The rain arrived, September changed the cooking list overnight, and I am seeing a friend this weekend for the first time in far too long
It has been raining, and cool, and I am grateful for both.
The circle and the trees have been droopy and sad-looking after a long hot summer. This week’s rain is a bit of rest for them. There is a nor’easter working its way up the east coast this weekend, and if you are in its path I hope you are tucked in somewhere safe.
The best part of this weekend: I am seeing a friend I have not seen in a long time. We talk on the phone regularly, but there is nothing quite like being in the same room with someone you love after a stretch apart. I cannot wait.
What about you, what does your weekend look like?
Food
Once September turns, my cooking list changes almost overnight. Out go the tomato salads and in come the soup pot and anything that gives me an excuse to turn on the oven. Here are three I have my eye on this week.
Cabbage Sausage Orzo Soup from Gimme Some Oven
Ali’s secret here is a bag of coleslaw mix, the whole bag, stirred right into the pot. I do love a shortcut that hides in plain sight. The shredded cabbage and carrots melt into the broth along with browned Italian sausage, a generous spoonful of tomato paste, orzo, and a handful of kale at the end. Parmesan and lemon go in off the heat, which keeps the whole pot tasting bright rather than heavy. It comes together in one pot in about 35 minutes and feeds six to eight, so there will be lunch tomorrow. If you are filling out your soup list for the colder months, it would sit happily alongside my fall and winter soup favorites.
Get the recipe: Cabbage Sausage Orzo Soup at Gimme Some Oven
Butternut Squash, Sage and Parmesan Pizza from How Sweet Eats
Instead of tomato sauce, Jessica roasts butternut squash and whips it with Parmesan and a splash of cream into a spreadable base. On top goes Parmesan, fresh sage leaves, and delicata squash sliced thin it cooks right on the pizza with no roasting ahead. She says naan or pita will do in a pinch. If you have squash left over, my butternut squash soup will happily take it.
Get the recipe: Butternut Squash, Sage and Parmesan Pizza at How Sweet Eats
Autumn Glow Salad with Lemon Dressing from Pinch of Yum
A salad with no lettuce in it. Stay with me. Roasted cauliflower and sweet potato, a hearty grain (freekeh, quinoa, or whatever is in the pantry), chopped apple, and a parsley lemon dressing that wakes everything up. It is filling enough to be dinner, and if you keep the dressing on the side, it holds up in the fridge for the next day. Readers clearly agree, with sixty-two reviews and an average just shy of five stars. It serves six as a main or eight to ten as a side, so it would be a welcome guest at a fall potluck.
Get the recipe: Autumn Glow Salad with Lemon Dressing at Pinch of Yum
Read, Watch, Listen
When students attend these colleges, taxpayers often pay. Here’s why
Satellites show Earth lost more than 12 trillion tons of ice from Greenland, Antarctica in 47 years
J.R.R. Tolkien on How to Fall in Love with Life
How to Politely End a Party When Guests Linger Too Long, According to an Etiquette Expert
The Tech-bro in the Treaty Room
Looking for a two-ingredient hight protein bread?
A 2-Minute Story for Those Who Are Overwhelmed (and Not Sure What to Do Next)
On the Nightstand
Here are the three books on my stack and my list this week.
The Invisible Women’s Club by Helen Paris
Janet Pimm is in her seventies and perfectly content to go unnoticed, as long as she has her allotment (the British version of a community garden plot). When the local council moves to shut the allotments down, she reluctantly joins forces with Bev, the relentlessly cheerful neighbor she has spent years dodging. Somewhere in the battle for her beloved plot, Janet starts to wonder whether fading into the background suits her after all, and Bev turns out to be a great deal more than bright chatter. It is a warm story about friendship, community, and women finding their voices on the far side of menopause.
Maggie and Liz are sisters (named, yes, after a rather more famous pair of siblings) with almost nothing else in common. Maggie drifts around the world without letting anyone get too close, while Liz presides over village life in Little Martin and is determined to get marriage, motherhood, and homemaking exactly right, new build house and all. When their grandmother, known to all as Queen Vic, dies in suitably dramatic fashion, the sisters inherit the family manor along with their spendthrift father, a notorious ladies’ man who leaves trouble wherever he goes. After years of separate lives, they finally have to decide whether they can meet in the middle. An inheritance that includes a manor house was always going to end up on my list.
The Stargazer’s Sister by Carrie Brown
Caroline Herschel really lived. She was the younger sister of William Herschel, known for both his music and his discoveries in the night sky, and she became a gifted astronomer herself. The novel opens as William brings Caroline, called Lina, out of a dreary, servant-like existence in Germany to England, where she runs his bustling household and helps him with his music and his telescopes. She gives herself over to her brilliant brother completely, until the day he announces he is getting married and everything she has built around him falls apart. Carrie Brown weaves family loyalty and rivalry together with the wonder of the night sky and how small we are beneath it.
Outfit of the Week
Black and gray in the winter is one of my favorite color combinations, it is classic and sophisticated. This week I paired black cords, with an argyle sweater and loafers topped with a cropped gray barn coat. Then I added one of my favorite bags from Moncrief.
Outfit Separates Below
I hope you enjoyed Friday Favorites! Tell me which was your favorite recipe, or what is on your weekend list.
Find me on Pinterest and Instagram for more during the week.
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