Carbonade Valdostana, honey lime enchiladas, a Southern ghost story, Nuremberg’s hidden women, and a Gilded Age novel to watch for
Another week has gone by in what felt like a blink. My mom was visiting, and time always moves faster when she is here. Now she is home, and we are back to real life, which this weekend means yard work, weather permitting. We are cutting back the peonies and moving a few of them before several more big pines come down between now and Christmas. We should have spread the mulch months ago, but we were at the pool, and the beach club. Now we are getting the house ready for winter, and here we are. After all of that, there is a chili cookoff to get to, and my latest book.
And with that, on to the favorites.
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Friday Food
Carbonade Valdostana from Inside the Rustic Kitchen. This is a rich, hearty beef stew from the Aosta Valley in northern Italy, made with a whole bottle of red wine and festive spices: cinnamon, cloves, herbs, and onions, all slow-braised together until the sauce is deep and dark and the beef falls apart. The recipe serves it over creamy polenta, and I cannot think of a better combination for a cold November night. This is the stew for the first genuinely cold weekend of the season.
Honey Lime Enchiladas from Six Sisters Stuff. Marinated honey lime chicken, wrapped in tortillas with cheese and a creamy white sauce. Sweet, tangy, and completely impossible to stop eating. These can also be made ahead and frozen, which makes them even more useful on a busy week. The kind of weeknight dinner the whole table is happy about. (link)
Fall Harvest Salad from A Cosy Kitchen. Roasted delicata squash (no peeling required, which I appreciate), dino kale massaged into the dressing until it is perfectly tender, shallot, pepitas for crunch, pomegranate seeds for tartness, and soft tangy goat cheese holding it all together. This is the salad that converts people who think they do not want salad for dinner in November.
Something Sweet
This moist chocolate pumpkin marble bread is the perfect treat to serve this Fall with a cup of coffee or tea.
Read, Watch, Listen
Shorter days and dark afternoons can trigger depression. Here’s how to fight back
Ozempic Is Wreaking Havoc on Mother-Daughter Relationships
How to Read a Detergent Label, According to the Substack’s Laundry Whisperer
20 Things Every ’70s Kid Remembers That Have Completely Disappeared
99-Million-Year-Old Amber Reveals Earliest Direct Evidence of a Lizard Shedding Its Tail
What Greens to Cook in November
22 Old-School Recipes That Prove Comfort Food Doesn’t Have To Be Expensive
How can we exercise more without even trying
Patrick Stewart – a life in pictures
Are you an organ donor? Here are some rule changes you may want to know
On the Nightstand
Through an Open Window by Pamela Terry. Margaret Elliot has lived a quiet, charmed life in the small Southern town of Wesleyan, Georgia, until the recent loss of her husband. Now she is seeing visions of her Aunt Edith, the formidable woman who raised her after her parents died when she was a baby, and she is becoming more and more convinced that Edith is trying to tell her something. As Margaret follows the clues that keep appearing, the secret she uncovers reaches back further than she ever imagined, and her three grown children are pulled into it right alongside her.
The Nuremberg Women by Natalie Livingstone. In November 1945, the Nuremberg trials began, and the world was watching. What most people do not know is how many women were there, and how much they mattered. Natalie Livingstone follows eight of them: a brilliant American lawyer, three pioneering journalists, an iconoclastic artist, a refugee aristocrat, a survivor of Auschwitz, and a young Russian translator. They were researchers, reporters, interpreters, witnesses, and in some cases defendants, and the trial would not have looked the same without them.
I have studied the Holocaust for years and have always been drawn to the stories behind the stories, the people who were present for history but did not make it into the headlines, and this book is exactly that.
![Peregrine Hill Nina de Gramont book cover Gilded Age historical fiction Rhode Island]](https://pineconesandacorns.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/11/Peregrine-Hill-by-Nina-de-Gramont-BookBub.jpg)
Peregrine Hill by Nina de Gramont. This one is not out yet, but it is already on my list and I wanted to put it on yours. At the turn of the twentieth century, widow Isabelle Bishop needs money to save what is left of her family after a devastating shipwreck. When a wealthy New York man takes an interest, it is not in Isabelle but in her eighteen-year-old daughter Mariah, who has a secret that gives him all the leverage he needs. Isabelle makes a bargain she knows is wrong. Mariah finds herself in a gilded cage with a dangerous man, and an unexpected ally in her ambitious maid Hetty, and the two of them begin to look for a way out.
It is being described as being in the tradition of Edith Wharton and the Bronte sisters, and that is enough for me.
Outfit of the Day
It is fair isle sweater season, and today I paired one with cozy winter white pants with plaid trim and black ballet flats. Then I added a bright green coat to bring the whole thing to life.
If this black and white fair isle sweater is not your style you can see all of the other colors and patterns I shared this week on Shopmy.
Outfit Seperates
That is what I have for you this week, friends. I hope that you have a wonderful day.
Do not forget to come back Saturday for Weekend Meanderings with Kim at Northern California Style and Juliet at Make Mine a Spritzer. We always have something worth sharing.
Tell me: what are your plans for the weekend? And is there a book on your list that you have to share?
Find me on Pinterest and Instagram for more during the week.
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