I am going to try the ratatouille recipe from this week, I cannot remember ever eating eggplant so this will be something different for me, also I have a recipe from the kitchn awhile back; rosemary brown butter cookies. And my new favorite salad from the italian dish the farro salad in which I use barley instead of farro, one of these days I will have to find some farro to try.

My friend's having an offal party tomorrow afternoon/evening and I'll be making steak & kidney pie for the first time ever. He works at a natural/organic butcher so he picked up 6 pork and 1 beef kidney. Yesterday I bought 1.7lbs of chuck roast from Whole Foods for the steak part of the recipe.

I'm planning to use my mum's lard crust recipe although my boyfriend wants to put a mashed potato topping on top. We may compromise and do a lard bottom crust with a mashed potato topping.

I'm thinking of using one of the following recipes:

http://allrecipes.com//Recipe/steak-and-kidney-pie-with-bacon-and-mushrooms/Detail.aspx

http://www.houseboateats.com/2009/10/steak-and-kidney-pie.html

Any excellent recipes or advice would be very welcome!

This weekend I will be trying out the Spicy Cocktail Meatballs. I know you may be saying it easy to make but I've never tried it so wish me luck :)

http://www.styleyourfood.com

I am going to make a fig tart, among other desserts for a friend's party, just like the one pictured here! and a special favorite apple tart that I learned from my old and wonderful French mentor. Honestly, I know it's obnoxious, but you can find the recipe for the apple tart here:http://bakecupcakes.blogspot.com/2010/05/building-repertoire-apple-tart.html

more gazpacho requested by my partner, and perhaps potato leek soup, depending on how cool it actually gets here in Portland.

shabbat dinner for ten tonight! Zuni roast chicken and bread salad, moroccan couscous, roasted veggies, homemade challah, fig and almond crostata and apple crisp!

Sally - thanks for the link. That looks and sounds delicious!!

The tropical front has left my part of NY state and it's chilly (but still rainy) out, so split pea soup is bubbling away on the stove. With weird purple/orange and white carrots instead of the regular.

I might make an apple pie later, though the boyfriend is craving pumpkin. No such luck with the canned stuff at the store today though. Shelves were empty. Anyone know what gives?

I just made roasted tomatoes with garlic for a potluck tomorrow (will add some vinegar when I pack 'em up). Other than that, maybe nothing. House is a wreck, time is short and I just want to laze a bit this weekend.

i had the best apple pie today. it was a work party and it was from sam's club. i'd like more of that. but...instead i'm making cheesy soft tacos and tons of veggies.

I'm going to a potluck wedding tomorrow. I just made two "slab pie" versions of the Hoosier Pie from Molly Wizenberg's "A Homemade Life." They smell so good it's making me crazy!

Eating up some chilli today, then cooking an autumnal veggie lunch for friends tomorrow. We'll be having spiced carrot soup, mushroom and barley pie, and baked apples.

@vintagejenta, what you're seeing is still a result of last year's lean pumpkin crop and it should ease up as this year's crop hits the store shelves. Some regions still had trouble this year due to too much rain or heat, but overall the projections look good. I saw some this week.

http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/money/50365603-79/pumpkin-canned-nestle-libby.html.csp

Jamie Oliver's Chicken Braised in Milk, but I forgot the lemons (damn, back to the store I go), roasted potatoes and mushrooms, roasted beet salad.

I'm taking advantage of the chilly day to do some bread-baking - Peter Reinhart's multi-grain sandwich bread and either a batch of ciabatta or olive bread.

Today's hot lunch (and tomorrow's cold leftovers) will be Greek pizza, using the thin crust dough recipe from this here website. Artichokes, olives, tomatoes, anchovies and capers, a little red sauce (recipe also from thekitchn,) and some feta should do it. I'm just getting into making pizza doughs/breads/yeasted things, and was floored by how simple this pizza dough was to make, especially with a stand mixer.

Also making chocolate chip cookies with walnuts for a party tomorrow. The recipe is from David Lebovitz' "Ready for Dessert," and is my new go-to choco cookie recipe.

I think I just made the perfect pizza! The crust took two days (just 15 minutes over the two days) but it was AMAZING! My husband ate all of his! We plan to grill tomorrow and eat light this week as we are headed to New Orleans to celebrate our anniversary.

It's a cool off-and-on gloomy day today, perfect for something autumny. I'm thinking Sausage and Pumpkin Pasta tonight and either a hearty stew/soup, roast or meat loaf tomorrow to eat over the week. Craving warm comforting foods.

I got my weekend cooking started early - Thursday night I made pasta with a sauce of heirloom tomato, onions, white wine and capers. After that, my two daughters and I made "stained glass" snickerdoodles - they used different colored sugars and sprinkles along with the standard cinnamon-sugar to dip the cookies, and they came out gorgeous.

Then today I made a crust for a blueberry pie which I'm going to bake tonight, and I also made some yellow cupcakes that came out a bit tough. I think I overbeat the batter.

Finally I need to make a double batch of bread!

what is the recipe for that fig pie???? i have 2 kilos of figs and don´t know what to do with them. i´d love to make a pie!!!

Finally, after being intimidated by it for way too long, I made Julia's boeuf bourguignon. 4 hours later.... meh. I was underwhelmed but am hoping it will have a fuller flavor today after resting in the fridge overnight.

This morning I made a yumalicious breakfast casserole and I plan to make a cinnamon roll dough this evening for next week's breakfast.

It's fall, friends! Pumpkin cookies in my house!!

In our house, it is Red Velvet Cake season (what other kind of birthday cake are you going to make for a girl named Tallulah?? Honestly, sometimes I think I named my daughter Tallulah just so that I would have a reason to make red velvet cake).

I used the last of my precious hoard of White Lily flour (and natural cocoa, which is impossible to find here in Europe) to make the Lee Brother's version of red velvet cake. Their variation is to add grated orange rind -- I like it, but I think the next time I try the recipe, I will use much less, maybe a third. It is just too strong. I filled it with a raspberry mousse; raspberry and chocolate are a great match, and the mousse was amazing.

I used the Cupcake Café recipe for French buttercream; an interesting variation, as it uses whole eggs, and not just egg yolks. The only problem I have with it is that I cannot get my buttercream very white... it looks, unsurprisingly, butter-coloured. However, I have eaten many a Cupcake Café cupcake in my time, and know that they get a great white buttercream --- how do they do it? The taste and texture fit with the recipe I have, and I don't think they use a chemical whitener... does anyone know???

friday night we were lazy so we got take out pizza from a local place ...it was really good.

Saturday I found some bone in pork ribs at my local grocery store on sale that tempted me. I slathered them in an asian seasoning mix and put them in the slowe cooker for a few hours. Then for the last hour I poured in some sweet and spicy Thai sauce... served with sticky white rice and steamed sugar snap peas. YUM

Yesterday I was still in a slow cooked kick so I put some bone in chicken breasts in there with a southwest seasoning mixture and let them cook. Once cooked I shredded the chicken and made burritos with chili verde sauce.

i have leftovers of both in my fridge so I'll be eating both meals again today and tomorrow.

not a fan of split pea soup but i had it recently with barley at Califorina Pizza Kitchen and now I'm itching to make it. so I might give that a try sometime this week...and since it's suppose to rain all week that might be a good thing to make.