Warm me up!

Ah, fall. The leaves, the cool crisp air, the frosty grass in the morning. I just love fall. It's my favourite time of year! Perhaps because it always coincided with the start of school; and let me tell you, I LOVED school. I loved picking out my new outfit to wear, and packing my bag with freshly sharpened pencils, crisp white notepads and books that smelled like.....well...I don't know what books smell like! But I know that I have always sniffed books, regardless of whether they're new or old.

Fall is a time of darkness and death, but also a time for rest and preparation for the long winter ahead. Cooking and cleaning seem to go well with fall.

And cooking, I will be doing tons of! You can't go wrong with a warm fall soup, and I am always excited to try my hand at a new recipe. Here's one of my own concoctions:

1/2 small turnip, chopped into squares
1 sweet potato, chopped into squares
1/2 onion (or more...I don't particularly like onions)
1 cup lentils, chickpeas, whatever you like!
1 tbsp olive or canola oil
1 tsp minced ginger
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 tsp. turmeric
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
(1/2 tsp. salt, if no stock added)
1 can diced tomatoes
4 cups (or less, depending on whether you want soup or stew) water or veggie stock

Heat the oil in a medium size pot. Add the onion, ginger, garlic, turmeric and cinnamon, and cook until onion is soft. Stir in the turnip, potato and lentils and coat. Pour in the can of tomatoes and your water/stock and bring to a boil. Simmer for 20-25 mintues. Serve over quinoa, couscous, rice...whatever!

While you're slurping away, have a listen to "Autumn's Here" by Hawksley Workman:

You can tell by the wind
By fresh cut wood
All stacked to dry
That autumn's here
And it makes you sad
About the crummy
Summer we had

With pine trees creeking
The raven's screeching
Just like the story my grandma tells
About when a bird
Hits your window
And someone you know
Is about to die

Autumn's here
It's ok if you want to cry

Find a sweater
And you'll be better
Until the kindling is tinder dry
We can be quiet
As we walk down
To see the graveyard
Where they are now
I wonder how
They brought their piano
To haldane hill
From old berlin
Be hard to keep it
Well in tune
With winters like the one
That is coming soon
Auntumn's here
It's time to cry now

I think that ghosts like
The cooler weather
When leaves turn colour
They get together
And walk along
These old back roads
Where no one lives
And no one goes
With all their hopes set
On the railway
That never came
So no one stayed
I guess that autumn
Gets you remembering
And the smallest things
Just make you cry.

Autumn's here.