An eating and drinking thread

[Cori]

What are you eating/drinking at the moment? Or, what did you have at your last meal?

I thought this might be fun, because at the moment I'm midway through a lovely cup of Earl Grey tea, with milk and half a teaspoon of sugar, in the most stereotypically British way. And, given how diverse our community is ... I'm super-curious about what everyone else is up to.

[Hokuspokus]

My last meal was a cup of coffee and a "Brötchen", which is a very German thing as far as I know.
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Br%C3%B6tchen
The dictionary says it's a:
roll, biscuit (amer), bap (brit), bread roll or a gem (amer)

I wish I had a dictionary with pictures and recipes so I would know for sure what I had in English

[Cori]

That would have gone very well with my lunch today too. I'm having cheese and piccalilli, but on crackers, which keep breaking and dropping the topping.

[Newgatenovelist]

This is fun, and I'll bite!

Tonight for tea I had roasted pumpkin on couscous. The couscous was seasoned with garlic powder, dried chili flakes and sumac because I bought a large jar of the sumac so I've been experimenting. The pumpkin was a tiny thing, but it's all I could get. I think a lot of people here buy them and then just put them out as a sort of decoration. I just eat them! There is nothing quite like the smell of roasting seeds or the feel of pumpkin goo on your fingers (and wrists, and forearms) to signal that autumn is coming, and Halloween, and Dia de los Muertos.

To drink: right now, herbal tea. Earlier, it was lapsang souchong (no milk, no sugar) I brought back from a trip to the UK. I miss odd and inexplicable things from UK supermarkets, and that's one of them. Tea also travels reasonably well, since it doesn't matter if the box gets bashed in transit!
Erin

[Cori]

I love pumpkin soup -- I ate it often when I was in Australia, where a pumpkin is a regular vegetable. It's frustrating that we Brits are so silly about them. A swirl of cream cheese stirred in, and hot buttered rolls (I used part-baked ones, I'm no cook!) Cosy food bliss ...

Don't think I've ever had sumac, though. What does it taste like?

[Newgatenovelist]

You've reminded me, I ought to make roast veggie soup. It's a faff, but it's very sweet and tasty - when I can be bothered. Most of the soups and stews I make are vegan, but that's more down to what I usually have in than by design. I'll see if I can find vegetarian cream cheese, so thanks for the idea!

I have to confess that I live abroad, so I feel as if I've imported (?) this fondness for pumpkin and have to keep it quiet because it's seen as odd!

Sumac, at least the stuff I've seen, has a maple-crimson colour. You've caught me out in trying to describe the taste. It's a bit citrusy, but not as distinctively so as lemongrass. It tastes as if it comes from the earth, but it's very slightly bitter, rather than woody like haldi. I would have said it's relatively mild, but I'm told my 'mild' isn't the same for everybody else, so I might be a bad guide.

I'm not really selling this, am I? I hope somebody else chips in with an interesting meal.

[Cori]

Hot cross buns, anyone? Preferably actually hot: split in two, toasted gently and buttered. Wonderful!