Fellow cats, mesh your gears / Won't you lend your politic ears?

A couple of pies waiting at home for my lovely wife, spending the day doing last-minute get-out-the-vote canvassing in New Hampshire. The one on the left is supposed to have the Obama logo in the center, but it's somewhat obscured due to my filling it with way too many blueberries, which overflowed the vents. (Insert your own joke about liberal profligacy here.) On the right: a sour cream pumpkin pie. I may be an elitist, but not too much of one for The Joy of Cooking: those pie recipes never let me down.

Wash down the past two years' electioneering follies with this purplish and thus bi-partisan concoction. The scotch gives it a vague sort of toasty, pancake-y vibe; hence the name.

Morning in America

1½ oz. blueberry juice
½ oz. Cointreau
½ oz. scotch whisky
Champagne, chilled

Shake the first three ingredients with ice and strain into a champagne flute. Top off with champagne. (I like a relatively sweet, vanilla-overtoned scotch; if your single-malts are on the peaty side, maybe try some Johnnie Walker Black instead. If you're working with blueberry juice cocktail, perhaps add a touch of lemon juice if it's too sweet.)

And, whatever your persuasion, get out and vote! Even if you cynically doubt its actual efficacy, you'll at least be a player in one of the largest regularly scheduled productions of street theater ever conceived.

One more thing: let's not forget... the farmer: