We Have a Cold Day; Thinking of Cooking.

Tuesday, December 10, 2013.

There have been many cold days in probably every state in the union these past weeks, and more cold is still coming. Have you been cold? What do you do when you are cold? Sometimes I don't like to step out the door, and I'll stay inside and put a sweater on.

Sometimes when it gets cold, we think of soup, don't we? Making a delicious warm soup always gives us comfort on a cold day. One day in 1986 I made some soup with chicken skin and juice from turkey sausage, adding a potato, garlic, carrot, celery and bay leaf. It certainly did warm me up. I had cooked some skinned chicken legs for a few meals the week before and froze the skin. How lucky I was that day to have it in the freezer. Bay leaf makes a soup tasty, and we can also find this and that in our refrigerators, for making soup on a cold day.

It is cold here today, about thirty-five degrees, but sunny. It will probably rain by the end of the week. The eastern part of the country is getting ready today for some rain, snow, and sleet before mid-afternoon. Maryland, eastern Pennsylvania, and much of New York are having bad weather already.

It's quite amazing how excited we can get with making certain foods! Late this morning I thought of the acorn squash that I had in the fridge. I wanted to see how it would cook in the crock pot. I washed and cut it in half horizontally, scooped out the seeds, then the stringiness, and put half of it in my one-quart crock pot to cook. This crock pot is so small, it has only low temperature, so I must wait another few hours for that half to be cooked.  

With the other half, I scooped out the lovely seeds first, then the strings (to keep them separate from the seeds). I turned on the oven to 400 ˚ and put a bit of olive oil in the squash on a small pan. The seeds stirred it up and patted it all down. The seeds were ready to come out in about nine or ten minutes, and
turned out to be such a lovely shade of tan / brown, crispy, and very delicious (and very good for you). The oven half is still in the oven, with a little added honey. I am eager to taste it.

Then I thought that while I'm at it, I may as well take out one of the medium turnips from the fridge and cook it in a frying pan. A little olive oil goes a long way, to gently fry some half-inch strips of peeled turnip. Yummy is all I can say! Sometimes I plan what I shall have for a meal. At other times I have impulses and good ideas that are not planned, which turn out to be quite interesting and tasty.

I hope you are using your cold day to make some soup...


I'll see you at the Corner Post ...