It Can Be Done!!!

The pumpkin "Chinese" food experiment was postponed until dinner, because at lunch I was in the middle of canning 4 more quarts of pickles, but last night I was ready!

Taking the pureed pumpkin out of the bag and finding it not very "pureed," I stuck it in the food processor with some water and a little 5 spice powder, figuring the cinnamon & spices would mix nicely with the sweetness of the pumpkin. I stir fried some veggies from the garden, then added the pumpkin "sauce"
simmering just about a minute before sprinkling in a small amount of cornstarch, then served it over rice noodles with some toasted pecans added for protein:
It was actually pretty good and EXTREMELY healthy, but ugly enough that no restaurant in the world is going to be pilfering my idea. Or any of my other cooking ideas, for that matter, but I'm sure our collective cholesterol count dropped by 10 yesterday.

And since we were enjoying an unseasonably cool evening, I made ginger-garlic mustard. No matter what we decide to do in the future, we'll never be able to go back to commercial mustards. We are both tremendous fans of mustard, and when we first moved in together & combined refrigerators we must have had 10 different types of mustard, so I certainly loved the commercial stuff, but NOW we have experienced a new level of condiment and we just can't go back. And we might spend just a little too much time thinking about food somedays.....

Anyway, this one had ginger, garlic, cracked black pepper, and water boil gently for a bit, then all the solids are strained out and you get this: which smelled AMAZING. Then yellow & brown mustard seeds soak in this for 2 hours, then it's all processed in the food processor, vinegar is added, and the whole thing is brought to a boil over medium heat.

And here's the reason we buy mustard: cooking mustard is one of the most pungent eye-watering fumes I have encountered, and I boil brine for pickles. Now, if you have a cold or sinus trouble, this might do some good. As it was, my eyes were stinging and watering while I had to "stir constantly." Once it comes to a boil, then you gently boil for 15 minutes until it is about 1/3 of the volume and you have inhaled the other two-thirds as nasty, stinging vapor.

Then after a little water-bath processing:
Yep, that's right. 2 1/2 cups of mustard. We'll open it in a couple months and see how it is. We might be sticking mostly with the mustards that DON'T have to be cooked, or saving this little project for cold & flu season........