Begin with this recipe from NYTimes / Melissa Clark.
The basic technique is to:
Roast some tomatoes and scallions in a 9x13 inch glass dish @450 deg F (adjust dish size based on if you are going to make the full recipe or half), along with minced garlic, herb sprigs, olive oil, balsamic vinegar drizzle, salt and pepper; for about 15 minutes
In the meantime, boil some veg stock (based on the amount of couscous you plan to use) and punch it up with cumin, a little more salt, lots of minced cilantro or parsley, lemon zest or juice, and we added TJ Bomba here, something like 1 TBSP, can do more or less based on your taste. This stock concoction should taste very intense as it has to seep into the couscous and flavour the whole dish.
Take the roasted veg out of the oven, add Israeli (pearl) couscous. I used 2 Cups couscous and how much ever stock it said to use on the back of the couscous package.
Add more vegetables - bottled (drained) artichokes and several handfuls baby spinach in this case and distribute aroundâŚ
Pour the boiling stock over it. Cover tightly with foil and roast for another 15 minutes.
Here is where I deviated: Take 2 (I think 8 oz?) pkgs of feta, slice them horizontally to get slabs, take the dish out of the oven, stir the contents to mix, place the slabs atop, drizzle with OO, cover again, and bake for another 10-ish minutes, then uncover and bake for another 10-ish minutes. The original recipe uses much less feta, crumbles it, and mixes it in and bakes (not the slabs on top etc.)
Thank you! Iâve been toying with the idea of making balls (using a cookie scoop), and wasnât sure where in my own stuffing recipe would be the best stage to shape them. Your explanation helps quite a bit.
FYI my all-time favorite stuffing recipe is from Bon Appetite. Itâs delicious, and can largely be made in advance. I think the best time to make the balls will be after the first stage (Step 4: Do Ahead).
Good on you for stepping in to help. But I can only imagine the frustration at suggestions that had been offered about using 2 roasting pans being ignored.
An after-Thanksgiving mini-Thanksgiving meal here tonight. Stuffed roasted chicken, cranberry sauce, peas. One of the cookies Iâll make this week calls for an orange cranberry filling which can double as T-Day cranberry sauce. I use an immersion blender to smooth it for cookie-filling. Baked cookies will also need the freezer space the whole chicken was occupying. And I missed âmyâ version of buttery stuffing with sliced almonds due to T-day with relatives, but now have satisfied that craving.
I got to sample scant leftovers last night, and they were DELICIOUS!
Canât decide if the âSmoked American Wagyu Brisket with Momofuku Spicy & Tingly Seasoning Crustâ or the âCrunchy Chocolate Peanut Pieâ were the MVP â that chocolate pie was just RIDICULOUS.
My friends were also waxing eloquent about (of all things) the coleslaw, daikon & jalapeĂąo pickles, and apparently the caulini (which I never tasted because it got wiped out the same night :joy):
Apparently âthis is every yearâs thanksgiving meal nowâ â but Iâm not buying that one of the other ideas wonât win next year, lol.
Almond Stuffing - enough for 4 Cornish game hens or a 3-4 pound chicken
ž cup butter (note - I now reduce this to 1/2 C / 1 stick, add 1/4 C. more broth/water)
½ cup chopped celery (or 1 T. celery flakes or 1 tsp Beau Monde and omit salt)
Âź cup chopped onion
½ cup chopped or sliced almonds
4 cups soft bread cubes (4 slices of bread, cubed)
1 Tablespoon dried parsley flakes
Âź teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon instant chicken bouillon (note - I now use broth in place of bouillon and water)
1/3 cup water
Combine butter, celery and onion in medium micro-waves safe mixing bowl
Microwave on ROAST for 4 or 5 minutes, or until vegetables are partly cooked. Stir in remaining ingredients; mix well. Stuff poultry.
from Litton Vari-Cook Microwave Cooking cookbook, c 1975, 8th printing 1978
Forgot to report back. We finally had it for Friday dinner. It was good, stuffed with a lot of lobster (which made me feel guilty, given my self-imposed moratorium on lobster). But the filling was drier than we expected (I think we were expecting something chicken pot pie-like, thick soup/stew-ish). It definitely needed a gravy treatment, which we gave it. Probably would not order it again, although I think itâs something good for a party of diverse eaters (eg, my parents would have loved it).
This year, as always, I made my not-too-sweet raw cranberry orange relish. Bracing and delish. One year I had an epiphany and turned the relish into a great sorbet. Wonderful palate cleanser. Best part is that this relish stays fresh and bright for many days in the fridge. Just right for turkey, chicken, beef, or lamb sandwiches. Itâs also pretty terrif on Greek yogurt. Just sayinâ.
Dinner was unremarkable. Dessert, however, is worth reporting on:
I usually make an apple pie, but DH mentioned that heâd like pecan pie this year. I decided to try the NYT Pecan Sandie Pie. The filling was the typical too-sweet-goo but a good ratio of goo to pecans. (I skipped the whiskey and used a little extra vanilla.) The crust⌠well, I liked the variety of a more cookie-like crust, and it wasnât very sweet so it balanced the filling well. But I must have read the recipe a dozen times to figure out what the heck it was saying to do for the top, then gave up and made a messy lattice that I baked separately and just set on top of the pie. I think it would have been better to just cut out 8-12 small shapes to decorate the top, and use more of the dough to make the sides higher/thicker (mine burned a bit as the pie needed to bake longer than what the recipe said - I think maybe 10 min more?). So⌠I canât really recommend it as is, but the crust might be worth trying or tweaking with a different filling approach. @CaitlinM and I were discussing offline and she proposed making it as a tart, which might work well and would avoid the sticking-to-the-pan situation.
SKâs pumpkin pie is da bomb. I made a different crust and skipped the praline topping stuff, but that filling⌠yum. It made an excellent breakfast on Friday.
