It’s official: autumn is here. I know this not by the date on the calendar, but because I was cold enough this morning to finally turn on our heater. Considering the amount of rainy, cool days we’ve had this past week, I probably should’ve switched the thing on before now, but I just can’t make myself turn on the heat until the A/C has been off for a solid seven days.

Another sure sign that it’s autumn: my crock pot has been allowed back inside the house.

Yes, it sounds crazy to some, but during the summer I use my crock pot in the garage. We’ve got an old freezer in one corner away from the automotive supplies and old cans of paint, and during the warm months that’s where my crock pot does all of its cooking. That keeps the heat out of the house, which is always a plus given the high cost of running the A/C, but it also keeps all of the yummy smells out, too. Now that it’s cool, though, my crock pot — and its delicious aromas — are back indoors.

Now that my migraine is gone — hooray! — I’m actually in the mood to do some serious cooking. I think it has something to do with the weather: it’s only 59 F outside, and the rain is pouring down. Definitely one of those perfect “soup commercial” days, although with homeschool and housekeeping to catch up on from my migraine-induced downtime, my schedule’s too hectic to nurse something along on the stove.

So I’ve spent the last half hour browsing through crock pot recipes at MomsWhoThink.com. They have over a thousand recipes for slow-cookers and crock pots organized into broad categories like “Appetizers” or “Crock Pot Beef”.

I’ve got an overabundance of chicken in our freezer right now, thanks to the combination of a sale at the Commissary and a husband who went grocery shopping after skipping lunch. So I’ve been checking out their “Crock Pot Chicken” category and randomly clicking on pages in search of the perfect recipe.

The recipe for Crock Pot Chicken Stew with Basil Dumplings caught my eye, particularly since I have one basil plant in the garden that somehow survived this long and needs to be used. (Sorry I can’t direct you to it; the site doesn’t have permalinks to individual recipes.)

Now, of course, my kitchen is filled with yummy smells and I’ve got the pleasure of knowing that my last chore for the day — making dinner — is already out of the way. Which is wonderful, really, except that it smells so darned good that my stomach’s going to be rumbling all day.

The USDA has announced the 5th largest recall of tainted beef in history, totaling 21.7 million pounds. The target this time? Pre-made hamburger patties packaged by Topps Meat Company. The patties are believed tainted with E. coli bacteria.

Inspectors found that Topps didn’t handle the meat properly: they mixed day-old meat held onto at the end of a product run with fresh meat on the following day, which violates safety standards.

Unfortunately, the recall is likely to have come too late. Consumption patterns cited by the company leads Topps to believe the majority of the beef products have already been consumed. Since this is a frozen product, the USDA urges consumers to look through their freezers for any of the tainted products and throw them out.

Frankly, outside of the fast-food industry, I’ve never understood why anyone would purchase a pre-fab hamburger patty in the first place. Tossing a machine-issued, disc shaped pile of meat on fire doesn’t make you any more of a BBQ King (or Queen) than the guy at McDonald’s, even if you’re standing in a fancy outdoor kitchen instead of wearing a little paper hat.

An all-you-can-eat crab buffet in one shell. Nice.

You know by now that I have a love-hate relationship with all things Anthony Bourdain, including No Reservations show. I love the guy, except when I don’t.

The times when I love his work is when he’s doing what he does best: haunting small out-of-the-way places, talking with locals, treading the unbeaten path. Sometimes the discrepancy between his voice-over commentary and the actual expression on his face as he tries, say, wiggly bean gel, are hilarious.

Other times, though, I can’t help feeling the show is becoming increasingly self-indulgent. Take, for example, the NYC episode during which viewers were treated to five long minutes of watching a spandex-clad Tony Bourdain desperately try to swing on a trapeze while looking oddly like one of those leggy insects that darts about the surface of stagnant pools. Five minutes. Five very long minutes. And why? No reason in particular: he just wanted to do it. M’kay.

Aside from lulls, I do like that the Travel Channel gives him such leeway to choose his destination and itinerary. Lately, in fact, they’ve been soliciting viewers for suggestions: perhaps in an effort to balance out Bourdain’s fascination with all things Asian.

Personally, I’d like to see him do a show in Trinidad. Considering that Bourdain retreats to the Carribbean for a break in his increasingly busy life, he might be a bit hesitant to turn his playground into paid work but I hope not.

Oh, I don’t want to see him do the tourist-y stuff at Carnival, poked by Jab Jab’s pitchfork or buried in Dame Lorraine’s ample cleavage. That’s not Bourdain’s style, anyway.

But I would love to see him explore the island’s eclectic cuisine. With Trinidad’s history of Spansh conquest and its conflicts with the Carib and Arawak tribes, one would expect a cuisine bearing heavy European influences. One would be wrong, though. The island has actually — since its failed cocoa crop in the early 1700s — become a “melting pot” for Indian, Chinese and African migrants. Sure, there are plenty of Spanish dishes to be had — but, after all, isn’t Spanish cuisine the “new thing” in food trends these days? They’re rivaled by the island’s Indian and Carib cooking, and the fusion of the various influences has created its own very special, very different style, too.

Besides which, I can’t help but thinking that if Bourdain wants to continue with the self-indulgent episodes, what better way than by extending his annual Carribean vacations by another week to do some paid work. I, for one, would love to see him explore Trinidad’s famous bat caves — where he’d look quite at home in that black spandex bodysuit from his trapeze-swinging episode.

Take two flavors of summer, put them together and what do you get: Kool-Aid Pickles. Really. Oddly enough, despite my fondness for Southern food (why, yes, I do keep a jar of bacon grease in the fridge for flavoring), I’d never heard of these until reading about them in a NY Times article a couple of weeks ago. My first reaction? Well, it sounded suspiciously like I’d just shoved a pickle too far down my throat, Kool-Aid not included.

Then I got to thinking, hey, I pride myself on trying all sorts of strange foods, so why not this? Besides, it sounded like a fun way to get my son “cooking.”

The recipe is surprisingly simple:

1 huge jar dill pickles
2 packets of Kool-Aid (we used cherry-flavored)
2 cups sugar
2 quart water

Directions

1. Remove pickles from jar and drain. Slice them lengthwise.
2. Place pickles in a 5-gallon container. I used our sun tea jug which works just fine.
3. In a large jug, mix the Kool-Aid, sugar and water. (Note: you are basically making double-strength Kool-Aid.)
4. Pour Kool-Aid mixture on top of pickles. Seal jar and give it a shake.
5. Shake daily for the next 5 to 7 days. Letting them sit longer is better.
6. After a week, remove pickles with tongs and insert Popsicle sticks or bamboo skewers to make them easier to eat. (This will keep your fingers from turning pink, too.)

How do they taste? Well, as the NY Times article says:

Depending on your palate and perspective, they are either the worst thing to happen to pickles since plastic brining barrels or a brave new taste sensation to be celebrated.

I kind of liked them. Then again, I’d had three martinis before my first bite.
[tags]Kool-Aid pickles[/tags]

Turning 40 means having a whole new slew of health issues to watch. Of them, getting my recommended amount of calcium is probably the most difficult: I don’t like milk and, although I love cheese I’ve had to cut back on it due to the fat content. (Low-fat cheese, in my book, is not cheese at all.) I’m not a fan of ice cream or yogurt, either, and while I do enjoy a glass of buttermilk now and again, I’m not about to drink three glasses of it daily. Oh, and there’s definite a limit to how much broccoli I’m willing to eat in a 24-hour span.

We all know that calcium is good for teeth and bones. Women know that it’s essential to preventing osteoporosis, and although the Dairy Council is supposed to stop advertising that calcium helps one lose weight, the notion’s already been planted in every dieting woman’s mind.

So what’s a milk-hating girl to do? One option is to pop pills. Coral calcium pills, to be precise. But with manufacturers offering so many different “proprietary blends,” it’s difficult to find the best supplement at the best price. So many companies opt for cheap sources, so what looks like a good deal might actually be a bad one in the long run, failing to deliver the amount of calcium they claim.

A non-profit group, The Coral Calcium Watchdog, tracks such things, along with research concerning the sometimes over-exaggerated claims concerning this supplement. In addition to monitoring the 9 leading manufacturers of coral calcium, they compare price per bottle and gram, and note how the coral calcium itself is harvested.

Harvesting directly affects the mineralization of the coral calcium as well as the environment. “Live harvesting,” a practice used in Brazil for instance, involves retrieving coral immediately after it washes up on shore. “Above sea level” harvesting takes place in Okinawa and involves digging up coral washed onto the shores and preserved under the sand. Both result in high mineralization and are environmentally friendly and without posing the danger to the reef of “below sea level” harvesting methods.

Now, while there have been many dubious claims made about coral calcium — some call it the “Fountain of Youth” — the research does not support them. Coral calcium is, however, a very effective source of calcium for those interested in supplementing their intake or who, like me, just don’t get it elsewhere in their diet.