We went to the Slow Food Des Moines Fall potluck / contest. My Chocolate Chunk Pumpkin Bread got third in the pie / dessert category, now this is not as impressive as it sounds as there were not that many more then 3 items available for voting in the category, but I still got a bag of prizes, which was nice. The best thing about going to something like this, as opposed to say, a work potluck, is that the food will almost always be very good. So many things to try, so much made from scratch. Good Things.

A couple of weeks back, the lid to one of my saucepans gave up the ghost and the handle would no longer be connected to the lid. This is kind of frustrating since looking for a replacement lid has led to many dead ends. I suppose I should get the actual measurements and try some more, but I am annoyed.

Baked Pasta with Merguez and Harissa Spiked Sauce

I liked how this turned out. It was tasty, a little spicy a good use of the sausage and the harissa. Though it wasn't a paste, per say, so I had to guess how much should be in there. Even so, it turned out well.

Butternut Squash Risotto

I needed to figure out what to do with this, and this sounded like something we would like. It made for a good dinner. It was a nice to use both the squash in the risotto and to move the taste up in the broth. Though this was what I complained about having to use so many dishes, it did seem a bit obnoxious.