use real butter

homemade croutons
Foods that can be used in two states: fresh and spoiled/stale are wonderful for people like me who hate to waste and are occasionally unable to get around to using them. Bananas are the best for banana bread when they are past due. Likewise, stale bread is terrific for making croutons (or bread pudding or stuffing). I learned to make croutons in the field where Chilean bread goes stale after you remove it from the store. You just need some garlic, olive oil, and stale bread. Plenty of that in Chile.

dice stale bread, heat minced garlic in olive oil, toss in bread and fry

serve on a delish salad

This afternoon Jeremy went about cleaning the whole house while I prepared dinner for our guests this evening. I have to say that Mr. Jeremy is an uber-swell guy. I don’t clean the bathrooms. He does. AMAZING. He probably does about 65% of the laundry, and he does 50% of the vacuuming, picks up 75% of Kaweah’s poops, and he does 80% of the dishes. On top of that, he never has a mean word for me and he is super duper.

autumn fruits for an autumny dessert

Maia and her husband drove up from Golden. She’s a friend of mine from high school (and junior high, and elementary school). She also got us set up with our realtor and helped us shop around for a broker. We had been meaning to get them out here for a while, but our schedules were full up until this weekend. I’m so glad they could come out. They are really fascinating and have moved around a lot – Prague, Buenos Aires, NYC, Boston, Golden. As we poured wine, we learned that Maia wasn’t drinking because she’s expecting! She’s due around the same time as S. which means I’ll have to add two more knitting projects to my already delinquent project list for two other kids who will be in college before I get around to their stuff… Her hubby is a freeheeler too! I think this is a requirement to live in Colorado :)

Tom and Kelly are both huge fans of food. You can tell they love to eat, but they don’t like cooking. I know for a fact that they are especially fond of baked goods. So tonight after we got home from tree harvesting, I make a cranberry nut dessert. Well, I made two: one for Tom and Kelly, and another to take to the office. There are other bakers in our workplace, which is kinda nice as it spreads the cheer and the labor. When I was at Cornell, I baked for the department fairly regularly for a time (also to keep myself sane until I decided I hated most of the people in the department in my fifth year). Feeding people is an intimate act – a motherly act. This is where you take ingredients that are generally unappealing on their own (with the notable exception of sweetened chocolate), and combine them to create something wonderful, something to bring pleasure to others. Our basic human needs include food, sleep, shelter, water. I find food to be the most gratifying both in intake and in giving. It is an act of love, of thanks, of friendship.