Pumpkin

My father always referred to us as "Pumpkin" when he was in an endearing mood. The name was altered slightly when we caught playing with his artist paints, a forbidden activity. But most of the time, he called us "Pumpkin" with good intentions.

For that reason and many others, Fall in the US is my favorite time of year. One moment sunny and bright with brilliant orange and red leaves dancing off the trees, the next it is rainy and cold with gunmetal grey skies that cause you to question your entire sub-human existence. Fall is very dramatic, very emotional, very unpredictable and of so very...

Irish.

Thus, what better time is there to bake comfort foods? The GK's and I  plunged into the real thing last week after buying it from a farmer friend selling such at our last Farmers Market of the year. Cut into chunks and plopped in the oven to soften it was soon soft enough to peel and throw into the food processor.

Once pureed we added our own raw milk, & raw eggs plus the spices we like. While it sat soaking up the goodness I taught my GK's how to make crust.

My mother was an excellent crust maker and though she had her hands full most days with all us kids I manged to get in her way long enough to learn the process. The key to good pie crust is COLD. You must use cold shortening (me ma used Crisco, I prefer real lard from our pigs) cold flour, preferable right from the freezer, and ice cold water.

Once mixed, but never over mixed we had fun using the rolling pin. It is my mothers rolling pin which means that piece of wood has been rolling out pie crusts sine the 1950's. Take THAT you germaphobes! Although I give it a quick wipe after each use it is never really "washed" as that seriously could harm the wood. This means each time I use it a nanometer of flour from say Thanksgiving 1976 or Christmas 1962 may have fallen into the dough I am making on that particular day. Yum....

The GK's love using the rolling pin and did a fine job. The way they could focus all their concentration on just the task at hand was so amazing. Just during the time to do this brief post I have gotten up to refill my coffee twice, OK six times, put in a load of laundry, tidy up the kitchen and throw away garbage off my desk of junk.

Soon it was time to pour and bake.

Waiting for it to cool always the hardest part but always so worth the wait. Thank you Knapp Family for growing such a fine pumpkin.

Thank you mom, for teaching me how good times roll.