A love affair

I think that fall and early summer are every eaters' fantasy time. The berries of early summer and the soups, the cinnamon and the roasted vegetables of fall make me love it despite what it will give way to- icky and awful winter. This summer's key dish was ratatouille. This fall's is vegetable lasagna. I have made this at least seven times now and I never get sick of it because I change something every time. The 'noodles' are sliced summer squash, zucchini or eggplant. The filling is some mix of beans and/or nuts and herbs, slather on some sauce and pop in the oven for an hour. One week it was pesto-y, another it was walnuts and sage. So delicious.

Roasting root veggies and apples with the simplest of dressings make the fall marvelous. The blazing oven and the scent automatically dial down my stress level and place me in crisp Saturday morning strolls under canopies of crimson and orange.

A new obsession has sprouted from a recent trip to VA to celebrate my little cupcake's 2nd b-day and catch up with some college friends: Sichuan hotpot. We went to a place called Mala Tang because my friend Nels could find an amazing restaurant anywhere in the world. The hotpot is broth- pretty much liquid fire that they place on individual burners and you order what you'd like to poach in the pot. I loved it so much I spent days researching how to do it at home and have had it half a dozen times since. Ah-mazing. The best part of hot pot and fall is all of the lovely fresh greens (napa, kale, chrysanthemum) that I get to play with.

I love fall.