Pumpkin and Spice

The holidays are rapidly approaching- it's truely the most wonderful time of the year! I love that once you hit October, you get a holiday every month until Valentine's day! Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas/Hannukah, New Year's, Valentine's Day- it's the best. It makes me feel all Hallmark card squishy inside.

 This time last year, I was in Utah with Sissy, and we spent our Thanksgiving with a co-worker and her family. This year, my parents are coming from Kansas, my brother is coming from Kentucky, and my in-laws and sister-in-law are coming from a couple streets over to our apartment for a big family Thanksgiving. It's going to be my first year hosting the Big Dinner, and I'm a ball of excitement and nerves.

Um... it's really freaking cold outside. Today, it was 4 degrees. It has been a looong time since I experienced single digit temps. And it snowed. Not pretty, softly falling, just-shook-up-a-snowglobe snow, but cold, icy, sideways snow. It's good that it's finally snowing, and that it's staying cold enough that the snow doesn't melt, but I've been constantly cold all week. I've been going into the sauna at the gym after my workouts  just so I can soak up some warmth!

Today was kind of an easy day at work. I'm totally okay with that, because it's been a long week, and today is my "Friday". Yesterday, I made a pumpkin chocolate marble bundt cake that was the coffee cake of the day today. I couldn't wait until this morning to see what it looked like sliced- so when I got in, a grabbed a slice off the display to take a picture of... and of course, to taste! It was very good- moist and dense. The pumpkin swirls were spicy with cinnamon, nutmeg and clove, and the chocolate swirls were rich and decadant. I really enjoy the combo of pumpkin and chocolate- I think it's vastly under-utilized.

I went outside Monday and it was cold! Well, not cold- cold for Florida anyway. It's beautiful and sunny, and a brisk 60F. It was the first really cool day of the season, which makes it finally feel like autumn. The cool temperatures remind me of trick or treating as a wee one back in Kansas and are really putting me in a Halloween-y mood. In the spirit of the season, I thought I'd share a review of some festive seasonal beers. Over the past month and a half, I've tried several varieties, all in the name of blogging, of course. (Oh, the sacrifices I make!)

This month at Florida Foodies Restaurant and Travel Magazine, they're featuring pumpkin recipes, and I was asked to share my recipe for Pumpkin Buttermilk Waffles! There's also a little profile on me (as well as a picture of Kyle and I in last year's Halloween costume. What were we? You'll have to click to find out!)

After you read my feature, be sure to check out the rest of the site. There's great stuff about Floridian Foodies, restaurants and other things that make the Sunshine State great!

Right now, I'm in my very last class in pastry school. I've been in classroom classes for the past few blocks, and they really do require a differnt level of work. Not that they're hard, but there's homework, tests, and quizzes to finish and study for. Currently, I'm in a cost control (read: math) class and a wines class. I love the wine class- I'm very interested in wines, and Kyle and I are members of a wine club, so this class is extremely engaging and informative. Wines class is also very time consuming, as there is a lot of studying.

This week, in between studying, work and class I found some time to play around in the kitchen and made the most amazing pumpkin coffee cake. My mom makes a coffee cake every year at Christmas, and while hers is a little different from most coffee cakes, it has sort of spilled over that all coffee cake makes me think of Christmas morning. With its pumpkin, cinnamon and pumpkin pie spices, this smelled like Thanksgiving and Christmas rolled into one. As it baked, I felt like I should be decorating a tree and wrapping a present.