Turkey Day Prep - Part 2

In continuing to be prepared for an early-in-the-day Thanksgiving feast, and just so I wouldn't feel too overwhelmed the day-of, I worked on preparing pies and casseroles the day before...along with this herb butter recipe I came across in a magazine from last year. First you sautee some shallots in a little butter, then dump in some white wine, simmer til that completely cooks off, then add minced herbs. Once those are cooked a few minutes you let it cool, then combine it with softened butter, form it into a log, and chill it.



Slices of this were much easier to insert under the skin of the turkey - but I'd forgotten all that fat put under there doesn't give you a uniformly golden crispy layer of skin on the bird after all that cooking, but instead you get VERY DARK spots, and other spots that aren't as golden (the cooking bag the turkey was in probably had something to do with this as well). Oh well - sure tasted good!

Sharon had pointed out a chocolate pecan tart recipe that looked really good - so I dumped the chocolate espresso pecan pie recipe I'd been considering for the one Sharon sent. I've apparently lost my crust-making-mojo (I was REALLY good at making crusts a few years ago - not so much these days). This crust, made with lard (per Peter's suggestion) went one of the two ways all my crust problems head. Either tough, or in this case a little greasy and just crumbling apart like loose cornmeal. I'm wondering if that means I'm being too paranoid about overworking the dough and not working it enough to give it some structure? OH well - while the crust was a bit too crumbly, this tart ROCKED! VERY good - definitely something to consider making again! (And hey, now that I have tart pans, it was fun to try something new in them!)



Another great recipe is one Carolyn made a few years back when she and Rick joined us for Thanksiving, and it's actually one that Mary had shared with Carolyn. While this recipe is really sweet (it would do well for a dessert), it rocks on flavor and texture and I LOOOOVE IT!

Before the topping...


With the topping (I used pecans):


And here's the recipe - I think you should bookmark this for making later! (Btw - last time I made this I boiled the sweet potatoes, and this time I roasted them. No real noticeable difference in the end result)

Aunt Virginia's SWEET POTATO CASSEROLE

3 cups sweet potatoes (drain before you mash), cooked and mashed (save
l/4 cup of juice from sweet potatoes and add) 1 cup sugar 2 eggs 1/4
cup milk 1 T. vanilla pinch of salt 1/3 cup butter

TOPPING:

1/3 cup flour 1 cup brown sugar 1 cup flaked coconut 1 cup chopped
pecans or walnuts (I usually use walnuts) 1/3 cup butter, melted

Combine all above ingredients until smooth. Pour into 2 qt. casserole
dish. Mix all topping ingredients and spread over sweet potato mixture.

Bake at 350 degrees for 35 to 40 minutes.

And it's just not Thanksgiving without - you guessed it - green bean casserole! I thought I would aim for a "more fresh" flavor with the green beans this year, and went with the optional usage of frozen green beans over canned, per the recipe on the Campbell's can of Cream of Mushroom. I recommend against doing this UNLESS you add in "steam those green beans before adding them to the recipe!!!!" It just said to use frozen or canned green beans - and I didn't bother cooking the green beans before adding them, figuring they'd cook in the oven. Well, they didn't cook enough. Laura heard the crunch when I bit into one as a taste-testing after they'd baked an hour, and we both panicked. Luckily a 10-minute jaunt in the microwave helped things out a bit - and then they went back in the oven with their fried onion topping. (MMM!)

BTW - am I the only one who likes to ensure it's not a batch of POISONED French's fried onions, by taste testing a whole bunch of them before you even start making the recipe!? Hey, I'm willing to make the sacrifice - and I can't help that it tastes soooo darn good! ;-)

Btw - what's better than green bean casserole?


Green bean casserole with CRISPY COOKED BACON stirred into it!!! MMMMMM! (Hey, I thought I'd try something new!)


Check back later for pics from the feast!

Turkey Day Prep - Part 1

So Brett's brother Blake looooves my stuffing. It was the only payment he requested when he helped us install the lawn last year. And he requests it for each holiday gathering. And, recently, his best friend George (who I've never met, but have heard a lot about), requested the recipe! LOL Um. Small problem. No recipe. So I decided this would be the year I'd TRY to assemble a recipe - just to make it easier. Another small problem... Well, actually it was a big problem. Not in a bad way...but just remember the word "big" - we'll come back to that later! ;-)

Ok, so I know I like a variety of bread in my stuffing, so I cubed up (quickly, thanks to an electric knife!) a loaf of sourdough bread,


a loaf of pumpernickle bread,


a fresh, soft and tender french bread loaf,



...annnnd a very crusty (aka messy) loaf of french bread I'd already been drying out for a few days.

Hm, all this chopping of bread sure got SOMEONE'S interest. Good thing I had a kitchen assistant - more than one cube of bread made it to the floor! ;-)



Once I had all the bread cubes mixed up in my two biggest mixing bowls, I sprinkled with the following:

1 tablespoon dried/ground thyme
1 tablespoon dried thyme leaves
1 tablespoon dried/ground savory
1 tablespoon dried/rubbed sage
1.5 tablespoons black pepper
1.5 tablespoons salt

Then I tossed them onto a couple sheet pans and baked them looooow and slooooow for a couple hours that night, and a little more the next night, just leaving them in the oven each day). Here they are pre-seasoning and pre-baking.


So the day before Thanksgiving I figured I'd just whip together all the stuff and set the stuffing in the fridge. Shouldn't take long, right? Well, let's see what all's going into the stuffing... Since I had so much bread, I'd picked up a second pound of Bob Evan's sage seasoned sausage...


...and browned that up in my biggest skillet.



Off to the side I heated the last remains (1 cup?) of a beef broth carton, plus I think 2 cartons of chicken broth? There were also various herbs (parsley, sage, thyme) tossed in, and a little salt and pepper? I thought I would use the giblets in this, but those went to the gravy...


Once the sausage was done, I set it off to the side and sauteed two tart green, and two mild/soft yellow apples...


...hm....what'm I forgetting? Oh yeah - a stick of butter!


Then I added in the veggies I'd prepared the night before - 6 carrots, 6 stalks celery, 4 medium onions and 2 large parsnips (a new addition this year!).


Oh, and two big handfuls of dried cranberries ("craisins").


Once the veggies softened a bit, I dumped the sausage back in and adjusted the seasonings (just sprinkled on more salt and pepper).


Hm....I'm starting to accumulate a lot of stuffing parts here! Ok, the biggest thing I could come up with to work in was - the turkey roaster!!! Dumped in the stuffing bread...


...and then added all the veggies/fruit!


At this point I forgot to keep taking pictures. I ended out using ALL of the broth I'd pre-heated (so at least 9 cups - perhaps more?), and stirred all that in....

And remember when I said to remember my "big" problem. Well, after assembling all this and getting it to where I was happy with the massive amount of stuff, I went and weighed myself, and then weighed myself holding the roasting pan with stuffing. I don't figure the roasting pan itself weighs more than a couple pounds.... And the scales? Well, they implied the stuffing + roasting pan - Jeph = 19+ lbs!! Oops - so yeah, don't make this recipe exactly to scale, with all my measurements, unless you're looking to feed a BIG crowd. I ended out calling Dave and having him stop by to take a gallon-bag loaded with the stuff down to Mansfield, where he was doing t-day with his mom (his dad was out shooting deer in WV). And I had another gallon bag stuffed full for Blake to take with him. And a quart bag of the stuff went right into the freezer. The remaining stuffing filled my largest casserole dish. Heh heh...that was a lot of stuffing!! ;-)

BTW - it tasted gooooood!

Happy (Belated) Thanksgiving!

How was your turkey day!? I hope it was as much fun as ours!



More pics coming soon - promise!

Brett gets home from work...

Isn't it exciting!!!?

Snow Dog

So last week we got the first big snow fall of the season. It wasn't that a big storm passed through, but rather we were getting hit with a lot of lake effect snow. You could watch the bands passing south-east off the lake on the radar animations, and predict how we'd pass from snowy weather to sunny skies and back to snow again. What was interesting was how I was doing that at work and could tell that just 15 minutes away, there was probably more snow falling at home.

And that was making me ITCH LIKE CRAZY to get outta work! I couldn't wait to get home, to see how much snow we'd gotten, and of course, to see what Doogie thought of it.

Sure, it'd be fun to take Tucker out in it as well, but between the cold, the deep snow, and hyper-Doog, Tucker decided he was done with it after just a few minutes.

Here you can see Doogie must have the same interest in getting out there in the snow as I had. That look says he was just BEGGING to get out there in it! (Ok, maybe he had to pee too!?) "C'mon daddy - let's GO GO GO!!!!" (Clearly he takes after me when it comes to snow)


At first he was a little uncertain - it was the deepest snow he'd experienced yet in his young life... But within minutes...BANG ZOOM he was off:


Honestly, is there ANYTHING better than a yard FULL of undisturbed snow? I think not!


And with a pristine yard-full-of-snow, it's fun to watch the tracks and see where all someone's been... Like why fly across the back yard only to veer a sharp right?


Oh I see! It's to turn around and throw out the challenge - "C'mon and PLAAAAAY WITH ME!!!!"


After a short bit of playing - Doogie's got a real taste for the snow!


Here's a couple more great shots - you might want to click on these to get the full size view. No, not to see how my landscaping needs some tidying, but to see zoom-puppy come flying at me from the deck.


That's GOT to be a smile on his face!


Seriously - I think he likes the snow! I'm guessing we had maybe six inches? I'm looking forward to the really DEEP stuff!


Zoooooooom! (Can't you just hear the sonic boom?)


Take note of this picture....specifically his ears. We really started worrying this past week when ONE ear (his left) started being droopy. His ears haven't normally been upright all the time, but they COULD shoot straight up in the ear, or fold back behind him, etc. But now the left ear droops all...the...time. Did we break it? (For what it's worth, within just the last day or so, his other ear is now doing the same...)


Where's Waldo/Doogie? Actually - he's not in this shot - I just thought the pond/snow/trees looked pretty.


Ok, what's he doing now?


And here he's doing it again in the middle of the yard. He'll be running along, start to dip down...


...and bury his face in the snow, then start snuffling around like he hunting critters down there. (There's no critters in the middle of the yard, trust me) What a goof!


And again! Dig dig dig! I DO know in this case he came up with straw and horse manure because he was digging in the garden. Nice.


And he's off again! And airborn!


It's really hard to believe it's not even Thanksgiving yet (and I obviously haven't felt the need to remove the "fall decor" such as bails of straw and the pumpkins under the snow here)...


...and yet we got something like six inches of snow!


At least Doogie seems to like it!


Did I mention I want to rename him "Snowflake"?


Ahhhh....a dog's best friend! (Oh, and you can see here that's we're just too far down the street from the fully-developed part of the neighborhood to have our streets plowed. That's right - our streets don't get plowed by the city unless we have a TON of snow. I think they only plowed when we had something like two feet last year?!)


Oh this again - and this time he could come up with spring-flowering bulbs!


We still have to work on his Christmas-card poses!


You can see here that the yard is no longer "pristine"... We've pretty much covered the back yard, both side yards and part of the front by this time. Here we're about to wrap things up. If you look closely you'll see Doogie way back by the raised garden beds. "Hey Doogie! Time to go in!"


Here he comes!


Oh shit - I don't think he's gonna stop! (And, actually, he DIDN'T! He shot right on past me - I yanked the camera up just in time!)


Ok, I can't blame him for wanting one more lap around the yard before going inside.


Now do I need to apologize for SOOOOO many puppy pictures, or are they just so darned cute that you'll forgive me? ;-)

Oh! And good news! We got DRIZZLE all day today - so now all the snow's a yucky mess, there's brown (and a little green) peeking up through it, it's gross on the sides of the roads, etc... But the temps are dropping, and we're due to get 1-3 inches of snow tomorrow and maybe 2-4 tomorrow night?? YIPPEE SKIPPY! Sure, everything might be coated in a veneer of ice tomorrow (so more slips and falls going in to work!), but at least the fresh coat will cover everything up so it looks pretty.