Fall

For a long time, the closest I had ever come to what I thought was a real fig was the dried kind or Fig Newtons. It wasn't until a family friend gave us a fig tree that I learned figs are actually fresh before they are dried. Not only that, but I discovered that fresh figs were worlds apart from the dried ones. We weren't the only family with a fig tree in the neighborhood. Italian and Portuguese neighbors had them too. That's because figs are native to the Mediterranean region, where they have been revered since ancient and biblical times. You can't not find mention of it in ancient Greek and Roman texts and of course the Bible's creation story. What would we have done without fig leaves?

For a number of years we were lucky to have our own Garden of Eden with a flourishing fig tree in the backyard. With much ingenuity we were able to keep it protected through many winters until one year it finally didn't survive the cold. But I can never forget how anxious I was all summer long as I waited for the figs to ripen. It seemed to me they always took so long. But fig season is late September, so I had to learn to be patient because there was nothing I could do to speed up mother nature.

I am an impatient person. I hate to wait. While some of the pears my mother gave me from her trees are ripe, others are not. Is there something you can do with not quite ripe pears? Yes! I discovered you can roast them.

Pears are sometimes added to savory dishes to add juice and moisture, or to make a sauce. My idea with this recipe was to make a side dish, something that could be served with pork chops, roast chicken, pork tenderloin, sausages, tossed with salad greens, on top of a pizza or maybe even used in a sandwich. Most recipes for roast pears call for pear halves or quarters, but dicing them just means they cook faster. You could also include pears with potatoes, parsnips, onions, beets or other similar vegetables that are good for roasting.

I really love the silky texture of cooked pears. The flavor intensifies too, which is why pears are so good in cakes and tarts. But you can get the same texture and flavor by roasting pears without baking them in a batter or crust. Necessity is the mother of invention and my mother's prolific pear trees accounts for the plethora of pear recipes I've created. Currently I'm really enjoying maple roasted pears with oatmeal or yogurt, but as the season progresses I'm sure I'll find even more ways to use them.

When you're pressed for time, the last thing most people want to do is cook. Coming home after a hard day at the office or dealing with kids and errands, the kitchen can seem unwelcoming.

You're hungry. It's dark outside. The house is cold. You open the freezer and stare at the frozen dinner you bought two months ago but never nuked. A can of chicken noodle soup in the pantry holds the promise of a warm meal but a quick read of the label tells you that the salt content is high enough to brine a Thanksgiving turkey.

Your mind tries to convince you that you aren't all that hungry. Maybe all you really want is a glass of wine and a bowl of dry cereal.

But you are hungry and you'd feel a lot better if you had a home cooked meal.

The truth is all it takes is a little planning and a couple of easy-to-make recipes and you'll actually look forward to coming home and cooking dinner. Ok, maybe that's a little Pollyannaish, but you get the idea.

Prominent throughout the Deep South and up through Virginia to Connecticut and back down towards Florida and west to Kansas and Texas, the common Persimmon, Diospyros virginiana, makes for a Farmer’s favorite with its growth habit, bark, leaf shape, and fruit color…that fabulous color holding the rank somewhere between terra cotta, salmon, apricot, and orange.

“Don’t you EVER bite into a green persimmon…it will turn your mouth INSIDE OUT!!!” That is what Grandmother, Mimi’s grandmother, my great, great grandmother would exclaim about this fruit. Tart and sour, the unripe persimmons are about as useful as a boar’s teat, but the ripe persimmons are lovely, flavorful, and quite delicious. “They’ve got to be DEAD ripe,” according to the grand dame Mimi herself.

Because of their extreme astringency, the persimmon will most often make you pucker, but once the sour cells within the fruit are “bletted" or partially rotted the fruit becomes much more palpable. Killed by cold, the astringent cells actually rot somewhat and cause the fruit to take on a sweeter flavor, and, thus, the old adage that persimmons are not ripe until the first frost. There is a whole chemistry lesson here but I shan’t attempt to explain the how’s and why’s – just know persimmons most often become ripe after the first frost.