Hi, Y'all!
I already mentioned the culture clash Halloween vs. St. Martin's Day (Note to self: Get some goodies for the children because they'll come lantern singing tomorrow!) and therefore, I will concentrate on the culinary side of fall.
And as I already started with Halloween, here is some good and scary stuff I made for our haunted house party:
First, some poisoned potion: (Blue Curacao, canned peaches, Fanta and some bubbly):
With some dry ice this could have a dramatic effect (a few years ago, we had that at a Harry Potter-themed birthday party) but our favorite chemist wasn't in town :-)
Bit of a salty snack: wiener mummys!
And some sweet treat: witch fingers!
But fall has more to offer than Halloween, and pumpkins can be used for more than soup; a risotto for instance. I diced up a Butternut pumpkin and roasted it in the oven. Then I fried some bacon, added the risotto rice and deglazed it with some vegetable broth (you could use white wine, of course). Before serving, add a healthy dose of sage and parmesan cheese and mix the pumpkin back in. Spritz some Balsamico cream on top and you're good to go!
Another very fally thing is tarte or quiche. And I'm being honest with you guys: Nothing works better than a store bought puff pastry, because in a few minutes your dish is ready to eat.
For example this pear tarte with goat's cheese and caramelized walnuts, or below one with figs, hazelnuts and camembert cheese:
Another good alternative are vegetable fritters. Here I grated zucchini as a base and mixed them with egg, breadcrumbs and shredded cheese. I made little balls and pressed them on a sheet pan to roast them fatfree in the oven. Side dish of greek joghurt with some herbs and lemon, and the healthy yumminess was ready!
But you guys know me well - I can't leave this post without some dessert. And so I made cinnamon buns! I guess, they are typical American, but they exist in Germany and in Scandinavia, as well. Thus I prepared a yeast dough and let it rest for quite some time. I rolled it into a large rectangle and brushed a mix of melted butter, sugar and cinnamon onto it. Then I cut strips and rolled them (you could roll the whole dough into a large snake and cut that in slices, too). Put the rolls with the spirals looking up into a casserole dish and let them sit again. Bake it afterwards and coat it with some frosting (I melted white chocolate and mixed it with cream cheese). Of course, you could opt for the classic topping of powdered sugar with lemon juice, that is equally delish. And this is how it looks like:
But to create some balance between my kitchen and my diy desk, please find below another possibility to recycle old t-shirts. When entering from our loggia into our living room there is a step slighty higher than normal. That was a bit awkward for our dogs, because they jumped down and then slipped on the vinyl floor. To make landing easier for them, I wanted to make a mat. Thus I produced some yarn from worn-out t-shirts and started to crochet a door mat.
I gave my best but that thing stayed crooked and I did not like that! So I ribbed it apart and started again, this time with my knitting needles:
Much better. To finish it I sewed an old leather label from a pair of jeans, and now it looks pretty professional and works like a charm:
Last Sunday we were invited to a birthday and I didn't want to come empty-handed. I already bought some faux leather in gold on our last fabric market in the summer, because you never know... And so I had the perfect material on hand to sew a cute little clutch:
Simple and elegant, with a snap as closure (because I don't like to use magnetic closures - you never know if they might destroy the magnetic strip on credit cards and such). And the tassle is only lightly attached to the snap, thus you can wear the clutch with or without.
Well, that's it for today - enjoy the fallidays, 'cause advent is just around the corner!
