Three Squash, watercolor on paper by Leora Wenger, 2009
Welcome to the Kosher Cooking Carnival, the Tishrei (Jewish month, the first one, the one with many holidays like Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur, Sukkot and more) edition. Thank you, Batya, for managing this blog carnival.
What’s for Dinner?
Chunky Tomato Soup with Rice by Frugal and Kosher is beloved by her son – I bet other kids and adults will enjoy this recipe as well.
Rivki Silver participated in a Rosh Hashana blog party and made a super salad. Hannah Katsman of Cooking Manager was also part of the blog party – she presented one of my favorite of her recipes, the marinated beet salad.
Whether you call this banana bread or banana cake, it is a favorite dessert in our family. When I buy too many bananas and at least two brown ones are sitting on a shelf, it is time to make the banana cake.
Ingredients
2 (or 3) ripe bananas
1 cup sugar (I used white sugar, but you can try brown)
1/2 cup applesauce
1/4 canola oil
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
2 cups flour
2 eggs
optional: cinnamon and/or chocolate chips
Mix eggs, banana and sugar until creamy. Add oil, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Mix in the flour last. Add to a baking pan, and bake for 45 minutes to one hour at 350°.
It’s probably a good idea to store this cake in the refrigerator.
Mount Greylock in the Berkshires has a lot of goldenrod on top of the mountain. And many happy butterflies are enjoying themselves.
We also visited The Mount in the Berkshires, where Edith Wharton lived for a while with her husband (before she divorced him) and his dogs. There is a pet cemetery near the garden that has lots of tidy flowers, many of which are butterfly-friendly, like this butterfly bush. The Whartons allowed their dogs to sit at their fancy dining table along with distinguished guests (is that natural? as this is Nature Notes).
We saw this red mushroom besides the trail that we climbed to the top of Mount Greylock.
When you reach the top of Mount Greylock in the Berkshire Mountains, you are rewarded with lovely views. It looks a bit like a puzzle, the Mount Greylock views below and across (one can see more mountains in the distance).
If you climb this tower on the top of Mount Greylock, you see even more views. My husband and two sons climbed to the top. My daughter and I wandered around below, looking down at the landscape.
There is an inscription in honor of soldiers at the base of the Mount Greylock tower. You can also find two quotes from Henry David Thoreau at the top of Mount Greylock. Supposedly, he too as some point in the 19th century climbed this mountain.
I don’t know who the man in the yellow shirt is, but he added a nice contrast to the scene of the lake or pond below the mountain.
Need refreshment? There is a little cafe in the Bascomb Lodge at the top of Mount Greylock.
At the entrance to the Bascomb Lodge is a butterfly garden. I’ll save my butterfly shots for another post. There are also butterfly-friendly flowers all over the top of Mount Greylock.
On the way down the mountain, we took the Overview Trail. I was hoping for several scenic views on the trail, but we were only rewarded with this one scenic vista looking west.
We just came back from a trip to the Berkshire Mountains in western Massachusetts. One day we climbed Mount Greylock (the highest mountain in the Berkshires). Toward the top we came across this cabin and pond. The trail is part of the Appalachian Trail that spans the mountains of eastern United States. We only hiked a tiny portion of the trail. In fact, we didn’t even climb the entire mountain. We parked at the top of the CCC Dynamite Trail, walked on Sperry Road to the Deer Trail, then took the Hopper Trail to the A.T. or Appalachian Trail. On the way back we took the Overlook Trail to the Hopper Trail. The Overlook Trail really only has one good scenic vista, so my daughter didn’t think it was worth the extra half mile.
