Cooking with 5 fall ingredients

Mark the transition to autumn with seasonal produce.

There’s a poem I love called “September Tomatoes,” by the Massachusetts based poet Karina Borowicz. In it, she evokes the feeling and details of the season change, like the fruit flies that erupt from tomato plants and the compost that cooks build from what remains of summer. It closes beautifully: “My greatgrandmother sang with the girls of her village / as they pulled the flax. Songs so old / and so tied to the season that the very sound / seemed to turn the weather.”

Borowicz captures in her poem what I try to capture in my kitchen this time of year: the palpable shift from one time of year into another. Cooking with autumnal produce means getting the final breath of the summer’s harvest while also inviting all that comes with cooler weather. It means juicy grapes and crunchy apples, toughskinned squash and pumpkins and tender heads of cauliflower and, my favorite, tall stalks thick as branches dotted with Brussels sprouts. Fall cooking comes with small trades (like the charcoal grill for the stovetop and flipflops for shoes with socks). While we’re not quite yet to dinner by the fireplace, we’re on our way.

My favorite fall recipes straddle this sense of in-between:

Apples

My take includes warm wedges cooked in brown butter that can veer savory with sage or sweet with brown sugar. You can serve the savory ones alongside roast chicken or pork chops, or on toast that you’ve slathered with goat cheese or ricotta. The sweet ones can be offered in the morning to make usual oatmeal less usual, or for dessert over ice cream.

Butternut squash

Any winter squash for that matter,

offers similar versatility. You can grate the flesh and mix it with Parmesan, thyme, a bit of flour and egg and fry the mixture into irresistible fritters that are perfect to serve with cocktails at your next dinner party. You can even tuck the fritters into warm flatbread that you’ve spread with yogurt and top with some cucumbers and salad greens for a delightful vegetarian sandwich.

Brussels sprouts

These can also take on so many forms and lend themselves well to strong flavors. One of my favorite techniques includes mustard in three forms: mustard seeds that add crunch and pop (these are optional, but do try them if you can find them); Dijon mustard, creamy but sharp; and grainy mustard, sort of a cross between the first two. Combined, they transform plain roasted sprouts into a side dish with an incredible depth of flavor. Serve with bratwurst or roast pork loin.

Cauliflower

With its sturdy florets (and, incidentally, now available in a range of colors), can also stand up to big flavors. I like to roast a

whole head broken into pieces until they’re browned and crisp at the edges and toss with butter and hot sauce, like chicken wings sans the chicken. Or roast and drizzle with a simple cheddar cheese sauce (like nachos sans the chips). Both of these remind us that vegetables can be just as satisfying as anything else.

Grapes

While available all year, hit

their peak in the fall. Besides just eating out of hand, try cooking with them. I like to throw them on a sheet pan with bitter broccoli rabe and fennel-scented Italian sausages and roast the whole tray. The grapes get soft and concentrated, almost like cherry tomatoes.

From my kitchen to yours, fall.

GORAN KOSANOVIC PHOTOS FOR THE WASHINGTON POST Baking makes the grapes soft and concentrated in Sheet Pan Sausage Dinner With Roasted Grapes and Broccoli Rabe.

Roasted Cauliflower With Butter and Hot Sauce and Roasted Cauliflower With Cheddar Sauce.