HERE COMES SEPTEMBER!

Hello, September. This is one of our most energetic months as summer fades and autumn sneaks up on us. Our nights turn cooler and our days are crisp. We stash our summer clothes and dig out our fall garments—jeans, flannel shirts, sweaters, and light jackets. Best of all, we get to take a walk and look for trees and bushes with colorful leaves turning to scarlet, gold, or orange. If we’re lucky we’ll see geese winging their way south or see a squirrel scurry over the ground as it searches for acorns and seeds.

September heralds a season when an assortment of activities now fill our lives. It’s apple picking time. It’s a trip to our farmer’s market, filled with pumpkins, winter squash, carrots, and peaches. We clean out our garden and flowerbeds. And let’s not forget that the cooler weather chases us willingly back to the kitchen for baking cakes, cookies, donuts, and pies. The scent of cinnamon, nutmeg, and vanilla swirl in the air. 

Below I’m featuring an apple treat. This is an old recipe I copied from my mother’s handwritten notebook of her most loved recipes.

Nobby Apple Cake                                                           

6 TBSP butter or margarine
2 cups sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp cinnamon
½ tsp salt
2 tsp baking soda
2 cups sifted flour
6 cups diced apples
½ cup chopped nuts
2 tsp vanilla

Cream margarine, sugar and eggs;
Sift dry ingredients together and add to creamed mixture
Stir in diced apples, nuts and vanilla
Pour into greased pan. 

Bake: 350 degrees for 40-45 minutes.

I prefer to lightly ice my cake with just a plain thin layer of vanilla frosting.
Great with ice cream or whipped cream or plain.

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LUCY ~ THE CLARINETIST - Coming October 26th

October reminds us of cool, crisp days, a rainbow of colored leaves, and Halloween. October is also National Dessert Month. With seasonal ingredients like spicy cinnamon, rich caramel, and decadent pecans, autumn is one of the best seasons for baking. Who doesn’t enjoy pumpkin pie heaped with Kool Whip? Or apple pie or crisp? How about pecan pie and the many cobblers?

This month, on October 26th, I’m releasing my last novella in the Musical Christmas Series. It’s Lucy –The Clarinetist, and like the preceding novellas, it includes a recipe that one of the main characters enjoys. This time it’s Andre Almanza who likes apple pie with a cinnamon crumb crust.

            APPLE PIE WITH CINNAMON CRUMB CRUST TOPPING

INGREDIENTS:

¾ cup sugar

¼ cup all-purpose flour

1 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 tsp. nutmeg (optional)

Dash of salt

6 cups thinly sliced pared apples (McIntosh work well)

2 TBSP. butter or margarine

Deep Dish Pastry for a 9-inch pie  (You need only the bottom crust)

Heat oven to 425 degrees. Prepare pastry or use one purchased from the store. (Frozen deep dish varieties work best.)

Stir together sugar, flour, nutmeg, cinnamon, and salt and mix with apples. Turn into pastry-lined pan and dot with butter.

 CINNAMON CRUMB CRUST:

Mix 1 cup flour, ½ cup cold butter, 2 tsp. cinnamon, and ½ cup (packed) brown sugar. Cut dry ingredients into butter with pastry cutter until crumbly. Carefully spread the mixture on the top of the apples, packing it down around the edges.

Bake 40 to 50 minutes.

NOTE: You many need to cover topping with aluminum foil for the last ten minutes to prevent excess browning.  Serve warm with ice cream or whipped cream.

BLURB:

A merry novella for the holiday season!

Lucy Ciaffonni wants nothing more than to start her own public relations firm, but she’s stuck at the local bank performing boring communications and advertising duties. When her best friend and computer guru, Andre Almanza, buys an area farm to create a barn theater, Lucy is pulled into the mystery of discovering where a rare, German, H.F. Kayser clarinet was hidden on the property during Prohibition.

Andre Almanza has always adored Lucy from afar. He hopes she’ll take the position of barn theater manager. When she agrees to help him renovate the barn and update and furnish his huge Victorian house, he is delighted—that is, until the entire town becomes involved in locating the missing antique instrument. To complicate matters, there are ruthless people who want to recover the expensive clarinet and cash in on its legend and value.

Will Lucy and Andre locate the clarinet and finally acknowledge the sparks of romance that have been smoldering between them for the longest time? Will it be the perfect Christmas?

       GET YOUR PRE-ORDER AND COPY OF "LUCY ~ THE CLARINETIST HERE!

 

Bon Appetite: Pumpkin Pie

I have to admit, pumpkin pie is one of my favorite pies. When fall arrives, so does the thought of pumpkins. Although the usual color of pumpkins is orange, they come in lots of other colors, such as green, yellow, red, white, blue and tan.

Pumpkins are considered part of the winter squash family and are used as decorations and Halloween jack-o-lanterns. The ever-famous fall pumpkin contests bring people together to witness the giant ones which have been known to exceed a ton in weight.

Pumpkins can be consumed in pies, soups, purees, cakes, and cookies. Even the seeds are roasted and eaten. In some countries, the leaves are consumed. Whether they are boiled, steamed or roasted, the pumpkin is part of our country’s traditional autumn harvest.

Here is my recipe for pumpkin pie.

 

Pumpkin Pie

¾ cup granulated sugar

1- 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

½ tsp salt

2 large eggs (beaten)

1 – 15 ounce can of pumpkin

1 can evaporated milk

1 deep dish pie shell

Mix sugar, cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, and salt in a large bowl. Stir in pumpkin, and then beaten eggs. Gradually stir in evaporated milk. Pour into the prepared pie shell. Bake in preheated over at 425 degrees for 15 minutes. Reduce temperature to 350 degrees and bake for 40 to 50 minutes more until a knife or toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool and serve with whipped cream or vanilla ice cream.  Calories: 230

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