Thanksgiving

I freaked out a little bit yesterday when I realized Thanksgiving was a mere two weeks away! How did this happen? Somehow it is almost Christmas! I am really looking forward to the holidays this year because last year my dad was sick and in the hospital and our holidays kind of sucked. I told my mom we should go all out this year (at least with the decorations around the house) and she agreed! I am anticipating some fun days of decorating ahead.

For Thanksgiving this year we are most likely celebrating with some of my parents' friends and some of their family. This means that we will be making more food and my mom and I are going to be perfectionists in the kitchen. We are also having some non-traditional foods this year.

We are making a goose instead of a turkey and I am really excited to try goose as I have never had it before. Along with that we may be making some sort of fish as a second main course. We plan to roast vegetables and make traditional stuffing. Since the Cinnamon Pear Bruschetta was such a hit I am making that again for dinner. I knew when I made the Brownie Cheesecake that I wanted to make a pumpkin version for Thanksgiving and I found the exact recipe that I needed. Now that we are having dinner with others I have to get candy melts and decorate the cheesecake, but that is OK by me! For a second dessert I want to make these Apple Tarts. They are from Alton Brown so you know they will be good and easy to make.

I think we are going to end up with way too much food but I also think it is going to be a lot of fun. I only know these friends of my parents' in passing but they sound like good people. You can bet that I am going to be taking photos galore so there will be plenty to see in a few weeks.

On a slightly related note: this upcoming week KOST 103.5 should start their 'Month Long of Christmas Song'. I am of course more than ready to start listening to more Christmas music. Brandon is less than enthused. He knows that whenever we are in the car, whether in our car or in my mom's car, that station will be on and we will be singing along with Bing and Nat and everyone else. I <3 Christmas!

Cinnamon Pear Bruschetta

Some time ago, while browsing Tasty Kitchen, I came across this recipe for a pear bruschetta. It sounded delicious and I knew I had to make it.

I told my mom about the recipe and she was excited too so she agreed to buy the ingredients. I have never cooked or baked with mascarpone so I was looking forward to that.

This recipe is fairly easy and turned out a product I would be happy to serve to guests. I hope to make it again for Thanksgiving this year. I did have some difficulty getting the results I thought I should. In the directions for the recipe it says to allow the pears to slowly caramelize. Now I don't know if my pears were too ripe and therefore there was too much liquid and this did not allow for caramelization or what, but it didn't matter how long I cooked the pears, they just got softer and no caramelizing was in sight.

Next time I will buy my pears the day I want to make this and maybe use a different pear, we will see. I hope some of you will make this, it is so delicious and looks really pretty. I adjusted the recipe slightly with the bread  and spices and really liked the flavor I came away with.

Original recipe here

Ingredients:
1 loaf Baguette, sliced
1 T. butter
3 whole pears, chopped
1/4 t. salt
1/2 T. cinnamon
1/4 t. ginger
1/4 t. allspice
1/2 c. mascarpone
1 t. honey
1/2 t. sugar
1/4 t. nutmeg
2 T. balsamic vinegar

Heat the oven to 400°.
Place the baguette rounds on a baking sheet. Bake 5-7 minutes or until toasted and golden brown.
Heat a skillet over medium-low heat.
Add the butter. Add the pears and sprinkle with cinnamon, allspice, ginger and salt.
Allow to caramelize slowly for 10-15 minutes. Stir occasionally.
In a small bowl, combine mascarpone, honey, nutmeg and sugar.
Spread on baguette slices.
Once the pears caramelize, add the balsamic vinegar and cook for 1-2 minutes more.*
Spoon pears over bread.
Serve warm or cold**


* I completely forgot to add the balsamic vinegar when I made this. It still tasted good!
** I recommend serving warm, it's kind of like eating a pear pie :)
By the way, make sure not to add the pears to the baguette while they are really hot, they will melt the mascarpone.

I took some nice photos and instead of showing you only one, I am going to show you all of the good ones!


The cinnamon stick was my mom's idea :)




I love how this looks against the fall tablecloth!


My mom thought it needed some green. It looks pretty good!


As always, thanks for reading!

Sam

Pear Cake

Remember this? I knew I wanted to bake a pear version of this cake and one day while I was out shopping I found a bag of bartlett pears for $0.97! They were smaller than the ones I usually bought but the bag had enough in it to make up for size. So I ate a few and let the rest ripen just for this cake recipe.

As I was gathering all of the ingredients for the cake I noticed that I probably did not have enough white sugar to fulfill the two cups needed. Luckily I did have an even one cup so I used brown sugar for the other cup.

What an amazing difference! This cake was waaaaay better than the peach version and the brown sugar was the only difference. This cake is so tasty and tastes just like fall. Perfect way to start the season.

I posted this recipe on The Pioneer Woman's website, Tasty Kitchen, so I am going to make you go to that site for the actual recipe. I urge you all to make this cake and then serve it warm, perhaps with some vanilla ice cream. But for now you can see some photos of this lovely cake.

Fall!

I know it's not technically fall until September 21st but if you looked out my window you would feel as I do.

This summer has been oppressive, at least in my mind. This probably has more to do with the fact that I had been living 5 minutes from the ocean for 4 years and got used to the temperature there, and less to do with how hot this summer actually was.

Yesterday I awoke to a sky that was blissfully overcast and an outside temp much lower than it was the previous day. Today was much the same and my brain immediately went into "fall" mode. Instead of thinking of berries and peaches, I now want apples and pears and pumpkin pie. I am thinking of getting my long-sleeved shirts out of my closet.

Part of my love for fall is the fact that it means that Christmas seems to be right around the corner, but I also love fall baking. Here are some things I am looking forward to this fall:

Changing my clocks back an hour
Using this Pumpkin Cheesecake recipe to make a Thanksgiving version of this
Making a pear version of this
Possibly whipping up a batch of Ginger Cookies or Pumpkin Fudge
Getting together with my family for Thanksgiving
Going to my friend Doug's family's pumpkin patch
A better chance of getting a job as retailers start hiring for the holiday season
Applying to UC Santa Cruz
The Premier of "The Walking Dead" on AMC (on Halloween!)
Lovely, cooler weather

What are YOU looking forward to this fall?

Sam