Homemade is Better...

All year long you can find me impatiently waiting for the first signs of the season changing. Come late August you can hear me say "Can you feel that? I think there's a little something in the air" to which my darling hubby will reply "Don't jinx it! Great, now it's going to stay hot forever".

Here in Maryland the very first sign of color change has arrived. The farm behind us has some beautiful weeping cherry trees and they are always the first to turn. They are beautifully peppered with the first yellow leaves! 

Which brings me to the topic of the day...Pumpkin Spiced Lattes or in my case since I don't have my own personal espresso maker, Pumpkin Spiced Strong Coffee with some Warm Frothed Milk.

Don't get me wrong, I love me a Starbucks Latte but every year when the Pumpkin Spiced Latte comes out I find myself once again going out for one and I am always disappointed. It just isn't pumpkin-y enough for me. Maybe it's just me.

                 

                                           

I found a recipe for PSL Syrup over at my favorite blog A Beautiful Mess and decided to try it this morning and WOW!

It's like liquid pumpkin pie! No Joke. 

Mr. AB saw what I was up to this morning and circled the kitchen till it was ready and he practically pushed me out of the way to pour some in his travel mug before leaving for the job site. One sip and he's hooked. 

Creativity in the Kitchen...

     Creativity isn't just relegated to drawing and painting in the studio you know. Cooking is a wonderful way to be creative. It satisfies so many of the senses. Just the other day while Mr. AB was making spaghetti sauce from scratch he observed the following, "You know, if all the people that went around spending all that money on scented candles and crap would just step into the kitchen once in a while and cook something their houses would smell delicious"! Then he promptly went back into the kitchen to stir his pot. I have to admit, every time he made a pass around the pot with the wooden spoon a whole new wave of hypnotizing scents would waft my way. I was drooling and my tummy was gurgling by the time we were called to the table.

   
     I am constantly being inspired by new recipes. A few years ago a good friend of mine turned me onto a blog called Smitten Kitchen and I can with all honesty say that I have made dozens of her recipes and not one, NOT ONE of them have been disappointing. There aren't too many things you can say that about. I highly recommend Smitten Kitchen for all your "what are we going to eat" needs. She makes everything over there!

     Fall is my all time favorite season. No other season can hold a candle to it. It makes me start to think of soups and winter veggie stews. With all our loads of tomatoes continuing to ripen on the vine out back I was looking for a new recipe to help ring in the season and I found just the trick. 

Roasted Tomato Soup with Broiled Cheddar

     The tomatoes were roasted, all soup ingredients combined then left to simmer on the stove in my GORGEOUS dutch oven that my wonderful sister-in-law brought me a few months ago during a visit. This seemed the perfect recipe to break it in! Doesn't the look of it just make you want to dive right in and rub this all over your body? No? Just me? Ok, I can live with that. 

     Pour the soup into an oven proof mug, top with a toasted italian bread slice and shredded cheese of your choice and broil till melty and golden bubbly!  

     No, I'm not left handed. This is actually a pic of Mr. AB's mug sitting across from me. His white mug was cuter than my black one. 

     The only thing I would change about this recipe is I would double it for leftovers! YUMMY!! As I type, I hear the sound of a spoon being scraped across the bottom of the mug getting every last bit of goodness. There's no better compliment to the chef I could receive. Well, doing the dishes perhaps?

                               What kind of recipes does Autumn inspire in your kitchen?

Lunch Time at the AB

Everything Bagel, toasted

Cream Cheese

Capers

Dill 

Nova Scotia Salmon

Sometimes you just need a bagel sandwich to keep ya going.

What's your favorite go to lunch item?