This is my favorite time of year. The smell in the air is crisp and fresh. Sweatshirt weather without snow boots. It is perfect but it is short.
One day all the leaves are green then you blink and it is a sea of orange, red, gold and yellow. And it is the best time of year for eating! Gardens are overflowing with tomatoes, potatoes, squash and pumpkins. This article is about those wonderful orange squash, grown in all shapes and sizes.
When I was young I thought pumpkins were grown for only one thing… to carve into a Jack O Lantern and bake the seeds in the oven. My brother and I would try to get the biggest pumpkin we could carry to make our Halloween carving. I liked the typical Happy Halloween face with a couple of missing teeth the best. I didn’t like scary things until I was a little older and started reading Stephen King novels. Even then I liked my pumpkin better in pie than made into a scary face with fangs.
Lately I have been baking with pumpkin and I have to say that these “Melt In Your Mouth Pumpkin Cookies” are one of the best recipes I have ever made. These cookies are soft like cake, not crunchy. Baking these also has your house smelling of cinnamon and nutmeg. I encourage you to make a double batch and share them with your neighbors. Or pack a picnic basket with a thermos of pumpkin soup and head out on a walk to enjoy the leaves.
Remember the days of autumn are numbered; enjoy them while you can before we are all snowed in.
I love autumn, the one
season of the year that God
seemed to have put there
just for the beauty of it.
Lee Maynard
Taste of Home columnist Sandy (Anderson) Holthaus lives on a farm in South Haven, MN with her husband, Michael, and their children Zoe, Jack and Ben. Her heart remains on the North Shore where she grew up with her parents, Art and LaVonne Anderson of Schroeder. She enjoys writing about her childhood and mixes memories with delicious helpings of home-style recipes.
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