Catnips Curry Pie

This is a dinner pie and really Daniels idea.
Catnips Curry Pie
Crust: put one cup of water in a bowl. add 1 t. dry yeast and some whole wheat flour. cover and let stand one hour. then add 2 T. olive oil, 1 t. salt and more flour. Knead until a good consistency.
Boil 2½ c.water
Add 1 t. salt
2 t. curry powder
1½ c. basmanti rice
simmer 15 minutes.
meanwhile:
chop 1 onion, garlic, red pepper. Sauté in olive oil. Add some frozen peas, green beans and corn and 2 t. curry. Brown 1 lb. lean ground beef and add to vegetables. add 1 t. salt. add the cooked curry rice and mix well. Put all of this into a very large greased pie pan. (mine is white porcelain). Roll the dough and cover. cut slits in the top in a decorative pattern and bake at 350 about 30 minutes.

Sunrise

Winter Magic

Happy Winter Solhverv

Stand by me with Music for Change

Quick Minestrone Soup

I used to make real Minestrone Soup and begin by soaking the dried beans. But this is a quick and delicious soup without dried beans so maybe it doesn't really qualify as a Minestrone, but it is for me. Perfect right now in November when it is getting gray and cold and dark and wintry outside. It is also good with a November cactus (above) which started blooming again November first.

Quick Minestrone Soup

Onion, garlic, carrots, celery, tomato paste or canned tomatoes, salt , pepper, oregano, thyme, water

Chop vegetables very fine. Add fresh grean beans, parsley root or other seasonal vegetables if you want. I grate my garlic. Sauté in olive oil. Add tomato paste or canned tomatoes. If using canned tomatoes, blend them so they are finely pureed. Add water and spices. Bring to a boil and simmer until the vegetables are cooked. Add dry pasta of your choice and boil until cooked.

Halloween- eating pumpkins and Hokkaido squash

As a kid, I wouldn't touch pumpkin pie, but I have found that almost all kids like pumpkin cake and toated pumpkin seeds. And lots of kids have eaten my cake, because I used to have a Halloween party every year at the little library I worked at which was combined with a school library. There would come around 50 children and adults each year who would carve pumpkins so the seeds and filling flew around the room and dress up in costumes and play pumpkin bowling, and pin the frog in the witch's cauldron. When I started no one in Denmark knew about Halloween, but today it has quickly caught on and they sell Halloween pumpkins and Halloween do dads everywhere. But trick or treating hasn't really started here. There is another holiday in January where the kids dress up and go from door to door. They prefer to get money, but I give them candy.

PUMPKIN CAKE

1 cup cooked and mashed pumpkin

I use a Hokkaido squash that I cut in pieces, scrape out the seeds and loose center, peel and chop and boil in water for 10 minutes until soft and easy to mash. I put in less water than squash and just mash the squash with the remaining water. Of course I have also used regular pumpkins but Hokkaido squash are smaller and look and taste like pumpkins.

2 eggs

½ cup oil

1 t. almond extract

1 T cinnamon

½ cup raw sugar (Once I forgot the sugar and although my son wouldn't eat it, my friends thought it was fine- pumpkin has a natural sweetness)

1½ cup flour (whole wheat)

1 t baking soda

1 t. baking powder

If the batter is too thick add some buttermilk

bake about 30 min in greased 9" pan at 350

ICING

confectioners sugar, 1 t cinnamon, 2T boiling water

PUMPKIN MUFFINS

this is almost the same recipe with less oil, less sugar, less egg and I leave out the cinnamon but you can use it.

1 cup cooked and mashed pumpkin

1 egg

3 T oil

1/3 cup raw sugar

1 t almond extract

1 ½ cup whole wheat flour

1 t baking powder

1 t baking soda

some buttermilk

bake in greased muffin tin about 25 min. before baking make pumpkin faces with raisins on top.

1½ cups whole wheat flour

TOASTED PUMPKIN SEEDS

rinse and drain pumpkin seeds. Mix olive oil and 1 t. salt. Mix seeds with this. spread on a baking sheet and toast in the oven. I toast and eat the whole seeds with the husk.