Dinner last night at my parents' house became a communal effort, a kind of post-fast blitz. I find lately that fasting changes my life more than it used to. Now it doesn't just involve not eating, it is also not cooking. And these days, I spend approximately an hour a day in recreational cooking. A day without menu planning, blog reading, puttering, and eating is a day with a very different rhythm. The next day, of course, it was back to the silliness, and Ellen and my mother and Matt and I made a startling amount of dinner. Pastry began and pastry ended, as I got absorbed in some empanadas and Ellen made a delicious tarte tatin from a hoarded old NYtimes recipe. Here she is rolling her pastry...
Here I am rolling mine.
The filling for the empanadas, which could have used some more seasoning and some more juice, was turkey and onions and potato with some corn and paprika. The dough was cooperative but too buttery for the ultimately dry payoff. Some tweaking to be done, but like the dumplings, these are always fun to make and fun to eat.Being home also means I was able to collect our neighbor's fallen quinces, some of which I already boiled into a very stiff jam, most of which are still awaiting their fate. They smell like fall and taste like a citrus-y apple.
Speaking of apples, I didn't take pictures, but we held a little heirloom apple tasting with local russets this afternoon, and the clear winner if you're a fan of dense and tart apples was the Orleans Reinette. Good thing, too, because I couldn't tell most of the others apart. If I remember correctly, there was a Golden Russet and an Ashmead's Kernel.
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