Chicken-Wild Rice Soup with Butternut Squash and Pecans

WE'VE MOVED! More Time at the Table is now published on wordpress.com!  This blog has been hosted on blogger for the past four-plus years and will be published at both urls for a month or so…or until all the kinks are worked out of the transition process.  Do change your bookmarks or links, please, and follow me here on Word Press:  http://www.moretimeatthetable.com/   Great thanks to my gorgeous daughter Emily who managed the migration.  So cool to have smart kids!

In January it's so nice
While slippin' on the slidin' ice
To sip hot chicken soup with rice
Sippin' once, sippin' twice
Sippin' chicken soup with rice...

--Maurice Sendak, lyrics; music by Carole King:   REALLY ROSIE (click to listen to the music)  Original text from Sendak's book CHICKEN SOUP WITH RICE one book in the Nutshell Library:

As a student in library school, I once was in charge of a weekend seminar about famed children's author, Maurice Sendak.  I had to plan the event from soup to nuts, including speeches, lunches, lodging, etc.  I also had to invite the man himself.  I was flabbergasted when he accepted.  I was near collapse when his assistant called a few days ahead, and citing illness, informed me the author would need to miss this particular conference.  Hundreds of people from miles around were nearly on their way.  Crushing…  But, still--the weekend went on as planned….though we certainly missed the main attraction.  No great matter in the long run, though, I never lost my deep and sincere admiration for the man, nor my love for his sweet lyrics about one of my favorite soups ever.  All of my children heard the Sendak books and we kept the REALLY ROSIE book around until…well, actually I still have it.

Turkey Wild Rice-Vegetable Soup with Sherry and Walnut Garnish OR One More Snow Day in Saint Paul

It's spring in name only in Saint Paul.  Whereas many food writers and bloggers are already complaining about too many fresh pea or asparagus recipes, people here are still sniffling and shuffling around town in their by now worn-out snow boots. (Uh, there are not even pea tendrils in St. Paul because snow covers the vegetable gardens; see below.)  In fact, if you move here, you'll save a lot of money on shoes;  you only need them May - September.  Not only that,  you can write about fresh peas, rhubarb, and asparagus when folks further south are eating their first tiny tomatoes and are getting tired of grilling already.

This picture is out my front door this morning.