November 1, 2003

• What to do with that used jack o’lantern:

  
  

  

  
  

  Meet Jack-of-the-Lantern version 2K3.  He’s sorta dorky-looking I know, but nearer to the spirit of the occasion than last year’s anime wai (below).  I think he’s the biggest pumpkin I ever carved.  I know that these were the biggest pumpkin seeds I’ve ever seen, but that was probably just because he was very ripe and had such a thick stem.  His “meat” is the sweetest pumpkin I’ve ever tasted.  The Jack himself is still parked atop the camper shell of my old blue truck in the driveway, where I put him after I took this pic through the window, but I’ve cooked and eaten some of the scraps from his mouth and eyes–all but the two that I skewered to the sides of him as ears.

  I was in town the day the first punkins appeared in the supermarket, when they were all one price instead of sold by the pound.  I picked one not to suit my budget but because I liked its shape:  a huge pear with an interesting thick twisted stump of stem on top.  That was the same day that the winter squash went on display and I stocked up on scads of them.  I hadn’t fully intended to eat much if any of Jack, but those scraps are so sweet that I’m going out later to fetch his burned-out shell and see what I can salvage.

  
  

  While I was baking my latest batch of gluten-free muffins, there was a sweet, fragrant uchiki kuri squash cooling on the counter.  On impulse I added the buttered pulp of one half of it to my muffin batter and this has turned out to be the best batch of muffins ever.  Pureed pumpkin would work just as well, so I’m sharing the recipe with you in case you have any old used jack o’lanterns lying about.

  
  

  
  

  Gluten-Free Pumpkin or Squash Muffins

  
  

  This recipe makes approximately 2 dozen muffins.  They can be frozen for later use.  The first 3 cups of flour need not be rice, sorghum and buckwheat as I have used.  You could substitute any gluten-free flours, or if you can tolerate gluten you could use 3½ cups of wheat flour and omit the xanthan gum.  In a gluten-free recipe, both the ½ cup of tapioca starch and the teaspoon of xanthan gum are important to the integrity and texture of the product.
  

  Whisk together in a large bowl:
  

  
  

  1½ cups brown rice flour
  1 cup sweet white sorghum flour
  ½ cup buckwheat flour
  ½ cup tapioca starch (tapioca flour)
  2 cups non-instant nonfat dry milk (or substitute soy protein powder or whey powder)
  2 teaspoons salt
  2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
  2 teaspoons ground ginger
  1 teaspoon baking soda
  1 teaspoon baking powder
  1 teaspoon xanthan gum

  
  

  Beat in a separate bowl:
  

  
  

  4 large or 3 extra-large eggs
  ½ cup vegetable oil
  3 cups plain unsweetened yogurt
  1 cup pureed cooked pumpkin or winter squash (without the rind)
  1 cup cold water
  2 tablespoons honey
  2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

  
  

  Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients, pour in the liquid and blend with a few quick strokes until flour is moistened.  Do not overbeat.
  

  Spoon into paper-lined or greased muffin cups and bake at 400° for about 14 minutes, until tops are partially browned and spring back at a light touch.

  
  

  Greyfox and I decided not to go to Anchorage for the NA Halloween dance last night.  Instead, we dressed up in some ordinary clothes and went about ten miles up the highway away from Anchorage and celebrated our anniversary with a good meal at Sunshine Restaurant.  It was another night of pea soup fog and we had both been tired even before our sundown trip to the laundromat for showers in preparation for our dinner out.  After we got home, I got into my pajamas and snuggled in bed to read.  As I was settling myself comfortably there, I looked at the clock and noticed that it was 9:00, the time the dance was to start.  I’m so glad we decided not to go.  Arthritis and Alzheimer’s aren’t the only things that come with age.  Sometimes there is some wisdom, too… and contentment.

  
  

  Both of us feel better today, much fewer symptoms of the cold.  He has gone down the valley to Wasilla to walk around with his sign, presumably holding it upside down for effect.  In case traffic is light and business sparse, he has taken along some therapeutic materials to work on and a notebook in case he gets inspired to work on website content.

  
  

  The skies here are overcast and there is a 20% chance of precip.  It’s anyone’s guess right now whether that would be rain or snow.  That’s iffy.  Anyhow, the temp is such that old Jack will keep out there, so I’m going to leave him out a bit longer since there is no room for him right now in my fridge and I have a few other things to do before I break him down into freezer bags.

  
  

  The website host where we have our Addicts Unlimited site went through some upgrades recently and lost all our content “due to the timing of [their] backups,” according to their tech support, whatever that means.  Unfortunately, one page of the content, which I had created using their “user-friendly website creation tools,” I had neglected to back up myself.  All the rest, that I’d created with a text editor and uploaded with ftp, is still in existence and can be reuploaded.

  
  

  I’m seeing all this as a blessing in disguise, since I’d not been ready to unveil the site yet when Greyfox started telling the world about it.  Now it is back to a holding page, “under construction”, and I intend to have content I feel is complete and worthy of revealing before I reveal any of it.

  
  

  …and then there is still that mess in the back room that has been on hold for a week or so while I’ve been otherwise occupied.  They say that a woman’s work is never done (by a man).

  • 3:20 pm
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