fall favorites revisited

Although the temperatures are moderating between late summer warmth and cooler fall air, I was in the mood for some gingersnap cookies. In the past, I've used recipes from Penzeys Spices, or Lora's ginger cookies, however, I decided to try a recipe that I download from the King Arthur Flour website. Their gingersnap recipe uses vegetable shortening instead of butter. The ingredients are similar to Great Grandma Moog's, but with slight increases or decreases in quantity. Instead of rolling the cookies in sugar, the King Arthur recipe uses a combination of cinnamon and sugar. I had some cracked ginger (small dried pieces) which I put  in my spice grinder and used that instead of ground ginger. 

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I must say the cookies came out delicious. I baked them for 11 minutes which gave them a crispy edge, but soft center. However, I prefer my cookies crisp all the way through. However, I'm sure they'll be devoured before you know it.

What other fall goodies have I made that appeared on this blog a year ago? Yesterday I had a friend over for brunch. I made pumpkin walnut flap jacks which were yummy paired with Wegmans  Chicken and Sage Breakfast Sausage, ($3.99) and Shop Rite's fresh mixed fruit bowl ($5.49/lb). I still had a small amount of pumpkin puree left after making the flap jacks, so I decided to make a half recipe of the pumpkin spice latte base for my oatmeal this week.

To complete the weekend, I went to in Asbury Park last night with my son and daughter-in-law for a belated birthday dinner at Talula's. Asbury was hoppin' last night. There was a 30-40 minute wait at Talula's, but we got seated sooner. It turns out the hostess on duty last night was a former student. It was a pleasure to see her and catch up on what she's been doing.

Back to what we had, we started off with ricotta toast. It is house made Italian bread smeared with ricotta cheese, a drizzle of EVOO, sea salt and a few grinds of pepper. Luscious! My son had the beekeeper's lament, which is a pizza topped with tomato sauce, hot Calabrian soppressata, house mozzarella and  local honey ($16). It was excellent, the soppressata had a nice kick of heat. My daughter-in-law had the meatball bowl,  meatballs topped with tomato sauce, garlic toast and topped with ricotta aged Gouda ($13). I opted for esquite polenta bowl ($15) that was made with local corn, crema, chili powder, cilantro lime oil and topped with queso fresco, fried egg and I also requested the roasted pork (+$2). I haven't had polenta in years, so I wanted to give Talula's version a try. It was delicious. It had a nice creamy consistency, a bit of spice from the chili powder. I cut through the sunny side up egg to get the egg yolk to run through the polenta. The pork was nicely roasted and gave a dish a richness. 

Although we were all full, we shared the date cake with butterscotch sauce and cinnamon whipped cream ($10). The cake was light, with pockets of dates, the golden butterscotch sauce added a richness to the dish and the whipped cream complimented the flavors.