Neither trudging nor trailblazing... forward

So I did get around to having that roasted tomato sauce on gnocchi, tonight, in fact. However, in several points my sauce needed help:
too soupy (should have used more than 2 tomatoes and broiled better)
too seedy (should have removed by straining or something)
too clumpy (should have ... smushed it with a fork?)
too ambivalent a color (again, more tomatoes, and not one red and one green would have helped)
Anyway, the flavor is still nice, and the vegan potato gnocchi in the frozen section of Whole Foods 'paired nicely.' Meanwhile, I returned to one of my standbys for a vegetable side: Roasted Cauliflower from Brownie Points blog. I used to have the blog on rotation, but as posting there is very infrequent, dropped it. Now I shoot straight for the cauliflower recipe, simple as it is. :-)
Also meanwhile (since I feel like I am just winding up for a run of cooking projects this week), I tried this recipe from The Leftoverist: Savory Bread Pudding with Corn and Tomatoes (and zucchini, in my case). Here's the before:
As I write, it is 18 minutes past her baking time, and not yet done however. This might be because the roasting of the zucchini didn't get out enough moisture and so now the bottom of the pan is still soupy. Or it could be because her hint about surrounding the loaf pan with boiling water (on a baking sheet) was foiled by my not-flat oven shelf, in which water runs down and toward the back and quickly provides an impression of Old Faithful. Something tells me that might not be good for the oven. *sigh*
Oh well. In other news, I had a very successfully balanced day: farmer's market bounty (all for $21),
a late and delicious brunch (pear with cottage cheese and drizzle of maple syrup),
going to the gym, and catching up with a dear friend on skype. In fact, the brunch was so good, the pear had to come back for an encore! The encore included a certain unidentified, whipped, chocolate-bearing substance (butter? cheese? I still don't know) procured from Founding Farmers last weekend, smuggled out in a Tupperware. Ahhh, glamourous thriftiness. I recommend FF for their philosophy and a few things very well done (such as the heavenly grits!). Anyone in DC, show their support!