pumpkin pie

This is the seventh post in the series Great Grains, highlighting unusual whole grains and easy ways to incorporate them into your diet. Check out recent posts on teff, barley, and rye.

Two years ago on a sunny Saturday morning in October, my husband and I pulled up to a church in North Minneapolis with a flyer, some produce from our garden, and a carload of anticipation. Earlier that week, a friend had forwarded directions to a canning bee for anyone brand new to canning. There was one typed line in the email: “This sooo sounds like the crazy stuff you’re always trying!”

My friends know me well; I called right away to register for the last two spots in the canning bee. From 9:30 am to 5:30 pm that day, our group of 10 quietly listened and scribbled down the canning expert’s notes, poked our heads over steaming pots of pickles and salsas, and had silly full-teeth grins every time we pulled a jar from the hot water bath.

Thanksgiving, and the holidays in general, can be a daunting time for those who are watching their waistlines. With so many food-focused festivities taking place bam bam bam, sheer terror strikes many a heart. Yet terror is antithetical to what the holidays are about and that terror can do way more harm than pumpkin pie lovingly crafted with butter crust and topped with real whipped cream.

‘Tis true, most of us eat more on Thanksgiving than we do on a typical day, but this doesn’t mean you’re going to gain weight. According to Dr. Andrew Weil, world renowned leader and pioneer in the field of integrative medicine, “Fortunately, the idea that Americans put on between five and 10 pounds over the holiday season is more myth than reality. A National Institutes of Health study published in 2000 showed that the average holiday weight gain is just over one pound.”

Going Rogue

Last May, in my family's backyard garden, we planted five varieties of tomatoes, three varieties of lettuce, plus fennel, squash, cucumbers, beets and onions. Oh, and one pumpkin seed that our daughter found on the floor of her first-grade classroom.

The first thing to ripen, the lettuce, was fantastic. The cool weather was perfect for nurturing those tender leaves. But the tomatoes were a major disappointment; not enough heat and humidity for them. And neither the fennel, the squash, the cucumbers or the onions had a great year. The beets, the last I saw of them, were just one day away from being picked when some nighttime visitor – a raccoon? an opossum? – got to them first.