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Don’t let the name scare you or your feathered friends away. You don’t have to use ostrich in these cheesy empanadas. The only reason I did was to rid my freezer of all my older meats. Last week Jim and I filled up on bison so the ostrich was the next meat to go.

I buy all my atypical meats from a local co-op where you can purchase many uncommon or wild meats including venison, bison, rabbit, quail, ostrich, and various types of seafood, so I have made many dishes that include wild or exotic game.

If you have never had ostrich meat you are in for a treat. Its a gamey meat but very lean. It behaves more like red meats than any poultry you may encounter (save for emu, perhaps). Ostrich is a deep cherry red color before cooked and tastes like flavorful lean beef. It’s low in fat and cholesterol and rich in calcium. I purchased a pack of ground ostrich although ostrich steaks are excellent as well.

I am very much a believer in using up leftover food, so when raiding my fridge for ingredients for dinner one night, I came up with this empanada idea. Earlier in the week I had watch

Seedy PumpkinsOctober 30

Tomorrow is Halloween so I figured I should highlight the mighty pumpkin. I, of course, carved pumpkins this year and while foraging the fields at Butler Orchards in Damascus, MD Jim and I decided to grab a couple small one for pumpkin pie. Now, I have never made a pumpkin pie with a real pumpkin so I have been debating as to how to do so. I have looked up many recipes but have not gained the courage needed to make the actual pie. So this blog goes pieless, but I will be highlighting some other recipes so bare with me.

After pumpkin pie, cookies, fudge, and any other sweet pumpkin treats, my next favorite pumpkin dish is that of roasted pumpkin seeds. Having carved rather large pumpkins this year I had an excess of seeds. If you just throw your seeds away, shame on you, because pumpkin seeds are rich in amino acids as well as zinc which we all know can help in the fight against the onslaught of autumn’s cold and flu season.

Save those seeds. Clean them up (by picking all the pumpkin off and washing them in cold water) and allow them to dry over night on cookie sheets all spread out. The next day, I preheated the oven to 250 and chose to sp

A Trip to the National Apple Harvest FestivalOctober 5

National Apple Harvest Fest.

The National Apple Harvest Festival is held in my old home state of Pennsylvania, more specifically in Arendtsville, right outside Gettysburg. This is the time of year when the local fair ground is turned into a massive apple themed village complete with road signs along paved roads.

Jim and I, along with my parents, decided to have a go at the fest’ this year which annually runs the first 2 full weekends of October.

None of the various gastronomical delicacies found can really be called unexpected at an apple-fest but I will highlight some of the more tasty treats.

Pumpkin Funnel Cake!

The first thing we headed towards was a favorite of my mother’s. She is a huge funnel cake fan (who isn’t, seriously?), so we headed down Candy Apple Lane to get a Pumpkin Funnel Cake. With 3 toppings to choose from (classic powdered sugar, cinnamon & sugar, or icing) Mom opted for the drippy gooey icing and we all admit it was a good choice. I love all things pumpkin this time of year and while the

GreenPans with Thermolon TechnologyOctober 1

Recently my boyfriend, Jim, and I moved into a new house. Coming from both our parent’s homes to a huge house was daunting to say the least. Neither of us had an apartment first so we hadn’t really acquired any essential tools needed to fill an entire house. Because of this our kitchen began in a very basic state. We ended up having to use what camping supplies we had gathered over the years to stock our kitchen with pots and pans. Considering these were bargain purchases (for use when camping, why spend a lot?!) it was hard to cook even the simplest of meals without burning something or scraping off cheap Teflon.

Why am I saying this? Well, my mother knew we needed new pans so she took it upon herself to order me a whole kitchen full in a brand that I had been coveting since the moment I saw it advertised 3 years ago. GreenPans.

Some of you may know of them, but most probably don’t. If you watch any HSN I’m sure you’ve seen them. The first cookware to use Thermolon non-stick coating, the GreenPan line is ceramic based and doesn’t contain any PTFE – the chemical found in tradi

Fresh Garden SalsaSeptember 16

Still having lots of heirloom tomatoes left I decided to make a quick salsa in my BlendTec. (Yes I have a BlendTec. For those who don’t know why thats fun, see the Will it Blend series.) Anyway, the salsa came out pretty good so I want to share my quick tasty salsa recipe.

Ingredients:

6-7 Heirloom tomatoes
2 cloves garlic, peeled
1 small onion, quartered
1 ½ tablespoons olive oil
1 can diced green chilies
1 teaspoon ground cumin
¼ teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons fresh lime juice
¼ cup chopped fresh cilantro

In the oven to roast.

① Clean and remove stem dimple from the tomatoes an place them in a shallow baking dish. Chop onion into quarters and also place in dish along with peeled garlic cloves. Drizzle with olive oil. Checking often, broil 5-15 minutes or until outside of tomatoes are shriveled and begin to char.