What if?

So, what if I were to start a food/baking/cooking themed blog? It’s something I’ve thought about a lot recently. So what if I’m a busy college student? So what if I’m preparing for student teaching in the next 4 months? I can still cook, and I can still bake, and I can still share my thoughts. At least once in a while. After all, as the apron I was just wearing always reminds me, you need to go out on a limb sometimes.

I went grocery shopping today – an occurrence I have been looking forward to all week, through all my studying and observing and busy-ness (along with a stop with a friend at Winfrey's Chocolate and Fudge Shop – for a homemade-marshmallow-covered-in-chocolate-with-Reese’s-pieces-on-a-stick. It was pretty wonderful). I love grocery shopping. But it also meant that I could finally get eggs to make the French toast I’ve been craving all week. And the butternut squash to make the recipe I’ve been waiting for over a year to try. And I could wait for neither, so that’s how I ended up with this odd combination for dinner:

Yes. French toast, butternut squash “fries” and homemade applesauce. Odd combination, I know. And I also made it in the most chaotically messy kitchen I’ve ever worked in. This is what happens when six people in an apartment have crazy schedules (and this is after washing my dishes):

It was a little strange eating the fries. It was like eating something “forbidden” and vegetables at the same time. In one yummy and healthy side dish. I’ve been waiting to try this recipe for a looooong time, and I finally got up the courage to get a butternut squash today and try to cut it up with our “knife-resembling-objects.” It wasn’t nearly as hard as I thought, actually, granted it was one of those pre-peeled, cut in half and seeded ones. Nothing like trying to cut through a buttercup squash with a bread knife. I wouldn’t advise trying it. They were actually pretty good too. They almost tasted similar to sweet potato fries, but some of them could have cooked longer and ended up with a slightly “squash-y” texture to them.

I’ll be making them again, that’s for sure. (And there are more in my fridge for tomorrow!)

Here’s the recipe.

Then came the applesauce. It’s also an altered Hungry Girl recipe. It used up a bunch of Macintosh apples that were getting soft and weren’t good for eating anymore, plus it made my apartment smell like fall! Instead of adding sugar, this applesauce has red hots candies in it. It isn’t spicy, just cinnamony and yummy. J I didn’t feel like pulling out my Crockpot, nor did I have the time to get it started, so I adapted it to the stove:

6 small-medium apples, peeled and cubed

½ cup water

½ tsp cinnamon

Dash nutmeg

Dash salt

Juice of ½ lemon

2 tbsp red hot candies

Put apples, water, spices, salt and lemon juice into medium saucepan and bring to a boil over medium-high heat.

Add the red hots candies and reduce heat to medium-low. Stir occasionally until the candies are melted.

Let it simmer, stirring occasionally for 20-30 minutes or until most of the apples have lost their form and it becomes sauce consistency. Serve warm or cold.

Makes 2 servings.

Finally came the French toast. I have this wonderful bakery-made molasses oatmeal bread, and I discovered a couple of weeks ago that it makes wonderful French toast. When I made it before, I also discovered that it’s really good with the applesauce ON the French toast. I didn’t have any maple syrup then (and what can I say? I’m a New England girl, I only do the real stuff) and I needed something on it. Applesauce and Nutella did the trick. But tonight, it was applesauce and syrup. Good stuff.

So that’s what made me start blogging. It was a really good dinner.