Fall

When I was a kid and my parents took us out for breakfast, I always ordered a glass of cranberry juice. I loved the way it sparkled like rubies in a glass. But most of all, I loved its mouth-puckering tartness that sent shivers down my jaws when I drank it. (Even typing that sentence caused the same reaction.)

Now that I'm all grown up, I no longer drink cranberry juice. Maybe my taste preferences have changed, or maybe I've just become a wimp.

Fresh cranberries, however, I adore. And since cranberry season peaks between October and December, now is the perfect time to buy them.

In the fall, cranberries are used most commonly for cranberry sauce on Thanksgiving Day, yet they have so much more potential. They balance the sweetness of baked goods such as pumpkin muffins and banana bread. They add a jolt of flavor to homemade sweet apple sauce. And they perk up fall vegetables, such as butternut squash and sweet potatoes.

Even though summer is considered the pinnacle of tomato season, in many parts of the country the last fall harvest before the first hard frost brings some of the tastiest and meatiest fruits to market.

And this is a recipe that gives those end of season tomatoes a last hurrah in a hearty dish perfectly suited to fall…Oven Roasted Tomato and Basil Soup.

Best of all, this version lightens up the calories and the clean up!

The original recipe from the Barefoot Contessa calls for 6 tablespoons of olive oil and 2 tablespoons of butter…which adds 920 calories and 104 grams of fat.

Instead, we’re using fat free half-and-half to add the creamy richness…which cuts the calories per serving by more than half and removes virtually all of the fat.

And while the original recipe requires roasting the tomatoes in the oven for 45 minutes, then transferring them to a pot and cooking them on the stove for another 45, you can now cook everything in the oven….which frees you up to do other things and saves you the trouble of washing another pan.

One night last week Jeff came home from work and handed me a bag from his clinic. I thought, "Yes! More free anti-wrinkle cream!" (Having a dermatologist as a husband does have its advantages). When I peeked inside the bag, however, I discovered something even better than antioxidant cream: a dozen plump, brilliant green figs that were beginning to split from ripeness. "Wow! Where did you get the fresh figs?" I asked. "Adel gave them to me from the tree in her yard," he said.

Adel, who works with Jeff, told him, "Last year my tree produced three figs. One for me, one for my husband, and one for the birds." Fortunately she's having a bumper crop this season, and we're two of the lucky beneficiaries.

To celebrate fall's arrival, I'm sharing a recipe for Dessert Risotto with Wine Poached Figs. Arborio rice, which is used to make risotto, makes the most luxurious rice pudding imaginable: it's plump, tender, and creamy. Topping it with perfumed, wine-poached figs adds elegance and sweetness, resulting in a remarkably velvety, rich pudding.

Move over apple turnovers. Here comes pumpkin.

Begin with a can of pure pumpkin puree, and it’s amazing how some sugar and spice can make everything nice. Pie crust helps out, too.

Grab-and-Go Sweet Pumpkin Turnovers are a little bit cookie and little bit pie. When refrigerated pie crust is sprinkled with chopped walnuts and cut into rounds, then mounded with a filling that will remind you of pumpkin pie, it’s hard to know what it should be called. Most certainly, it is a turnover.

The use of refrigerated pie crust speeds up the process of creating these turnovers. Pressing chopped walnuts into the dough adds crunchy texture and gives the pastry a homemade flair.

When the turnovers are eaten on the day they are baked, your teeth will crack through a crunchy topping of cinnamon and sugar. Once the turnovers have been stored in an airtight container, that crunchy shell will become melt-in-the-mouth soft. Either way, they are delicious.