I have been a bad blogger. We've been so busy celebrating feast days that I haven't taken the time to write about them. It's time to play catch-up!
September 29th: Michaelmas
The feast of St. Michael is a favorite in our home, where boys are drawn to heroic figures brandishing swords. Roast goose is traditional for this feast, but we substituted roast turkey instead (it's surprisingly hard to find a goose in TX. We did find a listing for geese in the pet column, but that would have just been wrong). The turkey was supplemented with gluten-free bannock bread (or Irish Soda bread), which was a great success! I got the recipe from Karina's gluten-free site. The main act was, of course, dessert. I made a g-f, c-f blackberry cobbler with a recipe I got off the web. Unfortunately, the batter was too liquidy and never set up properly. I compensated by adding a layer of sugar on the top, which browned to a crispy crust and helped a little with the lack of texture. Next time I will try a different recipe.
Funny thing about the blackberries: I had thought they were traditionally eaten on Michaelmas, but I happened to read (as my cobbler sat in the oven, not setting up properly) that one should NOT eat them on Michaelmas because the legend is that the Devil stepped in the blackberry patch on the eve of Michaelmas and now the berries are poisoned. Well, I found a way to compensate for this: lashings of whipped cream. Pure white mounds of whipped cream enveloping the devilish berries seemed a fitting metaphor for the day!
