Welcome, October

Just two more Thursday Markets left! October 4 and October 11. If you have favorite farmers and vendors that you hit up on Thursdays, be sure to stock up and ask about alternatives: will they be moving to Saturday? Do they offer places to buy their products in the off-season (buyers' clubs or CSAs)? Do they offer bulk deals?

The sun keeps on shining, but the calendar moves on. We're seeing sure signs of fall:

  

Goose Neck Gourds, people!

And how about these beauties?

As you probably know, you don't just pay those squash to look good. If they're uncut, you can just roast those puppies up anytime this fall or winter. Our family is still eating butternut squash from last fall, if you can believe it! So grab a few to decorate your house and eat them whenever you please. You can cut in half and roast in the oven or halve them and let them go in the crock-pot for several hours. Mash up the pulp, add butter, brown sugar, salt, and a little ginger, and you're good to go!

I tried two new pepper varieties this week:

Aren't they cute?

Darling "blueberry peppers" at Alvarez went in a salad, and the ones below were suggested to me as an alternative to jalapenos. Although they didn't have the slight kick of jalapeno peppers, they had flavor and crunch and worked just fine in my pico de gallo.

And then I saw these stripe-y wonders:

If anyone out there has an easy home recipe for Baingan Bharta (forgive my spelling), the yummy Indian preparation for eggplant, I would sure love to have it. It's the Asian subcontinent's answer to Eggplant Parmesan, and so far those are the only two ways I've enjoyed the beautiful vegetable. Err--fruit.

We aren't the only ones eating well this fall. When the nine-year-old sidekick and I hit up Juice Box for an "RPP" (red pepper, pineapple, and uh--something else that starts with a 'p'), we checked out the bin catching all those leftover peels and cores and such:

Food confetti

I commented on how awesome their yard waste must be, and they told me they actually hand the stuff over to Millingwood Eggs! Dave feeds it to his chickens who--to mix my farm animals--go absolutely hog-wild over it. All the beets in the pulp have actually tinted the eggshells faintly pink, I guess to go with Millingwood's lovely pink egg cartons. So if I drink the RPP from the Juice Box, and the chickens eat the leftovers from my RPP, and I eat the eggs from the chickens--mind-blowing. Some kind of semi-closed ecosystem going on.

Anyhow, there is all kinds of food excitement happening at the Market, and I hope you get over there! Remember Saturdays go until right before Thanksgiving.

And now, I leave you with a bouquet:

Because you're worth it.