Harvest

This is the time of year I call harvest. Its in full swing, this harvesty/autumny time of year. Temps down here still hover around 80 daily, but the winds are often drier and have begun shifting northerly and easterly (unless there's a storm approaching.... soon we'll be out of the wet season, yay). For some reason, today I feel traditionally harvesty. I considered going to our local pumpkin patch to select a pumpkin or 2 for a great pumpkin massacre, but time got away. Instead, as I write this I've got organic pumpkin walnut muffins baking in the oven (new recipe, we'll see how they are, I'll take them out for taste testing to my friends tomorrow..) I also just finished chopping a giant organic butternut squash which I intend to roast with olive oil, sage and sea salt, along with preparing my first ever "Field Roast", which we bought on a Ft. Lauderdale road trip. Along with all this, Mr. Happy Vegan wants potatoes, and he wants them mashed. So it will be.

Our harvest down here will be coming in very soon. More papaya than I know what to do with, loads and loads of bananas, and of course beautiful key limes. We've finally got a tree full of starfruit to pull soon, usually the iguanas discover the tree before we pick... I've never managed to get more than 1 or 2 a year. This year, we're determined to be ahead of the wildlife. So, although my harvest is coming in soon, I felt a little melancholy today and wanted some of what I was accustomed to for most of my life.

My house is filled with the amazing aromas of cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon, ginger and allspice (so is the beach!!) and Mr. Happy Vegan is in the kitchen every 10 minutes or so "is it time yet? is it time yet?" I just took the muffins out of the oven, they've turned a spectacular shade of burnt orange. Here I sit, an admitted anti-pumpkin person, waiting for later to have a cup of chai & one of those crazy pumpkin muffins.

I must go... its time to roast the squash and fill the beach air with the scent of sage.

Happy Harvest, Happy Autumn, Happy Pumpkin Picking, and Blessed Be.