Mistakes were made as expected. But overall, a great meal.
The good:
- The turkey was excellent (I always eat turkey on Thanksgiving, pescatarian-ism be damned). Moist, crispy skin. Spring Onion was sad about no wishbone, though. My gas Bosch oven has never been well-behaved since we moved in (a new house with new appliances) but it was really bad yesterday. It repeatedly dropped the temp - I had to constantly turn off the oven and turn it back on and let it get up to 475F. I had 2 thermometers going, each showing slightly different temps. But by some miracle, it got cooked perfectly. B and Spring Onion loved it. And the sherry gastrique that Seasons to Taste provided as accompaniment was a welcome hit of acid that I think Thanksgiving meals often lack (which is why kimchee is such an awesome accompaniment).
- NYT air fryer brussels sprouts with garlic/balsamic/soy/lime juice. This is going into our regular dinnertime rotation as we eat brussels all year round. Easy and delicious.
- Mashed potatoes - Per seriouseats, I cubed (but not peeled, we love the peel), rinsed, boiled/simmered, drained, rinsed briefly with hot water, returned to the pot and mashed with butter, tiny bit of milk. Rinsing off the starch was notable. I’ll do this again.
- Some excellent wines, as usual, from our local wine shop, Berman’s in Lexington.
The adequate:
- Gravy purchased from Summer Shack - missing some umami; I thinned it out a bit with broth since we didn’t have pan drippings.
- Bell’s stuffing mix supplemented with carrots/celery/onion/fresh thyme + rosemary/broth; sauteed in the roasting pan. I made the mistake of adding fresh cranberries (from frozen from last year) because I forgot to get dried cranberries. Too tart for my crowd but luckily, I was able to fish out the cranberries. I love tart so I kept the roasted cranberries and added them to my portion. The stuffing crisped up nicely while the turkey was roasting. We love those crispy corners.
- Green bean casserole from Seasons to Taste with bechamel and mushrooms. Good, but it was under-seasoned. After salting it, it was a welcome addition to our table (I could probably categorize this under the Good category. The green beans were not overcooked mushy mess, which is how I picture this dish.) First time I’ve ever had green bean casserole.
- Pumpkin pie from Summer Shack. Eh. I’m not a dessert person whatsoever but even I was underwhelmed.
The bad:
- Parker House rolls; I make these quite regularly for Thanksgiving so I don’t know what happened (I riff off Smitten Kitchen’s pretzel’ed rolls). This year, I decided to try the King Arthur recipe and as I was going along (neglected to do my homework and read ahead) and I knew I was in over my head. I am a “hold my hand” kind of baker. I had tested my yeast the day before and it looked good. But we also keep our house at a toasty 60-62F all winter so maybe I should have turned the heat up. We baked them a bit a more and because we are frugal New Englanders, we’re going to call them hardtack and eat them with gravy.
Sad first rise:
Even sadder post-bake:
Yet to be enjoyed/evaluated:
- Lobster pie from Summer Shack; I baked it yesterday but we decided to keep it until today. I’ll report back.
The best part:
- I struggled with the idea of a meat-eating kid, but it is what it is. Spring Onion has always been a picky eater, but this year, he has decided that he likes burgers and he loved his Thanksgiving meal! I’ve learned to go with the flow. Above all, seeing him enjoy his meal made me the most happy this holiday season.
Final plate - B didn’t take a photo of the table as I requested. Oh well. He borrowed some of Spring Onion’s diced up turkey for the photo as he had already eaten all of his portion. Not very photogenic, as usual for brown/beige-ish Thanksgiving meals. We eat so much salad/veggies all year long that we’re cool with a brown meal.
