The Sweet Smells of Fall

Cinnamon, maple, nutmeg, brown sugar.

That’s what it smelled like in my apartment last night ❤

I came straight home from school and tackled dinner because I was determined to have daylight for my dinner pictures.  Apparently it gets dark at 5 pm now!

Maple Butternut Squash and Apple Casserole (compliments of Angela)

Modifications:

• brown sugar instead of maple syrup because I ran out of that $11 bottle long ago 😦

Okay, so that’s the only change I made.  It was awesome!

The resemblance between butternut squash and cheddar cheese in uncanny.

I popped the b-nut in the oven for 20 minutes on 375* and dashed out the door for a little two miler.  I fought the wind the entire way and it was awful.  Hence me skipping my run this morning…

Oh and I tried to bake my pumpkin seeds from Saturday and burnt them instead.  Oops, but you better believe I’m still eating them.

I did, however, throw this clump away.

Thankfully, dinner turned out much better than the seeds.

Once it was back into the oven for half an hour I waltzed down to the work out room and did some quick lifting and lunges.  My left hamstring is so sore today and I don’t know why!  It’s not like I’ve never done lunges before.

By the way I feel like a million bucks walking around in my Denver Rock’n’Roll Half Marathon shirt.  Yeah, that’s right fellow work out room users you can stare at me in awe because I ran 13.1 miles last week 😛

Pre-bake

Post-bake

Are baked apples not one of the prettiest looking things?  I would like a framed picture in my house, please.

Joey and I were pretty impressed with this recipe.  It was the essence of fall.

Oh and after the casserole came out yet another pumpkin went in the oven.  This time for pumpkin pie.

I cut the pumpkin into about 6 pieces and baked on 400* for about an hour then scraped out the insides.  And no I didn’t wait till it cooled off.  I’m sure it was annoying to listen to me yelling “ouch” and “hot hot hot” in the kitchen for 20 minutes. 

Then I tossed the pumpkin in the food processor and blended it all up.  It was a little liquidy so I let it sit in the strainer with the paper towel for 45 minutes.

It’s SO bright colored!  I did a little taste comparing with my Libby’s this morning and real pumpkin tastes nothing like it.  I’m praying my pie doesn’t taste you like you know what…

On the agenda for tonight:

• Jambalaya
• Sleepy Hollow — Johnny Depp makes the sexiest Ichabod Crane 🙂
• Pumpkin Pie

All with the family.  Can’t wait!