Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Let’s delete this post and never speak of this again.

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires.

The current Supreme Court is a dangerous, rogue court.

American history and black history cannot be separated.

Dear elected officials: Trump is temporary, dishonor is forever.

Come on, man.

This really is a full service blog.

These days, even the boring Republicans are nuts.

The unpunished coup was a training exercise.

No Kings: Americans standing in the way of bad history saying “Oh, Fuck No!”

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

Seems like a complicated subject, have you tried yelling at it?

“Loving your country does not mean lying about its history.”

Republicans firmly believe having an abortion is a very personal, very private decision between a woman and J.D. Vance.

I would try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

The gop is a fucking disgrace.

Republicans cannot even be trusted with their own money.

Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.

Republicans don’t lie to be believed, they lie to be repeated.

One of our two political parties is a cult whose leader admires Vladimir Putin.

In my day, never was longer.

I am pretty sure these ‘journalists’ were not always such a bootlicking sycophants.

Narcissists are always shocked to discover other people have agency.

Optimism opens the door to great things.

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This Week’s Fall Menus

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JeffreyW makes a yummy pot roast

I’ve been running to keep up with things and it looks like that is going to continue until the holidays, but I want to try and continue with the weekly menus. Here is the first of our October’s menus. I will do my best to keep this up…

Monday is my favorite Taco Salad and Tuesday is a super easy Creamy Chicken.

Full menus are here: October Menus 1

Wednesday features a Slow-Cooker Pot Roast and a sweet Ice Cream Delight for dessert.

JeffreyW makes Gumbo

Finally, Thursday is an easy Gumbo and Creole Salad and Friday is kid favorite Chili-Mac. 

The week’s shopping list can be found here: October Weekly Shopping List 1  Remember it’s color-coordinated so you can eliminate any items from recipes you aren’t using.

In honor of Friday the 13th, this week’s bonus recipe is Bewitched Roasted Squash and Apple Soup, below.

That’s it for this week. What’s on your menu for the weekend? What’s tasty in your kitchen tonight?

Tonight’s bonus recipe:

This is based on a recipe sent to me. I punched it up a bit. The first thing I did was roast the squash to help bring some depth to the dish. I added a little heat and finished with a splash of lemon juice to brighten everything when it was done. I don’t think of it as a stand-alone soup (like my very favorite Tomato-Spinach soup – next week’s bonus recipe), but I think it would work well as a first course in any meal.

Bewitched Roasted Butternut Squash and Spiced Apple Soup

  • 4 medium butternut squash, halved and seeded
  • 1/4 cup butter
  • 1/2 yellow onion, chopped
  • 2 large apples – tart works well, but I used my neighbor’s backyard apples which worked great
  • 1 tsp grated nutmeg
  • 1/2 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/4 tsp allspice
  • 1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
  • 12 cups (3 quarts) water or vegetable broth
  • splash of lemon juice

baking dish, dutch oven or large saucepan

Put about 1/4 inch of water in the baking dish, put squash face down and roast at 375 degrees until it is easy to put a fork through the skin. Turn over and continue roasting until tender and squash are golden brown. About 30-40 minutes. You can turn the heat up after you flip them to brown them, if desired. Remove to cool.

Meanwhile, core and slice apples into about 1 inch pieces. No need to peel or get fancy with the dicing since this is a puréed soup. Melt butter in the saucepan, add apple, onions and sauté until apples are soft and onions are golden. Add spices and coat the apple mixture. Scrape squash from skins and add to the apples, add water or broth. You can use chicken broth, but to keep it vegetarian I used vegetable broth. Let simmer for 30 minutes, purée until smooth, heat an additional 5-10 minutes, adding water if necessary and add a splash of lemon juice just before serving.

You can use a blender or hand blender to purée the mixture. If you use a blender, add a couple of ladles of soup to the blender, cover and blend slowly to start, to keep the mixture from expanding too much. I’ve seen hot liquid blow the lid off…you don’t want that. Blend in small batches. With a hand blender, keep it immersed and again blend slowly, to avoid splattering the hot liquid.

Reader Interactions

36Comments

  4. 4.

    SiubhanDuinne

    I eat very little red meat these days, but gotta say that pot roast has my mouth watering. Except I’d have about three times as many carrots, because I love lots of carrots in my pot roast. Plenty of onions, also too.

  7. 7.

    The Dangerman

    Just returned to my home in CA; I did a quick look to see if there was any post on a Seattle Meet-Up on Sunday, but, at first pass, didn’t see one. So, I’ll mention it here.

    I was hoping to be there Sunday, but a Family matter popped up and I’ve done little but drive for a couple days (OK, a short detour to enjoy Bandon Dunes Golf Course for a few minutes on a gorgeous day; other than that, driving). Anyway, I’m back home again in CA.

    Probably for the best; somebody would have taken a picture and the Marshall’s for the Witness Protection would have been upset and I don’t like upsetting Dudes and Dudettes with guns.

  8. 8.

    NotMax

    @SiubhanDuinne

    This stuff turns out a very nice pot roast. And as it comes with an oven-safe cooking bag, no gunk encrusted pan to clean. Toss some baby carrots and quartered onions in the bag along with the meat. I add some extra black pepper and a touch of garlic, but that’s optional.

  17. 17.

    NotMax

    Port wine and bleu cheese loaf made in the super duper bread machine was a winner. Added to the permanent repertoire.

  18. 18.

    satby

    @Omnes Omnibus: that’s when they’re sweetest. There’s an old picture of me with my grandparents on a farm we were visiting when I was five, and I’m holding a bunch of carrots I had picked. I remember eating most of what I picked at the farm, it never made it home.

  19. 19.

    Omnes Omnibus

    As this is a cooking thread, let me just share that I have discovered the secret of making doing the dishes entertaining. Have two drinks first.

  21. 21.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Gin & Tonic: Yep. Bubbles are amusing but nothing gets damaged. I do have Corelle plates and dishes. They can handle a reasonable amount of hamfisted-ness.

  24. 24.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Yup. Even with a little bit of earth clinging to them. They are the best!

    But according to my mother, when I was a baby I went absofuckinglutely apeshit berserk over strained carrots — my first “solid” food. I never tired of them. I used to have a great recipe for carrot soup that used Gerber’s strained carrots as a base, but haven’t made it in years.

    Now I want a huge glass of fresh carrot juice.

  28. 28.

    Steeplejack (tablet)

    One of the things I want to do this coming week while my mother (age 87) is visiting is to “interview” her about some of her signature dishes that I would like to preserve for posterity. Some of them are ordinary things, like apple pie or cornbread, for which there are dozens of recipes but which always fall short of the way she made them. So I think I’m after “tips and tricks” as well as recipes.

    Let’s see: apple pie (with and without cheddar cheese in the crust); old-fashioned Tennessee cornbread; her special German chocolate cake, which became a favorite family request for birthday cake; the unbelievable Bolognese recipe that she wangled out of a chef at a swanky Hong Kong hotel in the ’60s; and her brisket, which she cooked in an old stovetop pressure cooker that terrified me as a kid.

    And she had some things that I don’t think I could find recipes for now; “sea foam salad,” which we used to joke about and which might have been dangerously Jell-O-adjacent, but it was good; her “Mexican casserole,” which was like a really good casserole version of enchiladas, which she made with beef or chicken; and a nameless thing she did with cranberry sauce, walnuts and other unknown ingredients (orange zest was one, I think) that was frozen in muffin tins and then deployed as a Thanksgiving side dish that was light-years beyond plain cranberry sauce.

    And there are a couple of things from her farm childhood: traditional “Southern” white gravy and a sort of muddle of cooked apple slices that was served with breakfast to go on homemade biscuits.

    I was also reminded today that I definitely want to be the one to “curate” her cookbook collection after she’s gone (hopefully many years in the future).

  32. 32.

    NotMax

    @Steeplejack

    Ah, well. There’s always Parcel Post.

    Life is a revolving door. This past week Mom (89) called up to get a recipe which she had relayed to me years and years ago.

  35. 35.

    Steeplejack (tablet)

    @Uncle Ebeneezer:

    Huh. Recently ran across Maangchi’s cookbook after looking at another Korean chef’s TV show (Cathryn or Cathlyn something). I’ll have to check it out.

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