I bought a pomegranate a month ago for Rosh Hashana, and it was disappointing and too white inside, not quite ripe. The seeds were bitter. On a whim, I decided to try again on Friday and was pleased to find bright red pomegranate seeds inside the pomegranate.
Pomegranates have Vitamin C, anti-oxidants and are considered to be anti-inflammatory.
A fence in our yard – one can see the mums in the front of our house in the distance. The burning bush is right above the fence. Today it snowed – who knows how this fence with mums scene will look tomorrow!
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A red carnation petal fell into my creeping phlox. Creeping phlox blooms in the spring.
If you want to see my sukkah decorations, I put them in the previous post called Sukkot in Highland Park.
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I really would have liked to have photographed some of the blue jays I saw yesterday. Instead, here’s a rudbeckia from a yard in which I emphasized the blue background with Photoshop.
When I put this photo of tiny asters on my computer, I noticed a tiny flying insect enjoyed the flowers even more than I did.
Ugly red berries (maybe you like them?) are growing on a tree in my backyard.
I finally filled my bird feeder again. I left it alone all summer, as birds seem to love my compost in the summer. But I’m trying to get in the habit of filling it, so in the winter the birds will know they can show up for a nosh. This sparrow seems to have already helped himself – do you think he is digesting his meal before flying off? Or is that only something humans do?
Next week is Sukkot and the week after Simhat Torah-Shemini Atzeret, so I won’t have much time for blogging or Nature Notes. On Sukkot we do have some contact with nature – in particular, we sit outside in a sukkah for all our meals. One can see see the stars through the roof of the sukkah (assuming it’s a clear night). Can any of my Jewish friends explain to my non-Jewish readers a few other natural elements of Sukkot?
Last Sunday we went apple picking at Lee Turkey Farm in East Windsor, New Jersey. The previous September we picked apples at Terhune Orchards near Princeton.
Our first stop was Von Thun Farm in Monmouth Junction, New Jersey; however, they did not feature apple picking until the next Sunday. So we proceeded unto Lee Turkey Farm, which also has a corn maze and pick your own corn. My daughter and her friends enjoyed watching the chickens for a while.
No real reds in this photo, but I loved the rushed look of my daughter running through the corn maze at Lee Turkey Farm.
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Ant enjoys a climb on a pink hollyhock.
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Last week we visited a farm and bought way too many apples. So anyone have any good apple recipe ideas? I’ve already made apple cake (I skipped the nuts), and I plan to make apple pie. I cooked some apples with raspberries for my daughter last week when she wasn’t feeling well (no added sugar – I’ve been convincing her sugar is no good for the healing process).
Cooking Out of the Box hosted Kosher Cooking Carnival – the Holidays are Coming. Some links are Rosh Hashana recipes. I’m drawn to Hannah’s Rosh Hashanah Tips and Recipes, and I see one for stuffed cabbage. Maybe for Sukkot.
Here’s a link to Flamingo Musings’ brisket. She soaks hers in coffee. I’ve done wine in the past. My kids don’t like when I use a lot of cloves. Hers has no cloves. It does have garlic cloves. That would work for them.
I’m planning to make a Moroccan carrot salad – the kind where you steam the carrots briefly, then add the spices and bits of parsley at the end. My middle son said he is mostly likely to eat the simanim for carrots if the carrots are cooked, so I’ll leave some unspiced in the hopes our children will join us for this one.
I saw a recipe for quinoa salad among Rosh Hashana recipes in a local paper – it had pomegranate seeds and nuts. I will skip the nuts, as it is our family custom not to eat nuts on Rosh Hashana. Do you eschew nuts for this holiday, or are you like some of my friends who poo poo this custom as superstition or plain false?
Zucchini (or squash or gourds) are one of the simanim. Ordinarily, I would cook the zucchini (we have some new baby zucchini growing in front of our house, just in time for the holiday) with onions, but it seems more appropriate to skip the onions for the simanim dish. I will add some spices to some sauteed zucchini. No point in trying to get my kids to eat zucchini unless disguised in a cake.
More side dish ideas: as a friend who is a vegetarian will come one of the days (when I am serving meat), I will consider making kasha with mushrooms and onions. Maybe potato salad, too – that could be a side dish at any meal.
Honey cake seems like a natural for this holiday. I printed Ilana-Davita’s honey cake and Jewaicious Honey Cake.
Finally, I might try Mrs. S.’s blondies. At first, I was tempted in my mind to add blueberries (before carefully reading the recipe and realizing this would be a vulgar addition). But as this is really for my kids, chocolate chips will remain the only flavoring.
So, what’s cooking at your house?
Niagara Falls at sunrise: it is the last round of Summer Stock Sunday for the season, so I’m adding one of my favorite photos of the summer. This shows the Horseshoe Falls, photo taken from the Canadian side. You can see more water photos of Niagara Falls and some nature photos, too.
We are going apple picking later today – maybe I’ll get some nice photos to share from our trip.
What was your favorite part of this summer?
Water is the first of my three macros for this week. This is a detail of the waters of the American Falls of Niagara Falls.
Detail of Highland Park Farmer’s Market flowers.
The tail end of the shofar, the ram’s horn, that is sounded every day in the Jewish month of Elul. One does not blow into this larger end of the shofar but into the other, smaller end. It is not easy to do, but if I purse my lips together in a certain way, I can get the right sound.
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