A few months ago we received an apple peeler machine as a gift and Eric immediately started playing with it. Its a little bulky and has lots of sharp moving parts so we don't usually leave it out, but last weekend our neighbor dropped off a whole bushel of apples (okay, maybe a big paper bag full of apples) so it was time to break out the fire-engine red toy. In addition to slicing the skin right off any apple you have this little thing will take the meat right off the core in one go, leaving you a really nice even spiral of apple. A few more cuts and you've got enough even apple slices to make an apple tart even Paula Dean would drool over. Actually she would probably drool over it because its an apple tart covered in caramel. And by drool, we mean eat quickly. Even

Eric does not like tomatoes. It's a fact that we've documented quite a few times. On the other hand, Eric loves fried things so we combined the two just to see how he fared, and he liked it! Granted a decent helping of "shut up and eat this" helped, but we definitely had a winner on our hands and hey, it makes for a great excuse to pull out the movie and watch it. The green tomatoes don't really have that squishy squeaky texture that Eric can't stand, and the acidity of the tomato is hidden pretty well by the breading and dipping sauce. It tastes more like a fried zucchini than a tomato and is a perfect bribe for anyone with a list of chores for their significant other to do. "Honey, can you vacuum the house, I'll make fried green tomatoes". We'll bet you'll never see the house

Charisse loves the fall. By loves the fall we mean talks about how she can't wait for fall starting around April. This shouldn't be confused with her love for Christmas, something she starts waiting for around Dec. 26. But to start this fall season off we came across this recipe and it might just be one of the most fun ones we've done. Eric liked it because he wanted to open a pumpkin with a power saw. Charisse liked it because it was very Fall-ish. When it was done, we both liked it because its probably one of the best soups we've ever made, though Eric was disappointed because he didn't get to use his power saw (he was working in the garage at the time). We thought the coolest part of this soup is the bowl, which looks suspiciously like a roasted pumpkin. Yup, its a soup served in