Fall and Pumpkin Spice Lattes

As I mentioned in a previous post, this week is a busy one. With our first major storm approaching, we have been keeping a frantic pace, trying to finish outside projects. With minutes to spare, we did it!



The bounty that we received from our garden this year was well worth the hard work that went into it. We successfully harvested onions, cucumbers, beets, peas, black, pinto and green beans, zucchini, carrots, Swiss chard, lettuce, potatoes, amaranth, and more tomatoes than we knew what to do with! What was once a beautiful "oasis", has now turned into a very large compost pile! The bean arbor's are put away, the tomato cages dismantled and the water system have all been stored for the winter and it is time for the garden and the gardeners to rest a spell.

We can also put a check next to stacking the firewood and cleaning the chicken coop. With the entire family pitching in, the outside is ready for the long, cold winter. And so are we!

I visited another blog recently and "borrowed" her recipe for Pumpkin Spice Lattes. As usual, I couldn't leave the recipe in its original form...it needed "tweaking". So I tweaked. But just a little...

Pumpkin Spice Lattes

3 cups milk
3 T. canned pumpkin
3 T. pure maple syrup
3 T. pure vanilla
3/4 t. pumpkin pie spice
3/4 cup very strong, brewed coffee

Whisk together everything except the coffee in a medium saucepan. Heat until temp. reaches 160 F. Add hot coffee. Pour into coffee mugs and top with freshly whipped cream. Sprinkle with pumpkin pie spice. This fills 2 large "to-go" mugs or 3 human-sized mugs. The original version called for 3 T. white sugar, since we don't use white sugar too often, I replaced it with the maple syrup. The maple and pumpkin mesh very well together!