Monday, November 5, 2007

I went to a writer’s conference in Helen, Georgia this weekend. Helen is a very German, gingerbready sort of small North Georgia mountain town. Imagine a really small scale Disneyland, but with Hansel and Gretel instead of Mickey and Minnie. Except I didn’t see Hansel and Gretel. What I did see was Elvis Presley riding up and down main street in a white convertible Cadillac tossing candy at passers-by like her was the grand marshal in a parade, except there was no parade. Apparently Elvis impersonators are very popular in Helen.

The conference was really at a lodge in Unicoi State Park. It was nice to get out of the city and wake up to a vista of mountains with foggy mist sinking into the valleys below my window. The air smelled really good up there too. Leaves had changed. They were falling and crunching under my feet. You get the picture. The conference was more like a workshop. It was small and intimate. I saw the same people over and over again. This offered me the opportunity to advertise The Recipe Project. I have no shame.

The first person I told about the project sat down and wrote out a recipe right then and there. Congratulations to Ashleigh for being the first person to participate and give me a recipe!

Pumpkin Chocolate Muffins
Recipe #1: Ashleigh H., Tucker GA

1 can of pumpkin (15-16 oz.)
1 box of Devil’s Food Cake Mix

Fold together. If you need moisture, and an egg or two. Bake at 350 degrees. Cook as long as it says on the box, but watch them. (Works best as mini-muffins.)

“I found this recipe while looking for healthier alternatives for snacks for my very picky daughter, Katherine. My kids love them! (So does everyone else who’s tried them.)”

As I was driving down the mountain from the conference and was sitting in traffic in Helen, (yes, it really was bumper-to bumper), my sister called to tell me that she was up to her ass in pumpkin.

Apparently, she had decided that Saturday afternoon would be the perfect time to cut up and boil her Halloween pumpkins (this is NOT recommended, if you have already carved your pumpkins). Anyway, she was in the process of cooking 64 cups of pumpkin and needed some ideas for what to do with them.

So, less than 24 hours after receiving my first recipe of the project, I shared it. In between clutching and breaking, I read her Ashleigh’s recipe for Pumpkin Chocolate Muffins.

Before I was even back in Atlanta, my sister called to tell me how they turned out. She said they are very light and fluffy chocolate cupcakes that don’t even taste like pumpkin. And after looking at the box, she noticed that not using oil and eggs in the muffins and substituting the pumpkin instead saved something like 1,000 calories each. Okay, that might be an exaggeration. But I do know this much…her daughter loved them, just as Ashleigh said she would!