Tomorrow's the winter solstice, which we'll be celebrating with a special meal, children's books about the solstice, and music. Here's a post from the ZRecs Archives about how we like to celebrate the "return of the light" with our daughter - an occasion that holds a special place for gardeners, but is a celebration of life and the seasons that everyone can relate to.

Thursday night was the winter solstice, an event that is surprisingly easy for a two-year-old to wrap her head around. We had our first annual Winter Solstice Celebration that night and Z had a blast. We explained to her that yesterday was the longest night of the year and that by celebrating, we were asking the sun to please start coming back and making our days longer and warmer.

Jeremiah had a chocolate cake in the oven when Z and I got home, and the two of them made yellow butter creme icing and then decorated the cake with the icing and construction paper triangles around the edges and a last-minute construction-paper smiley face. Next year, I'll push for cupcakes which can be easily frozen and enjoyed later - a three-person family just can't eat that much cake!

For dinner we made a vegan pumpkin soup, got out our best sun-themed dishes, and had ourselves a party. Here's the recipe:

Solstice Pumpkin Soup

• 4 cups veggie stock


• One can of 100% pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling)


• Garlic and onion


• Olive oil


• One can of coconut milk


• Seasonings

Saute onion and garlic in a little olive oil until translucent, then blend with a little broth until smooth. Combine broth and pumpkin puree and warm over medium heat. Add the blended garlic and onion. Season with a little basil, oregano, thyme, and a dash each of paprika and cayenne. If the soup is too thin, add cornstarch to thicken. Add the can of coconut milk and heat on low until warm.


You might have seen this coming from the pic at top...

The bowls, which have sunflowers on them, surprised us by creating a sun of their own once we'd eaten a bit of soup and the yellow pointed tips of the sunflower petals appeared!

We had also planned to make pine cone feeders but ran out of time. We'll make those sometime next week.

We also played "Here Comes The Sun" and "Good Day Sunshine" by the Beatles. Z wanted to make a toast so we toasted to the return of the sun.

Do you like to do anything to commemorate the winter solstice with your family? Share it in the comments!

I harvested a bumper crop of pumpkins this year, and am happily storing them under my stairwell. Winter squash (like pumpkins, butternut, and others) store really well at or a bit below room temperature; as long as you don't put them in front of the heater or freeze them, they'll stay good for months.



As I need them, I bake my pumpkins and puree the flesh. The recipe for this is easy: Cut the pumpkin in half along the center, as if it was wearing a belt, then remove the seeds and any stringy flesh you can get out and place each half cut-side down in a oven-safe dish containing one inch of water. I use glass pie plates, but you could use a rectangular casserole dish, too. Bake at 375 degrees for about an hour, or until when you poke the pumpkin with a fork it feels about as squishy as a nicely baked potato. Then, I like to use a ice cream scooper to get all the flesh out. Stick it in a food processor and puree!

The next step is to make something tasty. I have three favorite things that I do with pumpkin.

Pumpkin Pie

I use Mollie Katzen's recipe in the Moosewood Cookbook. Delicious and a little different from the kind you make from canned pumpkin. Try it out!

Pumpkin Soup

If you are an intrepid soup maker, pumpkin puree is an ideal starting point. All you really need to do is saute some onions and garlic. Once they are done, combine one part stock (chicken or vegetable) to two parts pumpkin puree, toss in the onions and garlic, and add ample ground pepper, paprika, chili powder, and any other spices you like in a zesty fall soup. That's all! This is great with thick hearty breads, or just chunky crackers.

Ultimate Pumpkin Muffins

After nearly ten years of searching for the ultimate pumpkin muffin recipe, I stumbled on this one last fall. I am confident that this will be a recipe you like, and I've worked out two easy variations on it that are really delicious. The muffins are incredibly moist, rich, and wonderful.

Ingredients:
1 1/2 c flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 c sugar
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp of each: cinnamon, nutmeg, alspice, ginger
1 cp pumpkin puree
1/3 c melted butter or canola oil
Two eggs
1/4 cp water

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Sift all the dry ingredients together in a medium bowl. Beat eggs in a separate, large bowl. Mix all the wet ingredients into the eggs, stir
well. Gently pour the dry into the wet and stir until all mixed - don't over stir, and never use a mixer. Be slightly delicate with the batter.

Bake in muffin cups for 25-30 minutes. Makes one dozen muffins.

Fall seasonal variation: Stir in 1 cup diced frozen cranberries.

Decadent dessert variation: Replace the 1/4 cup of water with 1/4 cup of cold leftover coffee. Stir in 1 cup dark chocolate chips or shavings.

A cool wind "burnt" all my remaining basil to a brown yucky crisp one recent evening, which was frustrating and sad to see. The edges of the pumpkin runners were tinged with yellow and curley. The end of the season is upon us- this means the night winds are dancing on the 32 degree border.


Zucchini bread, here I come!

Therefore, I'm harvesting like mad. Tomatoes need to all come in off the vines before they are destroyed, the remaining zuchini and yellow crook-neck all got pulled inside, and the pumpkins are done. The potatoes could wait, but if the above-ground plants get too withered and crisped, sometimes the dog will knock them off and then we can't recall where we planted them, which makes harvesting them a nightmare. So better to get them out of the ground, too, instead of digging 27 random holes to find 8 potato plants.


The hanging pumpkin's final moment of glory.

But these last weeks of summer, I realize, are not about me. They are about the local farmers at the market. They are desperate to sell their produce, and it is beautiful like nothing I could ever grow. Flawlessly smooth organically grown eggplants, hundreds of pounds of heirloom tomatoes, bushels of basil, crates and crates of unbelievably beautiful bell peppers. I want to cry as I walk through the market. This is what I could grow if I was smarter, had more time, better educated in the ways of vegetables. Mere mortals, surely, but they are like food superheroes to me.


Someday I will be reincarnated as a successful eggplant and pepper grower. Until then, I have the farmer's market.

One unusual thing in Missoula is that a large portion (possibly a majority) of the small-scale farmers are either first or second generation Mung refugees. This is an ethic group displaced in part by the Vietnam War, as I understand it, and resettled in small cities around the US. Now, I can't be sure of this, but I really doubt that the highlands of Laos bear any horticultural resemblance to Western Montana. So not only are the farmers unapologetically brilliant at growing amazing produce, they are also self-taught! They aren't even benefiting from generations of living with our fickle climate, rocky soils, and hordes of pocket gophers. They are just geniuses of the soil. It isn't fair. I want to be them.


I should stick with pumpkins. I'm a New Englander by birth - my people can do pumpkins.

This was underlined in a moment of self-pity as I picked up a huge rubber-banded bouquet of basil. I stared at it in awe. My basil was dead, shriveled, and depressing to think about. A petite man with a thick accent told me it was $2. I asked, "How can you grow such a nice basil plant at this time of year? Mine all died!" He smiled widely and seemed to laugh at me. "Can't grow basil here. Need a greenhouse."

I guess know I need a greenhouse. Why did he have to rub it in? But he doesn't know that after buying 12 basil starts that were killed by a late frost, and then 12 more to replace those, I failed to harvest enough to make a single batch of pesto. He doesn't know that instead, I ended up buying all the basil that he had to offer in a fit of envy. He shouldn't care about my basil sob story, anyway. He's just glad to make a living, and I understand that.

I hereby resolve to not plant any of the following next year, because it will be too depressing when I go to the market. I will leave these things to the professionals. No bell peppers! No hot peppers! No eggplant! And for god's sake, Leigh, don't get your hopes up with the basil!