Rocha-chatter

Some of my favorite foods are in season right now.

Pumpkin soup at the Coal Tower Restaurant in Shoehn Place. Sounds weird but sooo good.

Snack Jack pumpkins can be found at some pumpkin patches. The seeds are delicous roasted because they have no hull!

Really, doesn't pumpkin anything taste good? These are from Richport Bakery.

Abbotts has their pumpkin and grape custards, but you have to hurry. They will be closing for the season soon. Corn Hill Creamery is offering sweet corn ice cream. Sounds odd... but quite yummy.

'Tis the season for caramel and candy apples. If you look hard you can even find grape candy apples!

Grape juice and grape pies are a fall favorite too.

Forget about gaining weight over the holidays... I think it starts as soon as summer is over.

Labels: bakery, fall, food, restaurant

"Hey, you wanna go run around a corn field in the dark with nothing but flashlights and pieces of a map?"

"Cool! Let's go!"

Two hours later you are still stumbling around picking bits of corn stalk out of your hair.

The Amazing Maize Maze is at Longacre Farm and if you like a challenge you can attempt it at night. (more agritainment)

You usually start off with lots of energy and excitement.

It is not unlike being part of the Scooby Gang.

This is the dreaded moment. Getting left behind by the person with the last working flashlight.

Because finding your way out of a maze isn't hard enough, they hide mailboxes throughout the maze with pieces of the map inside. If you are obsessive compulsive, you cannot leave the maze until you have found ALL the pieces.

We found all the map pieces and made it out alive. After two and a half hours.

Labels: agritainment, fall

I think there are a lot of benefits to living in Rochester, and a big one is the local agritainment. Agritainment is consumer focused agriculture. A farm that actually provides entertainment. Agritainment can include U-Pick, pumpkin painting, hay rides, goats to pet... that sort of thing. We have a lot of agritainment in our area and in the autumn it's at it's height.

I forget that most people don't have agritainment in their area. Last week my coworkers and I took our lunch hour and picked apples. When I wrote about it on my blog, I got a lot of comments from people who were quite envious. They either did not have an apple orchard near them or close enough to drive to during a lunch hour.

For us, it was a lot of fun and a nice way to spend a lunch hour.

I love going to the pumpkin patches too. There are the pumpkins for carving, the pumpkins for decorating and the pumpkins for seed roasting. For seed roasting, I recommend Snack Jack's... they don't have hulls!
Oscar likes to take part in agritainment too.

There is so much to do and my kitchen is full of apple cider, grape pies and candy apples. I look forward all year to this season.

Labels: apples, fall, pumpkins