Deep Fried Squash Blossoms

Squash Blossoms

Every year I tell myself I’m going to do something with those beautiful pale yellow squash blossoms and every year I fail. When they sat right in front of me at a recent Bay Ridge Food Co-op distribution, I no longer had a way to ignore them. I went home with a dozen of the light puffs in hand, still no idea what to do with them. When posed to my twitter friends what to do, an overwhelming cry of “fry them!” came back. I’ve never really deep-fried anything. Beignets once when I was a child, but after the labor of making the dough, cutting, waiting for them to rise before I even got to the hot oil stage, I promised myself never again. But how much trouble could squash blossoms be? There’s not much dough involved and no yeast or rising. I picked up a bottle of canola oil on my way home and was ready for something new.

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Maple Cranberry Cupcakes

Fall is here with a vengeance and I love it! Especially after our trip to Vermont the other weekend, I feel like everything I make or want to make evokes the flavor of Fall. Rich soups and stews, maple, cranberries, pumpkin, squash, apples. I just can’t get enough.

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Locavore Challenge #20: Join a Food Coop or Winter CSA

Food Coops and CSAs are great. They’re an easy way to guarantee LOCAL farm fresh produce. With a CSA get to know the farm, often the farmer. You can visit. It’s like your very own farm, because you actually “own” a piece of it. With coops, you own a store, with maybe a few hundred or a few thousand other members. You get a say in what’s stocked and how the store is run. Plus, by buying in bulk, you save.

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