Pumpkin Hot Chocolate

Pumpkin-flavoured ice cream
1 packet instant hot chocolate mix
Water or milk

Hands-on Time: About 2 minutes
Cook Time: 2-3 minutes

I love pumpkin, and it's always a treat to find pumpkin-flavoured ice cream this time of year. Since I don't normally like coffee, but like pumpkin-flavoured lattes, I thought pumpkin hot chocolate might be even better. You may have to seek out the ice cream in an ice cream parlour if you can't find it at the grocery store, but if you can get a hold of it, it's a delicious treat by itself, on top of warm pie, or in this drink.

Fill a tall mug about halfway full with ice cream, or full a regular-sized mug most of the way full. Add water or milk until the mug is almost full and microwave it for 2-3 minutes. Add the instant hot chocolate and stir.

Bean Salad

1 can cut green beans
1 can yellow wax beans
1 can kidney beans
1 can small lima beans (optional)
1 small bag bean sprouts (optional)
1/2 cup vinegar
1/2 - 1 cup oil
1/2 - 3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup chopped celery (optional)
1/2 cup chopped onion (optional)
1/2 cup chopped green pepper (optional)

Hands-on Time: 10 minutes - 1 hour
Refrigeration Time: 8 hours

This is another Thanksgiving favourite in my family that works well all year round. If you're looking for a quick, no-fuss dish to add to any meal, the simple three-bean version takes virtually no time or effort. If you want to dress the salad up for a fancier occasion, add some of the optional ingredients to your taste; it will take a bit more time to chop vegetables if you want to add them, but they add some nice variation and allow you to mix up the way this salad tastes if you want to make it a regular staple dish. If you want to use the onion or green pepper, there's no need to dice; simple long slices will work just fine. Use more oil if you are adding more ingredients; the amount of sugar can vary according to your taste.

Drain the kidney beans and rinse them. Drain half of the liquid off the other canned beans. Combine all ingredients in a bowl and refrigerate overnight.

Corn Pudding

8-oz package cream cheese, softened
2 eggs
1/3 cup sugar
8-oz package cornbread/muffin mix
16-oz can cream-style corn
2 1/3 cups frozen sweet corn
1 cup milk
2 tbsp butter or margarine, melted
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp nutmeg

Hands-on Time: About 20 minutes
Cook Time: 3-4 hours

This has been a Thanksgiving favourite in my family since we first discovered the recipe about 10 years ago. The preparation is easy, and cooking in a Crock-Pot enables you to set this dish aside and forget about it, which is nice if you have several things going at once for a holiday meal. You can substitute soymilk and vegan butter; I have not tried using vegan cream cheese, but I have found that low-fat cream cheese does not blend as well as the regular variety, so you might want to consider this a seasonal indulgence like I do rather than a year-round meal if you are concerned about calories.

In a mixing bowl, blend the cream cheese, eggs, and sugar until the cream cheese looks more like a lump of cookie dough than a bunch of chunks off a block. Add the remaining ingredients and mix well. Lightly grease a Crock-Pot and transfer the ingredients. Cover and cook on the high setting for 3-4 hours.

Autumn Snack Mix

Miniature pretzels
Unsalted peanuts
Craisins
Candy corn

Hands-on Time: About 5 minutes

It's hard not to indulge in candy temptations this time of year, especially the seasonal ones that seem impossible to resist for another whole year's time, like candy corn. Yet I personally find that a little candy corn goes a long way, and to help stretch it even further so that I'm not tempted to eat too much at once, I made this snack mix. By mixing protein and carbohydrates, you can feel more full after eating less, and I find that only a few pinches of this are enough to make me satisfied. It's also a great treat if you've bought too much candy corn for Halloween festivities and want to use up your leftovers in November.

You can mix the ingredients in any proportion you like, but I try to use a little less candy corn that anything else, and I also find that you have to put in more pretzels than you think you need to if you want to make sure to have a pretzel in every bite. You can also leave out the pretzels and substitute salted peanuts--the salted peanut and candy corn combination by itself tastes like PayDay candy bars--but pretzels are usually less heavily salted than salted peanuts are, so I used salted pretzels and unsalted peanuts to try to limit the sodium. A suggested ratio to try might be roughly two parts peanuts and Craisins and three or four parts pretzels to one part candy corn.

Be sure to store the mix in an airtight container if it will not all be eaten right away. Even after about a week of storage, I noticed my pretzels were getting a little stale, which might be because of moisture in the Craisins, so you might also want to leave the pretzels out until you're ready to eat if you want to store the mix over a long period of time.

Ghosts in the Graveyard

2 3.9-oz packages instant chocolate pudding mix
3 cups milk or soymilk
1 12-oz package whipped topping
1 1/2 cups crushed chocolate sandwich cookies (about 15 cookies)
3 or 4 Pepperidge Farm Milano cookies
Milk chocolate chips

Optional:
Icing
Toothpicks
Red food colouring
Candy pumpkins

Hands-on Time: About 1 hour
Refrigeration Time: About 1 hour

I can't take credit for this beautiful picture; my mom made this dessert. But it looks so nice, I had to share it with everyone else.

Pour the milk into a large bowl and whisk the pudding mix into the milk until it is smooth. Fold half of the whipped topping into the pudding. You can buy crushed chocolate cookies in some stores now, but if you can't find them, put whole cookies in a plastic bag and crush them with a hammer, meat cleaver, or rolling pin. Pour half of the crushed cookies into the pudding mix and stir. Pour the pudding into a 9" x 13" pan. Carefully spread the remaining crushed cookies over the top of the pudding, trying to cover as much of the pudding as possible. Put the pudding in the refrigerator for one hour.

After the pudding has chilled, cut three Milano cookies in half. If you are talented with piping icing, you may want to pipe words onto the cookies to make them look more like tombstones. Stand the cookies, cut side down, in the pudding at random intervals. Spoon the rest of the whipped topping on top of the pudding in dollops. Try using a larger dollop with a smaller dollop on top to get the tapered look of a ghost. Carefully insert chocolate chips, pointed side first, into the tops of the dollops to look like eyes. You may want to use a toothpick as a guide rather than your fingertips. If you like, you can also dip the ends of toothpicks in red food colouring to stick through the tops of the dollops as spears. You could also decorate the surface of the pudding with candy pumpkins if you like.

Mediterranean Bread Salad

1 cup romaine lettuce
1/2 cucumber
1 tomato
2 green onions
1/4 cup parsley
1/4 cup mint leaves
2 cloves garlic
2 1/2 tbsp lemon juice
2 1/2 tbsp olive oil
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp cumin
1/2 cup hummus
1 whole wheat pita

Hands-on Time: About 1 hour 15 minutes

This is a nice dish to take in a lunch if you want to get all your proteins, vegetables, and grains in one bowl. This amount will make two salads large enough for a meal, or more if you want to serve this as a side dish.

Wash and shred the lettuce and arrange it in a large serving bowl. Wash, peel, and chop the cucumber into a regular-sized bowl. (If you want to serve this dish over more than one meal, you might select a lidded container so that you can keep the dressed vegetables separate from the lettuce until you are ready to eat it). Wash and chop the tomato, green onions, parsley, mint, and garlic and mix them with the cucumber. Pour the lemon juice, olive oil, salt, and cumin over the cucumber mixture and stir. This mixture can be set aside until you are ready to serve the salad.

Tear a pita in half and toast each half in the toaster on a medium setting. When the toasted pita is cool, tear it into bite-size pieces. If you are going to serve the entire salad at once, you can mix all the pita into the lettuce. If not, set some of it aside in an airtight container.

To serve the salad, spoon the cucumber mixture over the lettuce and pita bread, and then spoon hummus onto the salad. You may want to serve this dish with extra pita bread. Alternatively, you could leave the toasted pita out of the salad and stuff the ingredients inside of a pita for a sandwich.

Tomato-Corn Relish

1 14.5-oz can diced tomatoes
3/4 cup frozen corn
1 green pepper
1/8 red onion
2 1/2 tbsp brown sugar
1/2 cup apple cider vinegar
1 tbsp Dijon mustard
1 garlic clove

Hands-on Time: 30 minutes
Cook Time: 20 minutes

This relish has a slightly sweet, slightly tangy taste but provides an alternative to the traditional pickle relish. You can use it as a topping for veggie burgers and hot dogs.

Dice the green pepper and red onion and mince the garlic. Combine all the ingredients in a medium saucepan and heat on medium-high until boiling, stirring occasionally. Reduce the heat and cook for 20 minutes, or longer if you would like for more of the juice to reduce.