Pumpkin Pie French Toast with Cranberry Relish – Gluten Free

This turned out to be one of my best recipes of the year! We ate it for dinner and then had a second helping for dessert. I will serve it for brunch during the holidays. The trick to getting great French toast from gluten free bread is to whip the eggs until almost frothy, keep the eggy mix thick, and cook slowly. Adding pumpkin thickens the egg mix and also tastes incredible.  If you don’t have time to make the relish, just whip up some of the best French toast ever!

My Cranberry Ginger relish recipe is here. Make this at least 4 hours in advance. It keeps for weeks. Well, theoretically it does. In our house it gets eaten up pretty quickly.

Pumpkin Pie French Toast with Cranberry Relish

serves 2

4 slices gluten free bread (or sourdough)

1 egg

1/2 C canned pumpkin

1/3 C milk

2 t pumpkin pie spice

2 t powdered sugar

butter for pan

Whip egg until almost frothy; blend it into 1 substance until the yolk and whites are all one. Stir in pumpkin, milk, spice, and sugar until smooth. On a hot griddle, add a pat of butter then reduce heat to medium high. Dip both sides of bread into eggy mixture, allowing it to soak in and leaving a nice coating on the outsides. Use a spatula to remove bread and place on the griddle. Cook both sides until golden brown, approx 3-5 min each side.

Place 2 slices of French Toast on a plate with a healthy dollop of cranberry relish in between. Add a dollop od relish on top. If you are really ambitious, you can top with sugared cranberries. But only if you are serving mimosas or another drink where your beautiful cranberries can be used as a garnish.

Well, it is Thanksgiving eve and I still have a pie to make. I unloaded a great kiln load today, so check out my adorable new Owl Bowls!

From our Thanksgiving table- Roasted Butternut Squash, Garlic and Onions puree

The flavors of roasted root vegetables are intense and I can’t get enough of them! I’ve tweaked this roasted butternut squash recipe until it is absolute perfection. I also made it dairy free by using coconut milk which improved the taste even more. It’s not hard and you can’t get it wrong; just adjust the salt and pepper to your satisfaction at the end. I serve this in my 4 cup flower bowl for a pretty presentation.

Roasted Garlic, Onion and Butternut Squash puree

1 butternut squash, peeled, seeds removed, cut into 1/2” cubes

1 whole garlic pod

2 med. onions, peeled, cut in wedges

2 T olive oil

1/2 C coconut milk

1 1/2 t thyme

toasted black walnuts (or other seeds) for garnish- optional

Wrap squash cubes drizzled in olive oil in aluminum foil packet. Cut top off garlic so that every clove is exposed, place on foil, drizzle with olive oil, wrap into closed packet. Place onion wedges on foil, drizzle with oil, wrap into packet. Place all your packets on a cookie sheet and roast in a 400 degree oven for 50 min.

Remove squash and onions from packets and puree together in a food processor. Add roasted garlic by squeezing 9 of the cloves into processor. Save the extra cloves for another use. Add coconut milk, thyme and salt and pepper to taste. You may have to puree in batches and transfer to a larger bowl, in which case, just stir it all together and then add the salt and pepper. Serve hot. This can be made a day ahead and heated up before serving with garnish.

 

You can also make this into a soup: Put puree in a saucepan with 2 cups chicken or vegetable stock and heat.

You can make it into a pasta sauce by adding 1 cup chicken or vegetable stock.

If you have to serve a vegetable dish on Thanksgiving, this will hold its own.

Remember to count your blessings! I count you as one of the things I am grateful to have in my life. It’s a treat to find people who share my passion for tasty, wholesome food that is beautifully served.

Thanksgivukah! Thanksgiving + Hanukkah

Thanksgiving and the first night of Hanukkah coincide for the first time in 125 years! Latkes and cranberry ginger relish, hey, what’s not to love about that? The food is easy since our Thanksgiving dinner is served early afternoon so we can waddle off for a hike afterwards. Hanukkah will be my homemade latkes, rustic applesauce, and an extra dollop of leftover cranberry relish on top, with the sour cream optional. I’ve always served gingerbread Hanukkah cookies for dessert. So the only problem left is how to set the table to morph easily from the riot of fall colors to the cool blue of Hanukkah. My solution is to go with showy white flowers, vases and candles, accent the rustic side of Thanksgiving décor, add gray as a transitional tone, and use blue for color pop. My husband made the new rustic menorah, which we will light fully for the afternoon meal, and reset for Hanukkah in the evening. Here are some style shots you can use to help style your own Thanksgivukah.

 

 

 

 

 

May we be forever grateful for the miracles of light that bless our lives with hope and abundance. Have fun setting your table! The pottery here is available at Lee Wolfe Pottery.

Family

I rarely start out to make these insanely elaborate decorations. You would think that after 70+ hour weeks in the studio making pottery, I’d just make a pie, or stick flowers in a vase. But my mind is racing with imagery. At the market I just have to have these particular lime green mums, and…not those…not those…oh, have to have these bright red mini carnations! And then they have to be meticulously arranged. Like this:

And the funny thing is, I never feel closer to my grandmother than when I am obsessed with getting the pie crust to look just right. I can so vividly recall her lattice crust and the way she used a zigzag cutter to cut the strips.

This Thanksgiving, my daughter returned for the first time a grown woman. She went right to work in the studio, making pottery for her Etsy shop, MarciG. When she helped me cook and bake, I was amazed at how much she knew without being told. And then it occurred to me how many years she’d silently been there, just watching.

Flock of Love by MarciG

I think what makes us family is not so much our genetics, as we are all so very different. It is rather this silent language that runs through us.

We make our nests, our homes like a monk prays, or like a little bird sings.

Raised In Love from OneClayBead

Thanksgiving 2010

Me, Marci, husband Ken, Mom and Dad Wolfe
We’ve eaten, walked by the French Broad River, shopped, played Scrabble and worked. This year has been so full of blessings and rich in rewards. I am grateful for my health this year, for my daughter’s acceptance into High Point University, my husband’s career success, my in law’s wisdom. There is more, actually so much more.
I wish for you:
After you sit down at the table
After you  eat and savor those familiar dishes
After you look deeply and joyfully into the eyes of those who love you :
Take a bit of food outdoors
Walk among trees, by a river, or find,  along a country lane
 some wild critter, and share your feast.
If you can, look into wild eyes.
Then touch a place of this beautiful earth, like homage to that which feeds us.
Happy Thanksgiving.

A Potter does Thanksgiving

I was looking forward to baking with my daughter on the Wednesday night before Thanksgiving, as a break from making a gazillion ornaments in clay. When we made our sweet potato buscuits, cut out in Star of Davids, I realized that this is basically the same thing as working in the studio, except it smells better baking. And when it came time to put a lattice crust on the apple pie, I couldn't control myself. The potter in me took over, and soon I was cutting out leaf shapes, and hand forming acorns. Then adding a milk and organic sugar coating to make it brown nicely.

Yes, I have always been this way, and so has Marci. I knew that she had the artist's gift when she requested broccoli at age 5. She didn't eat it. Instead, she made a hump of potatoes and stuck the broccoli heads in like little trees.

I guess you just can't take a break from being who you are.