Happy All Hallow's Eve, folks. Tis the season to celebrate pumpkin beer, and here are some ideas to get your mouth a-waterin'.

From the crew over at Beer America TV:
Pumpkin love continues, but this time with a twist, it's not an ale but a lager, the only one of its kind in the world! Lakefront Brewing gets a look and a taste with their Lakefront Pumpkin Lager. We also drop some knowledge about one of America's Founding Fathers.

* Some intrepid brewers make their pumpkin beer ... imagine this! ... INSIDE A PUMPKIN. Check out this slideshow: Brewing in a Pumpkin.

* Read about that "experiment" in more detail in Pumpkin to Tunkin: Last Call 

* One of those intrepid brewers is a contributing writer for Mother Earth News. Read his latest article: Brew Your Own Beer 

Also of seasonal interest:

* Make Your Own Hard Cider 

* Those Beer America guys also took a look at Sam Adams Octoberfest.

Now what?

Now, I drink pumpkin beer! Here are the brews from my neck of the woods that I'm planning to try this weekend:

* Brooklyn Brewery Post Road Pumpkin Ale (New York)

* Greenpoint Beer Works/Heartland Brewery Smiling Pumpkin Ale (New York)

* Smuttynose Pumpkin Ale (New Hampshire)

But what about you??? 

Yes, you should try some pumpkin brew too. Drop a note about your favorites in the comments section below.

Ready ... Set ... Go!

Hey pumpkin carvers: Stop. Wait. Don't waste all those yummy seeds! (Happy Halloween, by the way.) You can save those seeds from ending up in the garbage can with 4 easy steps:

1. SOAK THE SEEDS in water for a few hours. Fill a bowl with water, drop in the seeds and rub them between your fingers to start loosening up any attached pulp. Don't worry about getting every last bit off, because soaking them for a while makes it easier to rub all the pumpkin-ey pulp off later.

2. DRY THE SEEDS on a towel for a few hours, or until they are dry to the touch.

3. SEASON THOSE SEEDS with whatever's on-hand and sounds yummy. Sweet and savory both work well — be creative. (Our friend Kim Wallace, over at Natural Home magazine has a step-by-step recipe for sweet cinnamon-n-sugar pumpkin seeds.) Using a little bit of honey or oil will add flavor and help herbs and spices stick well. For the pumpkin seeds I made as a salad topping (see below), I tossed the dried seeds in extra-virgin olive oil (Global Gardens 2007 Harvest first cold press, a wonderfully fruity and aromatic premium olive oil) and Maine Coast Sea Vegetables organic kelp with cayenne pepper blend (one of my long-standing favorite seasoning blends).

4. ROAST THE SEEDS in a 300-degree-Fahrenheit oven for about 10 minutes. Keep an eye on them: They'll be done when they're golden to light brown.

Crunchy seaweed- and cayenne-spiced roasted pumpkin seeds make a fabulous topping for a fresh arugula salad, and counterbalance the sweetness of crispy cucumber and pear slices.

More pumpkin know-how: Grilled Pumpkin with Rosemary and Sea Salt * Pumpkins Make any Dish a Smashing Hit * 7 Great Pumpkin Carving Tips * Wacky and Wonderful Halloween Pumpkin Designs * Three Phunky Pumpkins * The Great Pumpkin * The Great American Pumpkin * Make a Jack-'O-Lantern ... And Eat Pumpkin Pie, Too! * About Pumpkins * Beer America TV Pops the Top on a Pumpkin Lager 

Two items that we seem to buy every week from the grocery store are cream cheese and sour cream. Why I haven't already started making these myself sooner is beyond me. Most likely because I didn't realize how extremely easy it was to do both. For the cream cheese, I've read several recipes that call for fancy equipment or hard-to-find ingredients, but there are other ways of making it that won't make your throw your hands up in frustration. And, considering the amount of plastic packaging involved with both items, making them at home will also limit the amount of waste involved (although we do recycle both kinds of containers). These recipes are so easy, you'll wonder why you never tried them before.

Homemade Cream Cheese

1 quart homemade or store-bought plain yogurt (whole milk or low-fat, depending on your preference)

Instructions

Place a clean kitchen towel or clean muslin in a colander. Place the colander in a bowl that is large enough to hold it. Add the yogurt to the lined colander and wrap the towel over the top to cover (or use a plate). Leave this to drain for about 5 hours in the refrigerator. If you want a thicker consistency, leave it longer, making sure to empty what is draining so it doesn't reach the bottom of the colander and get reabsorbed. Store your finished cream cheese in a resealable container in the fridge. Better yet, use one of your old packaged cream cheese containers to do the job!

Your cream cheese will last as long as your yogurt would, so if you used purchased yogurt (rather than making it yourself), check the expiration date and use that as your guide. (I highly recommend trying to make the yogurt yourself since this will cut down on additional waste especially if you can get your milk in returnable glass bottles.) If you want to get fancy, you can add flavorings to your cream cheese. Try adding homemade strawberry jam for strawberry-flavored cream cheese. If you spent time dehydrating onions, then adding those (or fresh green onions) and chives from your garden will make a tasty chive-and-onion cream cheese spread.

Homemade Sour Cream

1 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup sour cream or buttermilk (or even white vinegar will work)

Instructions

In a screw-top jar or mason jar with lid, combine the heavy cream and sour cream (or buttermilk). Shake the ingredients up a bit to thoroughly mix and let stand, covered, at room temperature for about 24 hours or until it becomes very thick. You can store your sour cream in the refrigerator in the original jar you mixed it in (or use some other resealable container) for up to one week. Make sure that your sour cream is well chilled before using.

If you want to make a lighter sour cream, substitute whole milk for 1/2 cup of the heavy cream. 

Looking for homemade cheese recipes made with easy-to-find ingredients? You can find homemade ricotta and the like in my Easy Cheese Series.

See also: Easy Cheesy: 4 Super-Simple Recipes, You Can Make Yogurt at Home and How to Make Your Own Yogurt, Kefir, Chevre 

Several months ago, I participated in a honey-and-cheese pairing at Murray’s Cheese in Greenwich Village. Among the many miraculous marriages tickling my palate that evening, the great standout was Swiss Hoch Ybrig cheese drizzled with Connecticut buckwheat honey. On the tongue, the two blended together into an almost-dead-ringer for an old-fashioned butterscotch candy: butterscotchey, carameley, toasty and supersilky, but without any aftertaste of candy preservatives or too much sugar. So basically, something perfect. That was eight months ago and I can almost taste it still, if that tells you anything.

The cheese itself is in the Gruyere family so it’s dense and a little elastic to the bite but creamy as it melts, and it has the nutty, farm-ey flavors that come from aging (affinage). But this raw cow’s milk beauty is washed in white wine many times over the course of many months by a rock star. The rock star … I mean affineur … responsible for Hoch Ybrig is none other than Rolf Beeler. Google “Rolf Beeler” if you’re looking for a new hero.

The complement of buckwheat honey from Red Bee Apiary in Weston, Conn., was rich, velvety, nutty, molasses-dark and positively luscious. (If you’ve never had honey like this, then you probably have no idea what honey is capable of. Go out and get you some!)

The two different treats, each so unique, blended together into this incredible and oh-so-welcome new flavor. It was completely distinct from either the honey or the cheese, and stood alone as a new kind of yummy for me. What a perfect pairing!

What’s this about honey? I thought you said cheese and BEER.

Indeed. This weekend I attended another Murray’s pairing — a “standoff” actually. We tasted several cheeses, each with both a wine and a beer, then voted on the winning pairs. When I realized Hoch Ybrig cheese was on our plates again, I could barely wait to find out what we’d be tasting it with.

Amanda Crawford*, wine specialist at Christie’s Auction House, picked two stellar complements: Donnas Cuvee de Donnas and Arbois Savagnin Jacques Puffeney 2006. The Donnas, a red wine from the Alpine vineyards in the Val d'Aoste region of Italy was pleasantly crisp and light with a very clean grassy-fruity smell. It worked well with the cheese, but the flavors of the cheese lingered longer. The Savagnin, a white wine from the Jura, was impressive. We all thought it was sherry, because its aroma was superstrong and distinctly sherrylike, but its flavors turned out to be far less sweet and far less alcohol-ey. It’s a wine I’d definitely like to have again, even by itself. But it, too, made a great pair for Hoch Ybrig. (At least half the tasters voted the combo their fave.)

I was starting to think that anything could stand up to this fantabulous cheese, but then … sweet lord … then came the beer. The amazing beer. The combo of Hoch Ybrig and Ayinger Celebrator Doppelbock doppelknocked my socks off!! Chris Munsey, the beer specialist at Murray’s said he chose it because, like the cheese, it comes from Bavaria and is aged for several months before we get to devour it. Of course, aging beer is a little uncommon, but this lager-style brew simply takes longer to develop its full, dark, smoky-sweet intensity. It didn’t turn the cheese into butterscotch candy, but it did turn it into a little bit of Bavarian heaven.

RESOURCES:

- Look for Hoch Ybrig cheese in stores with a great cheese selection, or order directly from Murray’s through their online shop.

- Look for the beer and wines in specialty shops. (Warning: The wines will not be easy to find.)

- Discover more awesome pairing ideas in The Pairing Zone.

- Watch great beers being made and tasted at Beer America TV.

- Rate your favorite beers and find new ones to try at RateBeer.com.

- From our archives: Brew Your Own Beer, Good Libations, You Can Brew Your Own Beer 

*Amanda Crawford is a passionate advocate of wines that connote a sense of place and tell a story. She has worked as a wine buyer in retail, a wine director in restaurants and vineyard hand during the harvest in both Italy and Croatia. She holds an advanced certificate from the Wine Spirits and Education Trust out of London and is currently engrossed in studies to achieve a Diploma certification. A frequent instructor of wine appreciation in New York, Amanda also writes frequently about wine for several local publications. She is currently a specialist at Christie's where she sources consignments and authenticates bottles of fine and rare wine for auction. She is a graduate of Wellesley College.

Even though it's October, I'm canning away the last of the summer berries. We've still got raspberries coming in from a local farm and I wanted to do something a little different than the standard raspberry jam recipe. When I spice up a jam it usually includes some interesting addition or flavoring and some sort of liqueur or liquor. Most of the alcohol gets burned off and you are left with a very complex flavor profile. This recipe makes ordinary raspberry jam seem, well, ordinary. Since I've started tinkering around with jam recipes, I really have a hard time going back to the basics. This recipe can also be used as a dessert topping as well if you lower the amount of pectin and keep it a little more liquid.

Ingredients

5 cups raspberries, crushed  (use a potato masher or other implement to crush the berries)
6 cups sugar
1 pack pectin
1 cup white chocolate chips (spring for the Guittard or other gourmet chocolate if it's available in your area)
1/4 cup coffee liqueur (Starbucks or Kahlua)

Heat raspberries while slowly adding in the pectin. Once the raspberries are at a full boil that you cannot stir down, add in the sugar. Return to a full rolling boil, stirring for one minute. Take the raspberry mixture off the heat and add in the white chocolate. It will take awhile to melt, so be patient (unless you want chunks of white chocolate in your jam). After the white chocolate has melted, add the coffee liqueur and stir until well blended. Because the raspberry jam is quite hot, the alcohol will burn off, so if you want to have more of the alcohol flavor, add it in at the very end. Pour jam into sterilized canning jars and process in a hot water bath for 10 minutes. That is, assuming you haven't eaten half of it already. Yields 10 pints.

If you are interested in other concoctions that I've made with my jams, check out my favorite strawberry jam recipe (Spiced Sangiovese and Strawberry Jam) and my favorite peach recipe (Cognac Vanilla Peach Preserves). All of these make for great holiday gifts as well.

The results from Mother Earth News’ latest round of pastured egg nutrient tests are beginning to come in. So far, pastured egg producers are kicking the commercial industry’s butt — woo hoo, go free range! We’ve invested a lot of time and energy over the last few years in researching the differences between the meat and eggs coming out of the commercial industry and those produced by conscientious farmers who let their animals graze on fresh pastures. In the past, we’ve found that eggs from hens raised on pasture, as compared to those commercially raised factory farm eggs, contain:

• 1⁄3 less cholesterol
• 1⁄4 less saturated fat
• 2⁄3 more vitamin A
• 2 times more omega-3 fatty acids
• 3 times more vitamin E
• 7 times more beta carotene

Now we’re looking at vitamin D, which many of us do not get enough of because we don’t spend any time outdoors, and even when we do we use sunscreen that blocks vitamin D production. (More about that here.) Eggs are one of the few food sources of naturally occurring vitamin D, and we wondered if true free-range eggs might be higher in this important vitamin, too. Our latest tests show that pastured eggs have anywhere between 4 to 6 times as much vitamin D as typical supermarket eggs.

So … (1) Get out there and eat some fresh farm eggs! and (2) Check out our ongoing pastured egg research here.

Do you raise chickens for eggs or meat? If you want to participate in one of our studies, please e-mail RealFood@MotherEarthNews.com.

From arugula to turnips, fall is the season for beautiful and nutritious cooked greens. Is there someone at your house who hates greens? The 10 ways to cook greens outlined here may convert them! Even if they are not swayed by Sicilian-style polenta with kale or Swiss chard strata, we greens lovers can always use fresh ideas to make fall a little more flavorful. 

Alton Brown's 2005 Good Eats episode called Field of Greens includes a killer recipe for Mustard Green Gratin, various versions of which get gobbled up fast at my house. Indeed, mixtures of cooked greens, eggs, milk, cheese and a little flour (which "set" when baked in a 325 degree oven) can be poured into a pie crust to make quiche, or you can stay crustless with a Spanish-style frittata.

A casserole bound together with egg and stale bread, called a strata, is easy and delicious when made with greens. Layer stale bread with chopped wilted greens, caramelized onions and fontina (or another nice melting cheese) in a buttered casserole dish. Pour in a mixture of 3 eggs and 1 cup milk, with a little cheese and bread crumbs on top. Bake until bubbly and set, and you have a great one-dish meal.

Making the most of the soft texture of cooked greens, Italians often enjoy them over polenta. My version of polenta – a half and half mixture of grits and coarsely ground whole cornmeal, cooked in lightly salted water until it stiffens – makes a fabulous bed for a mound of greens, roasted sweet peppers and grated hard cheese.

Medium-sized leaves picked from chard, kale and some types of mustard can be used as wrappers for not-really-cabbage rolls. Make a mixture of rice and meat, or rice and beans, or bulgur and mushrooms (you get the idea), roll it up in trimmed greens leaves, and place the rolls seam side down in a greased baking dish. Cover tightly, bake for about 45 minutes, and serve with a spicy-sweet condiment or mustard.

Speaking of condiments, fruits like apple, pear, raisins or currants make great flavor companions for cooked greens, or you might serve homemade chutneys with your greens. When making warm dressings for wilted salads, use balsamic vinegar to add a touch of sweetness.

When you're short on time, try one-pot pasta or rice. Have a bowl of clean, chopped greens ready to stir into hot pasta or rice just as it gets done. Put on the lid, let it steam a few minutes, and add additional ingredients (like chopped olives or roasted walnuts), maybe some salad dressing, or simply top with feta cheese and maybe some crisp crumbled bacon.

My last tip (please add more in the Comments section below!) is to gob on the garlic. Three big cloves is not too many – you may want 4 or 5 when seasoning a large pot of greens or a casserole. Don't want garlic? Try a half teaspoon of fennel, dill or anise seeds instead. In addition to adding flavor, they tame the aroma of simmering greens, which is greatly appreciated by people who hate them.

Above: Why not mix and match your greens? Chard, turnips, arugula, mizuna and other greens can be chopped and cooked together in endless combinations. Photo by Barbara Pleasant.

We’re trying it before you buy it.

Company: Organic Valley
Product: Pasture Butter
Editor’s score: 5/5

Ingredients: pasteurized organic sweet cream, salt, microbial cultures
Price: $3.69 (Search Organic Valley coupons.)
Where to Buy: available at most grocery stores, or find a retailer near you

Why we liked it : rich, smooth, seasonal, high-quality, nutritious, unique, animal-friendly, farmer-friendly

“If you're afraid of butter, as many people are nowadays, just put in cream!” — Julia Child

Fact: Butter is one of nature’s simplest and most perfect foods. This is something Julia Child knew well — she sang butter’s praises until the end of her life, which turned out to be a not-too-shabby 91 years. And from the looks of it, Organic Valley knows it, too. That brand you likely recognize from the organic section of your grocery store has a fabulous new offering, Pasture Butter, and I give it two big ole thumbs up!

Like all of Organic Valley’s products, Pasture Butter is produced without any harmful and unnecessary pesticides, antibiotics or synthetic hormones, and the animals involved in its production are humanely raised. But that’s not what’s so unique about Pasture Butter, so let’s move on.

Pasture Butter is only produced during the summer (May to September) from the certified organic milk of cows raised on pasture. (You can find out the specifics of the cooperative’s pasture-grazing standards here.) Grass-fed animals have their most abundant buffet of nutritious greens precisely during this time, and that translates into some supremely healthy dairy products.

Ever heard of CLA? The benefits of conjugated linoleic acid have been in the news a lot lately. CLA is a naturally occurring trans fatty acid (this is not the man-made bad guy you’ve also heard so much about) manufactured in the gut of animals that graze. CLA research is new, but early studies have found that it may be a really great cancer-fighter and immune-booster. If milk-producing animals aren’t allowed to graze — as is their wont — their milk simply won’t be high in this nutrient, so you can’t expect to get it from non-pastured dairy products. In fact, grass-fed animal products are the richest natural source of CLA.

CLA is just one of the omega fatty acids that have been found to be richer in grass-fed animals. The potentially important ratio of Omega-3 to Omega-6 fatty acids has also been in the news a lot, and Pasture Butter has a naturally occurring, heart-healthy optimal ratio. See the rest of the Nutrition Facts for yourself.

How is Pasture Butter different?

1. REAL FLAVOR. It’s rich, complex, a little nutty, a little grassy, and … well … buttery. Like it should be. Organic Valley produces Pasture Butter in small batches, and churns it longer than standard butter, which has the result of reducing moisture and increasing yummy butterfat. Regular butter is still butter, so it’s usually pretty good and improves the foods you pair it with. But this one can practically stand alone, and if you can resist the urge to snarf it down solo, it’ll make the foods you dress in it simply sing!

Part of the reason this butter is so dang good is that it’s cultured. That’s right, sophisticated. Well, it is a pretty sophisticated butter we’re talking about here, but no, that’s not what I mean. Before being churned, live cultures are added to the cream to ripen it, yielding sweeter and more complex flavors, not to mention making it easier to digest. Allowing cream to ripen — or ferment, or culture, however you want to put it — was once simply the status quo. If you know someone with an antique butter churn who can remember a time before refrigerators, ask them how long they would let fresh cream sit out before making butter with it.

2. AMAZING TEXTURE. It’s creamy, thick, dense, silky-smooth and super-duper-spreadable. Little-known fact: The spreadability of butter is determined by its ratio of saturated to unsaturated fat. If it’s relatively easy to spread, it has more unsaturated (good, healthy) fat and less saturated (bad, artery-clogging) fat. And a 2006 study found that the softer the butter, the more fresh pasture was in the cow’s diet. In fact, cows that eat nothing but grass have the softest butterfat of all.

3. GOOD AS GOLD. The pretty, pretty yellow of Pasture Butter is evidence of its high vitamin and beta-carotene content. Grasses eaten while they are alive are higher in vitamins E, A and beta-carotene than the standard commercial dairy diet, and those nutrients end up in the cream, and thus the butter. (More about that here.) But buyer beware: The pretty, pretty yellow of some nutritionally inferior butters is only evidence of its high food coloring and additive content. Would you like a side of annatto with your butter? Always check the label!

4. RESPECT FOR THE SEASONS. Early summer butter used to command a premium price as compared to the butter you could get the rest of the year. But that was before our food system replaced seasonal and regional variation with homogeneity. Pasture Butter is one of the few food products you’ll find at regular grocery stores these days that even acknowledges Mother Nature in this way. In my opinion, that’s a reason almost as good as flavor to go out and get some Pasture Butter for yourself. (Did you know that meat and dairy are seasonal foods, just like asparagus and tomatoes? Learn more about that in Eat in Sync with the Seasons.)

The butter’s downfalls: Um, does butter have a downfall??? Let’s ask Julia Child.

My backyard grown sugar pie pumpkins are finally ripening up in spite of the steady rains we've been experiencing here in the Pacific Northwest. A few of the pumpkins ended up being somewhat small and weren't worth the effort to process into pumpkin puree. So, what to do with these little guys? I wanted to do something new and, not having grilled pumpkins before, I was quite excited to give it a try.

During grilling, the sugars in the pumpkin caramelize. The combination of sweet and salty, coupled with crisp rosemary, will give you a different way of thinking about pumpkin. After trying this, you just might find yourself dreaming of expanding your pumpkin patch next year.

Make sure you use sugar pie pumpkins or the equivalent for this recipe — you really don't want to eat a jack-o-lantern type pumpkin as they are stringy. If you aren't growing your own sugar pie pumpkins you should be seeing them available in stores and farmers markets this month or, better yet, make a fun trip out of it and head out to a U-pick pumpkin farm. Don't forget to pick up a few extra for making your own pumpkin puree for pies and breads later in the year.

Ingredients:
Sugar pie pumpkins (preferably on the small side)
Olive oil
Fresh rosemary, chopped
Sea salt

1. Heat grill to medium-high.

2. Wash and cut the pumpkins vertically into 3/4 inch slices. Remove the seeds and stringy parts. Brush both sides of each slice liberally with olive oil. Sprinkle with sea salt and rosemary.

3. Place the slices on the grill for about 5 minutes a side or until dark grill marks appear. Turn and grill the other side until you can easily pierce the pumpkin slice with a fork. You want to make sure that the pumpkin is tender.

4. Since some of the salt tends to fall off during the grilling process, serve with a small dish of additional sea salt.