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Yum! I’m having so much good eats with these persimmons! For this dessert:

1 pie crust (I made a slightly sweetened one for this)

Mix together:
3/4 cup pecans, ground (I used the blender)
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 tsp lemon zest
1 egg yolk

Spread that mixture in the pie crust. Then slice 2-3 Fuyu Persimmons and fan them out to grace the pie, leaving about 1&1/2 inch border

Mix 1/2-1 tsp cinnamon with 3 Tbsp sugar and sprinkle onto the persimmons.

Fold up the edges of the pie crust and pinch together. Pop in the refrigerator to allow the crust to harden and the persimmons to release their juices while you heat the oven to 375F.

Bake for 45-50 minutes – the crust should be browning. Allow to sit 15-20 minutes, then enjoy while still warm!

We’re back online again! Yay! The techy let me see what to do if it stops working again, so maybe I’ll be able to post semi-regularly!

It’s been persimmon month here. Two of our neighbors have Fuyu persimmon trees (the fruit are ripe & edible when still firm) and we have made several yummy treats.

What of the first ones we didn’t eat out of hand were made into jam. The next ones made it into a pie. And of the last batch, a couple made this yummy tart:

I’ve also put some pulp in the freezer for a more traditional persimmon pie for Christmas, at MissA’s request. I kept a couple back to either eat or make the tart again – it was fantastic!

My MIL gave me a copy of the fabulous book Who Wants Candy? when we moved here. The basic caramel recipe is easy and turns out great every time.

This time, I sent MissB with her Daddy to the store for apples while I stirred up the candy. They put sticks in each apple, and when the caramel was ready, I turned each apple in the sticky candy and set them on waxed paper to cool.

Yum! The bigger ones (including Husband and I) ate up the whole juicy treat. The littles mostly ate the caramel with a few bites of apple here and there.

MissB’s up late after a nosebleed.. So, she gets to be the first to try out the play-dough. I read a great blurb over at Sew Liberated that inspired me to make some again -finally! The recipe she links to is like my Mom’s recipe that she used to make us play-dough. I said to Ben that I was cooking up scents from my youth, and he said the smell seemed oddly familiar. I’ll have to ask his Mom if she ever made his play-dough!

Ben went a little overboard and bought 4 pounds of cabbage. But, he loves sauerkraut, so I used a widemouthed mason jar for the extra.

Sauerkraut is so easy to make!

For one mason jar worth of sauerkraut:
One medium head of cabbage
Sea salt or pickling salt
Knife or shredder
Bowl
Jar with lid
Cloths: towel or bag, one to set it on, one to cover the jar

-I like to put the cabbage through my shredder, but slicing it with a knife works just as well. If you don’t have a weight, save an outer leaf to keep on top of the kraut.

-Next, I add salt to the cabbage. The ratio 1 1/2Tbsp per 3 pound, let this sit while cleaning up to start the juices extruding.

-Last, in a clean mason jar (or crock, depends on how much you’re making), add a small amount at a time, press down each addition. This minimizes the air bubbles that can push the liquids up and out of the jar as it ferments.

Leave about an inch or so at the top.

Place the weight or leaf on top, pressing so the juices rise over it.
The lid is set on loosely so the gases can escape. I’ve got kids, so I screw it on about 1/4 turn.

-Set it on a cloth on the counter in a moderate temperature area (I put it on the fridge in the winter for warmth, but in the corner of my counter in summer). Cover with a cloth and check every couple days to make sure the liquid isn’t escaping.

You can leave it for a week to 10 days (sooner in the summer, longer in winter).

Sometimes, a yeast grows on top of the leaf that I use to protect the kraut -that’s why the leaf! Smell the kraut if you’re unsure. If it doesn’t smell worse than fresh sauerkraut then it should be fine. Pull the leaf out, wipe any yeast off the jar side and enjoy.

We made a carrot cake for dessert. The recipe is in Annabel Karmel’s Family Meals book. Coloring and forming the carrots from marzipan was fun, though next time I’ll make them smaller. MissC calls it a birthday cake.

The children love to grab random vegetation at the store or market and have me buy it. half the time, I don’t know what to do with it, or I get in one of my funks and it languishes in the fridge. This lovely broccoli has just been pulled from vegetable purgatory. Tonight, it ends up as Cream of Broccoli Soup. Nice.

Yum. The children weren’t too keen on the radicchio, but best to get them started on bitter young, right?

‘Tis the season & all. MissA, especially, has been asking me for several weeks to make cookies. On Monday, I finally mixed the dough. A friend had mentioned Sunday that she’d like to make cookies with us -keeps the mess out of her house -so I called her up.

They had fun. I had the colored frosting already set aside in bags when they arrived. The children were put right to work rolling the dough and cutting cookies. As the trays were loaded, into the oven they went. Once the last tray was baked, we cleared and cleaned the table, and set it up for decorating. Each child had one cookie to decorate, and once that was done, it was exchanged for a new one until all the cookies were done.

Everyone had a nice time!

I woke about 2:30 this morning and haven’t been able to get back to sleep. I changed LG’s diaper and nursed him back to sleep, but just couldn’t get the zzz’s going for me.

The husband will need lunch. Visions of salad danced in my head. He’s generally a healthy eater, but I’m not sure how well just a big ole salad will satisfy him. After all, he likes his sandwiches. So, I grabbed the Laptop Lunchbox; the PB&J was made and boxed with some carrots & Craisins. There’s a cookie for good measure.. But, the salad sounds so good! I grabbed a slightly longer container, half filled it with the lettuce and moved his lunch over.

Lettuce (per cup): 4 Cal, 0.6 g carbs
Craisins (2 Tbsp): 49 Cal, 12.5g carbs
Pecans (2 Tbsp): 94 Cal, 1.9g carbs, 1.2g protein
Caesar Dressing (2 Tbsp): 160 Cal, 2g carbs, 1g prot
Tangerine: 50 Cal, 15g carbs, 1g
Carrot: 25 Cal, 5.8g carb, 0.6g prot
Sandwich:
Bread x2: 200 Cal, 40g carbs, 6g
Natural Peanut butter (1 Tbsp): 100Cal, 3.5g carbs, 3.5g prot
Preserves (1 Tbsp): 50 Cal, 13g carbs
And a cookie: 69 Calories, 8.9g carbs, 0.9g prot

To give a grand total of:
801 Calories, 98g carbohydrates, 13.6g protein
The sandwich alone carries 350 Cal, 56.5g carbs (!), and 9.5g prot. I recently read that high carb intake is a great part of what keeps fat on the body. I can eat a huge salad (2-3 cups of lettuce, a handful of nuts & cranberries, and a slosh of dressing) and still have less carbohydrates than that sandwich. And, it’d be fabulous with some roasted chicken on it.

So, here’s a start. I’m working on balancing the meals well. Maybe I’ll toss in some cheese, too!