Back to School and Celebrating the Seasons

When we started eating seasonally, I bought a binder for each season. In each one I've included recipes based on ingredients that are available during those seasons as well as any holiday recipes or entertaining ideas that might be appropriate. 


Filling the seasonal binders has been a great way to keep me organized and connected in each season. I'm finding little reasons to celebrate the changing of the seasons...like when this hot weather finally breaks and I can grow lettuce again. 


When the weather changes, or in my case, the calendar says it is finally fall, I reach for my orange fall binder and feel a little more energized to start celebrating the season with food and family.


I just finished reading The Rhythm of Family, a book by Amanda Blake Soule, and it inspired me to add a few pages to my binders. This family-centered book has seasonal recipes as well as seasonally inspired projects to do with your children. 

In case you are considering a community-wide effort to cook in harmony with the seasons, try hosting a Preservation Party with your friends, neighbors or even as a fundraiser for your child's school. When you see the mason jars lining your pantry it will bring back great memories. Just like our Halloween Pickle last year. There's nothing like opening a jar full of summer produce on a cold winter day.

Here are a few seasonal recipes, just in time for the start of school, to help you connect with the seasons and your family.

These recipes are gluten-free and dairy-free or can easily be made so with a few substitutions.

Breakfast

Apple Cinnamon Blender Waffles (add 1/4-1/2 cup peeled and chopped local apples from Love Creek or Bat Creek Orchards and Pecan Butter from LocalBaby available at Farmhouse Delivery)

Maple Oat Scones with Apple Butter made with local apples or Confituras Bourbon Brown Sugar Peach Preserves

For the scones I substituted gluten free oats, Amande almond milk yogurt, maple sugar, almond milk and Earth Balance spread

Cinnamon Apple Oatmeal made with local apples

Lunches, Snacks and Treats

Pick up these cute snack bags from SnackTaxi and Rume at Wheatsville

Sliced Cucumber Rounds or sticks with Baby Zach's Hummus (available at Wheatsville)

Homemade Applesauce made with Love Creek Orchards' apples (available at Barton Creek Farmers' Market

Cucumber Melon "Sushi" - roll up cubed melon with thin strips of cucumber and secure with a toothpick and add fresh squeezed lime

Vanilla Pears (I might substitute some local honey in the recipe)

Pear Almond Cake made with local ripe, hard pears from Lightsey Farm

Baked Acorn Squash with Real Maple Syrup - Johnson's Backyard Garden has acorn squash at Wheatsville and almost all the farmers' markets around town

Sweet Potato Leaves and Acorns

Peach Date Bars - Try this recipe with dried peaches, dates, local honey and Texas pecans!

Maple Oat n' Apple Dessert Jars made with local apples

Pumpkin Hummus and Quinoa Flatbread

Butter Lettuce Cups w/Carrots, Dewberry Hills Farm Chicken & Almondaise ( all available at Wheatsville)

Zucchini Muffins

Cucumber Apple Salsa made with farmers' market cucumbers and apples

Eggplant Fries - pick up some za'atar at Savory Spice Shop, a cute and friendly little spice shop at 1201B W. 6th Street in Austin, Texas

Butternut Squash and Apple Soup or Smoke-Dried Tomato & Butternut Squash Soup

Roasted Eggplant Spread

Dairy Free Chocolate Pudding - make with dates from the farmers' market

Chocolate Chip Date Cake 

Peach Fruit Leather

Dinner

Sausage Stuffed Apples with Mashed Red & Sweet Potatoes from Johnson's Backyard Garden

You can try this recipe with local apples and Wheatville's Tipsy Cow Sausage or Sweet Italian Sausage. 

I made two versions of dressing - one with Annie's Horseradish Mustard for us and one with Annie's regular yellow mustard for our son.

Cooking with Clay: Gluten-Free Teff Thumbprint Cookies with Strawberry Jam

Before we left for a weekend vacation recently, I pulled out a few cookbooks for ideas and menu planning. Clay walked over to his play kitchen and picked his Sesame Street cookbook off the shelf and sat down beside me and flipped through the recipes. He pointed out a thumbprint cookie recipe with jam. 

I knew I could easily make a gluten-free version and had wanted to try cooking with teff flour anyway. Teff flour is, as Bob's Red Mill notes on the bag, a "nutritional powerhouse". It is a whole grain high in fiber, protein and iron. Use your own jam made with honey and this recipe would contain only natural sugars. Honey Strawberry Jam from Simple Bites

All good chefs cook in their underwear, right? Well, Clay does most of the time. He also is very good at tasting his creations throughout preparation. He helped me mix the dry and wet ingredients, pressed his sweet little thumb in the dough and then filled them with local Harvest Time strawberry jam (from Canyon Lake and available at Austin Farmers' Market on Wednesdays). 

Gluten-Free Teff Thumbprint Cookies with Strawberry Jam

Adapted from Teff Peanut Butter Cookies - Bob's Red Mill website (and teff flour bag)

Makes 24 cookies

1 1/2 cups Bob's Red Mill teff flour (available at Wheatsville)

1/2 tsp. Celtic sea salt

1/2 cup REAL Maple Syrup (I use Coomb's grade B)

1/2 cup grapeseed or canola oil

1 tsp. organic vanilla

1 cup Justin's maple almond butter (or peanut butter)

jar of Harvest Time strawberry jam (or your favorite - try Confituras at Austin Farmers' Markets)

1. Preheat oven to 350. 

2. Add teff flour and sea salt to a large bowl, mix and set aside. 

3. In a food processor (or use a potato masher if you are in a vacation house with no food processor!) add maple almond butter, maple syrup, oil and vanilla and blend. 

4. Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and blend well. 

5. Roll the dough into small balls and place on a Silpat lined or ungreased cookie sheet.

6. Use your thumb or finger to make a well in the top of the cookie for the jam or jelly. 

7. Add a spoonful of your favorite jam to the cookie. Our cookies were designed by Clay so they were more free-form, but if you want them to be uniform you might want to be careful that the jam doesn't go any higher than the top edge of the cookie. 

8. Bake 13-15 minutes and let cool on a wire rack before enjoying.