So, the traditional feast at BIL & SIL’s was excellent, as always. SIL is a fabulous and thinking cook. She decided to do the spatchcocked turkey in the oven to a lesser degree of doneness (the separated thighs got some extra time), with that resting, tented, while everything else came together. Then the bird went back in for a little blast of finishing heat and carving. I found this fascinating, because it pretty much guaranteed that turkey, gravy and fixins were all at optimum temperature for serving.
I watched the whole process, and I think it’s a great idea. HOWEVER, my white meat servings, while moist, I thought were… too chewy. I think it was just a tough bird. But it still ate great, and I was grateful to partake.
Another anomaly (for us, anyway) was that there was no dressing! SIL2 usually and for many years brings the dressing/stuffing, and for reasons not entirely clear to me, showed up completely empty-handed. This was a bit of a shocker to me, I guess by dint of habit–I LOVE making a palette of mashers, dressing, and gravy and sampling different forkfuls while the tableside conversations progress. The absence of stuffing was discordant, like someone stealing the cocktail bitters.
On the positive side, we had a wonderful bottle of Sancerre that was a pleasing complement to our turkey.
We went to DH’s younger brother’s house, and it was truly awesome, I loved every minute of it and the food was stellar, as was the company. The only anomaly was that one of the kids there (mid 20s) got diagnosed with covid Friday night. He was feeling bad before they left to go back to the LA area, so we are holding our collective breath, although we’re all vaccinated up to our ears (I think).
A’ight. I’ve done this holiday, cooking start to finish, since Moses. I always ask if there’s something anyone would like to see next year. Over the years, I’ve added the damn yams with marshmallows (got 'em in fridge right now, yuck.) Whatever. A guest shows up with a mother tub of wanna be mac ‘n cheese. As the chef du jour, I worry about oven space for warming all my sides. Ya know, if you’ve ever hosted. Big pan, 4 lbs of elbows, butter, Velvita (did I mention I live in WI, most here bechamel and add real cheese.) I was well into the rhythm before this culinary curveball. Everything on time , but only 1 hour before mealtime. So, I don’t see much action from the living room, so I salt 10, maybe 12, quarts of water in a big ole stock pot, and let the Mac person know it’s ready to go. Even put it on high for the boil. I had to tend to this stupid pasta, whilst managing the usual meal and carve the bird, etc. So, the pasta is done. 3 lbs. dry weight. Shtload. Mac person asks what to do next. I’m thinking: "sht, you never even made Kraft Mac. The feckin’ butter! I scream to myself. Then the cheese! Jeezus!." Glad I just thought what I thunk and didn’t say as much. Not a big Mac n Cheese guy, sorry. 'specially not with Velvita. Either way, someone wanted to wow us with their macncheese. It turned into to macncheese. Mothahpussbucket! Here I’ve got cheeses in my fridge that would have blown it up. Tell me ahead of time. Even if it is (gulp) Velvita.
It was a bad day for a native Buckeye - Ohio State got their asses kicked by Michigan. My DH took the reins and cooked most of our †-day dinner and found a “5 star” recipe for bread stuffing that called for 6 or more cloves of chopped garlic. It was awful and I keep having to brush my teeth.
I was born and raised there - my almost 91 year old mother lives across the river from the campus. If you step out onto her deck during a home game you can hear the roar from the crowd…
He’s a mathematician and engineer - came late to the party in terms of cooking. Very literal, always influenced by ratings from on-line recipes and always tells me 'that’s not what the recipe says" and I remind him of his mantra that half of the population is below average. I am not well, so he’s taken the job. So, I can’t complain except for garlic in my Thanksgiving stuffing.
I always, always make apple pie for Thanksgiving, even if I’m the only one who will be eating it. I typically have a small piece for dessert on the day of and then a much larger piece for breakfast the next couple of days (with copious cheddar cheese). Weirdly, I wasn’t feeling it this year and decided to make a maple dessert for myself instead.
While the maple dessert was good, it just wasn’t apple pie. Lesson learned - make the damn pie.
10 Likes
CCE
(Keyrock the unfrozen caveman lawyer; your world frightens & confuses me)
16
I was really running ragged and decided to just buy cherry pie filling to make a cherry pie. My daughter #3 (the baker) really gave me a hard time about that. “Do you even realize how much sugar they dump in there? It’s got 140 grams which is twice as much as I add for TART cherries, let alone sweet”.
I’m like, sorry, but I’m running out of time. Plus the only tart cherries I could find were frozen and I’m not a fan of the mushy texture from frozen cherries.
So, anyway, I bull ahead and I go to make the cherry pie Wednesday and find out the one big can of cherries isn’t nearly enough fruit to fill the pie, so I peel and slice up a couple of really tart honeycrisp apples and bed those slices down atop the too-sweet cherries before topping with the second crust.
My FrankenPie turned out to be a hit!
LoL. Dumb luck strikes in the least likely places.
CCE
(Keyrock the unfrozen caveman lawyer; your world frightens & confuses me)
18
Oh, yeah. Forgot to mention that I added about a Tbs of fresh lemon juice to the cherry pie filling to offset the sugar a bit. Plus I bathed the apple slices in the same to prevent them browning while working. I’m pretty sure the extra acid helped a lot.
