g of ginger (or less if you don't like the jam too spicy)
500g sugar (or less if you don't like your jam too sweet)
1 table spoon of dried ginger
a few cloves
3 table spoons of cinnamon
(you can also add vanilla or cardamom - depends on your taste)

Preparation:
1. Peel and cut the apples removing the seeds and put it in a large pot
2. Peel and cut ginger and add to apples
3. Add 0,5l water and boil until soft (around an hour). Don't boil it too hard and consider adding more water if you see there is not enough left in the pot (don't overdo it or you'll make the jam too watery)
4. Add spoonfuls of sugar and stir. Add as much sugar as you think is necessary for your taste.
5. Add the spices and stir - let it boil for another 10 min.

If the jam comes out too watery you can either boil it longer until the water steams away or you can add a bit of jelly fix powder.

Ginger has the tendency not to get entirely soft during boiling - if you prefer you can put the apples and ginger into food processor before cooking or use hand blender after.

6. Put the warm jam into clean jars. Screw the tops tight and boil the jars in hot water for 10 minutes - the jam is now pasteurized and can keep in closed jars for up to one year.

This jam is ok for sandwiches, waffles and crumbles but I also like to add it to my black tea.

Let me know if you tried this recipe and what came out of it!

Celebrating Autumn: The Pumpkin

First of all, I love pumpkins! This is what it will say on my grave...or at least in my post-mortem biography.

I love everything about pumpkins: the colors, the shape, the smells and the tastes. And most of all I love the fact that so few people in Europe know what to do with pumpkins which makes them at cheap and, at the same time, exotic food.

There are many pumpkin varieties but here in Denmark you can only buy two kinds of pumpkins, the halloween kind (they are destined to end up as jack-o-lanterns) and the hokkaido. The former one is watery, large and very cheap and is perfect for pumpkin curry soup (recipe below) and the later is more expensive but sweet and is prefered for the pies.

So, the other week I took a trip to a place called Bazaar (a topic for whole other post) and bought myself some pumpkin, Baby! And here is what I did with it.

Jack-O-Lantern/Halloween Pumpkin Preparation

1. Cut pumpkin in half and remove the seed nest with a spoon
2. Roast it in the oven, skin up, for 1h at 180C - remember to roast pumpkin in a deep dish. It will give out a lot of juice and can flood your oven otherwise.
3. After an hour check if the pulp is soft and let the pumpkin cool down
4. Scoop out the pumpkin pulp, divide it in portions and freeze for further use

Sweet and Spicy: Pumpkin Curry Soup

You will need:
- pumpkin pulp
- curry powder (or ingredients for curry powder)
- olive oil
- onion - sliced
- 2 carrots - sliced
- 2 potatoes - sliced
- you can also use other root vegetables such as celeriac or parsnip
- salt and pepper to taste

1. Heat up the oil in a large pot, add curry powder and let it fry for 2 minutes
2. Lower the heat to medium and add onions
3. When onions are glossy add carrots and potatoes (and any other roots) and steer well
4. Add pumpkin pulp
5. Add water and boil till the vegetables are soft
6. Blend the soup and spice it to taste (cayenne pepper fits well with this soup)

You might also want to add some vegetable stock with the water. You can also use fresh (not roasted) pumpkin - in that case cut pumpkin in smaller pieces and remember that it will take a little but longer to boil until soft.

Serve with roasted pumpkin seeds or garlic bread croûtons (mhhhmmm).

Protest Post: Let Christmas be in December

Christmas related items have already started to pop up here and there, on craft portals and blogs. Pretty, felted Christmas trees and Santa Clauses, embroideries with elves and so on and so forth. Despite the fact, that these creations are often very beautiful and/or interesting, I REFUSE TO GET INTERESTED. It is SEPTEMBER, people! Why ignore September? Why ignore autumn? It is after all, the most beautiful time of the year (at least in some countries)!

I have decided that I will ignore Christmas until December and instead lead "Love Your Autumn" campaign. Send me your beautiful autumn pictures or post them on your blogs and link back here! For starters, here are some warm colors of Polish September.

Autumn Doodling

Despite it still being plain summer, I was in an autumn mood the last few days.

This year, I get to spend September, the most magnificent month, in Poland. This makes me think of the colors and smells of my country and the beauty of "Golden Polish Autumn".

So, out of this melancholy came thoughts of Autumn Collection by Crafty Maria Design. I doodled and doodled and I came up with several ideas for hats and gloves. The results will soon be published here and in my etsy shop.

I am also considering changing this blog's design and playing with wire jewelry. These feel like good challenges for long autumn evenings...