Since you’ll likely be spending a great deal of time in the kitchen baking cookies and preparing delectable feasts for the holiday season, you’ll want to have the right tools on hand. Why not save precious time and energy with a high-performance blender that can do it all? Entertaining can be easy this season with the Vitamix Professional Series 500.

Featuring three convenient pre-programmed settings for hot soups, smoothies and frozen desserts, the Professional Series 500 makes hundreds of recipes and helps home chefs make gourmet meals like the pros. The machine’s superior pulse feature offers greater control in processing to create a variety of textures, and its full-range, variable speed control allows for flexibility and creativity.

The Professional Series 500 is much more than a blender. It can actually replace several appliances in your kitchen, saving valuable countertop space. This multi-functional kitchen essential is easy to clean and is equipped with a commercial-grade 2+ peak horsepower motor that generates blade speeds up to 240 mph.

It really can be simple to cook for the holidays with very little stress or mess. With a simple and tasty recipe, a festive and scrumptious holiday celebration is within reach with just the flip of a switch.

Holiday Squash Soup
Preparation Time: 10 minutes
Yield: 5 Cups

Ingredients:
2 cups chicken broth
1/2 buttercup or butternut squash, cooked, peeled or 2 cups cooked squash or pumpkin
1/4 small onion, peeled
1/4 medium apple
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon dried sage
1/4 teaspoon dried rosemary
1/8 teaspoon white pepper
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup heavy cream

Directions:
To cook butternut squash easily, split the squash in half vertically, scoop out the seeds and place flesh side down on a lightly greased baking pan. Pierce the skin and bake at 350F for 30 minutes. Cool and scoop out flesh.

Place all ingredients, except the heavy cream, into the high-performance blender in the order listed and secure lid. Blend until smooth. Add in heavy cream and blend an additional 20 seconds.
Note: This recipe can be reduced by half and made in smaller containers.

The post Blend up a No-fuss, Festive Recipe for Holiday Entertaining first appeared on The How Do Gardener.

Regardless of where in the country you live, fall produce is becoming abundantly available. For some regions, families have begun making their annual pilgrimage to the local orchard to pick apples or pears, and pumpkins are maturing in the backyard garden waiting to be turned into jack-o-lanterns. But even if these crops aren’t possible to grow in your area, fresh autumn favorites like pumpkins, apples, parsnips and kale are still most likely making frequent appearances at local farmers markets and grocery stores.

Roast them, stew them, can them or bake them. Pumpkin, squash, root vegetables, apples and pears make for great cuisine that the whole family can enjoy. For a new take on old favorites, try adding rutabaga slices to your au gratin potato recipe or pop some cubed squash in while cooking up your family’s favorite beef stew.

Get the whole family involved and take the kids along to the market to find new vegetables to sample. Getting everyone interested in new flavors can be exciting. Sample some unfamiliar items and find new favorites. Kids will enjoy comparing the flavors of roasted carrots, parsnips, rutabagas, yams, potatoes, jicama and squash when marinated in a dressing of olive oil, balsamic vinegar, rosemary, thyme, salt and pepper. Decide which flavors your family prefers and make this a seasonal tradition to cook up together annually.

Whether you’ve grown your own produce or pick it up at the market, America’s Test Kitchen and Miracle-Gro have teamed up to provide fresh new recipes and tips on fall gardening at www.scotts.com/GroYourOwn. Sample some of these delicious recipes while incorporating fall plants and produce into the menu and even learn which fall crops are best to grow in your area of the country.

Of course, nothing compares with the satisfaction of growing your own produce. Even if you didn’t plant a garden this year, why not make plans for one next year? With just a sunny place for a container on the balcony or a small plot in the backyard, you can easily plant your own garden to grow fresh squash, rutabagas or carrots in the spring to be enjoyed by your family next fall. If you prefer the crunch of a freshly picked apple, try planting a dwarf apple tree instead.

As the temperatures drop, enjoy the season’s harvest by incorporating locally grown produce into the menu. Start reviewing new recipes to try for family and friends and test their reactions. With the hearty flavors of freshly grown and harvested vegetables from the garden, everyone will be clamoring for more.

The post Enjoying the Fall Garden's Bountiful Harvest first appeared on The How Do Gardener.