First Attempt at Latkes

I made latkes about 2 months ago, from a recipe in a calendar.  Surprisingly, although I wrecked the kitchen, they came out, and in one piece.  Not bad for my first time.  Wringing the potato shreds dry after I food-processed them was the time-consuming part.  I still had to add some panko and other bread crumbs but once I fried them, they came out great.   

Autumn

Fall is here. Today the temperature only reached around 100 degrees in Mesa. It was muzzy outside, and my allergies were fierce. I baked pumpkin spice cookies from a packaged mix. Sometimes I spite myself and do something dumb, like stack all the baked cookies on top of one another even though they are still hot, and then they glump together. However, that simply gives me an excuse to eat the casualties. So I did that, as well as imbibe two different pumpkin beers. The first one, from Blue Moon, had a bit of spicy scent, but no actual pumpkin taste. The other one, Lakefront Pumpkin Lager, was a bit spicier and "pumpkiny-er". Also had some Trader Joe's sweet potato gnocchi. Delicious.

Indian Foods

I'm still looking for the direction I will go in with this blog.  Very excited about ethnic cuisines, particularly Indian.  Am reading, among other titles, Gil Marks' Encyclopedia of Jewish Foods.  There are Jewish food communities in India, of which I was unaware.  Marks' book has an amazing amount of info on the topic.  A couple of weeks ago, I visited an Indian market (and restaurant) and purchased some besan and some ajowan.  I was originally going to use the besan for making falafel, but instead, I'm going to try it as a thickener in some curry. 

Oxymel

So oxymel is a mixture of honey, vinegar (apple cider seems to be the flavor of choice) and garlic or other spices.  You're supposed to take it when you feel a cold coming on.  Sounds good to me--hot and sour soup seems to clear up my head colds almost immediately, and it has vinegar in it.  But oxymel would also help to soothe the throat. 

Don't mix artificial sugar with espresso.  It tastes like poisoned cherry cough syrup.  Just know this from my experience.