Thanksgiving

It may be cliche, but I do love Thanksgiving. Hanging out, eating and drinking, no expectations about gifts, just a good time. We head to the in laws and my family is also invited, which is great because we don't have to split up the holiday.

I'm doing something different this year, pies and bread. I'll be doing a black bottom pecan pie, a regular pecan pie, corn bread and some dinner rolls. The last couple of years I had been making a cauliflower gratin but I wasn't happy with it last year.


This year's recipes are a stretch for me, I've made one pie before in my life and have only made bread once before too, though I do have a bit of experience with pizza dough.

I'm planning on doing most of the prep tomorrow. I'll blind bake the pie shells, make the dough for the rolls and do everything with the cornbread.

The one point of contention is what to use for the pie crust, shortening or butter. There seems to be two camps on this so I'm splitting  the difference and using half butter and half shortening.

Thursday morning I'll make the fillings for the pies and bake them off. I'll have the rolls on sheet pans ready to go in the oven before dinner is served so they're nice and piping hot too.

Hopefully I'll remember to take pictures to post later. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

I'm doing it

I'm making my own turducken. I'll debone to duck and the chicken myself, but I ordered a debonded turkey from Paulina Meat Market.

I'll pick up the turkey next Wednesday and put it all together Thursday afternoon with the help of Charlie. The turducken has always scared Rory to some extend and having her help me put it together would probably be a bad idea. I'm going more traditional with the stuffing, i.e. onions, celery, sage, than Cajun.

It won't be as pretty as the one I get from Cajun Grocer, I'll split the turkey down the breast and sew it up. but it will hopefully be just as tasty. I will be sure to keep everyone updated here to let you all know how it goes.

Also, my apologies for not posting more, I don't have any great excuses. I have actually cooked a handful of new things lately but just haven't been writing as much. It might have to do with the stack of 15 contributed pieces sitting on my desk that need to be edited.

Also, Thanksgiving was good. My mom, dad and sister joined the future in laws up in Evanston. I made the Cauliflower Gratin that I mad last year and it was a lot of fun.

Been busy

Just as traffic seems to be somewhat picking up to the site, I disappear for a few days. A combination of things have made life somewhat crazed lately, and while I have been cooking, I haven't cooked anything new for a few days. I also was supposed to rework something for Chicagoist and haven't done that either.

Last Wednesday I made chili for a work potluck using this recipe, sans the beef short ribs. I also took a spill on some ice this day and kind of screwed up my lower back/leg. I tweaked my sciatica and it's still barking. This has made cooking difficult because even standing and chopping vegetables has been a bit of a challenge.

On Thursday night my office has its "unofficial" holiday party. We basically set up a drink deal at a bar and drank too much.

Rory and I both took Friday off and we went Christmas shopping and saw Golden Compass. I give it one "meh." That evening we had a holiday party with some of her friends and again stayed out too late.

Saturday was Rory's work party and it was fun. It wasn't open bar, they gave three drink tickets. When I walked up tot he bar and saw the selection they had your typical Heineken, Blue Moon, etc., but they also had the 22-ounce bottles of Fat Tire. While I do like Fat Tire I also believe it's overrated, but for free and basically two for one, how could you go wrong?

Sunday night we had Rory's high school friends over. I basically made a scaled down Thanksgiving meal. Initially I was going to do a turkey breast, but it was cheaper to get a whole turkey and I figure I could use the bones to make stock. I also did mashed potatoes, stuffing, a corn casserole, rolls and Rory made a salad. Sadly, I forgot to take pictures (no food porn).

I brined the turkey and it was excellent. I used a hybrid recipe of something I found online. Here's what I used:

1.5 cups of kosher salt
1 gallon of water
1/2 cup of brown sugar
2 bay leaves crumbled
15 peppercorns crushed
6 sprigs of fresh thyme
2 TBLSP of rubbed sage (fresh would be better but I forgot to buy some)

I heated the water to dissolve the salt. This was a first for me and I don't know if it made a difference, but it probably didn't hurt. They key with this is to let the water cool completely before putting it on the turkey. I let it brine for just about 24 hours.

This was also the first time I made stuffing. I'll write about that recipe this evening.

Thanksgiving wrap-up part one

Sorry for not posting for a couple of days, it was busy getting things ready for the holiday. I'll post about the dessert Rory and I made tomorrow.

Her parents put out quite the spread. They had turkey and turducken, both cooked on the grill. It was the first time in awhile I had grilled turkey and the flavor was fantastic. The turducken was also great. I can't wait to cook my own in a couple of weeks.

My cauliflower gratin turned out really well. The roux, which I had issues with before finally turned out (Kristen, thanks for the tip, I'll keep it in mind). Everybody seemed to really enjoy the dish.

Tomorrow is Thankgiving Part Deux: The Reckoning. My folks are brining the turkey, which make me very happy.

My potential Thanksgiving menu

One day, I don't know if it'll be soon, I expect to be hosting a Thanksgiving dinner
for family. It's just a matter of time. I'm already hosting a Thanksgiving/Christmas style meal so it may happen sooner than later. But recently I started thinking of what I would serve.

This past weekend as I was watching the Food Network Challenge Ultimate Thanksgiving Feast. Everything cooked in this show sounded and looked really good, though my major issue was only one chef roasted a turkey. The rest butchered and did various things to it.

Maybe I am too much of a traditionalist but you have to have a roast turkey. You can grill it, deep fry it or put it in the oven but don't butcher the bird and do different things for Thanksgiving. If you want to do that at another time of you go nuts (though how often does one cook turkey outside of Thanksgiving or Christmas?).

But anyway, to my menu:

Roast turkey w/ stuffing in the bird.
I debated this one. I love to grill, and wouldn't completely rule it out, but for the first time I would probably do a traditional bird with my father's stuffing recipe. He sautees some celery, onions and mushrooms and the mixes it with some stuffing mix and chicken stock and various herbs and spices. He puts some in the bird, and that's the best stuff, and the cooks some on the side. Now I know there's a big trend toward sausage stuffing and I am hardly ever one to turn down pork sausage, but this doesn't do it for me for a traditional Thanksgiving fare. I have had it other times though and it can be quite good.

Mashed potatoes.
We've had this conversation.

Sweet potatoes and cranberries
I'm not a big fan of either but I know others are so I would either cook them traditionally or be open to suggestion. But the cranberries would not be from a can.

Brussels Sprouts.
My aunt makes some really good ones with bread crumbs, garlic and olive oil. But I really want to Brussels sprouts with pancetta.

Cauliflower gratin

Corn
This has been a staple on family Thanksgiving tables for as long as I can remember. I would like to do more than just put a can of corn on the table but I'm not sure how the family would respond.

Dessert:
Pumpkin pie.
My moms' recipe

Chocolate cake.
I'll let you know how the one Rory and I turns out.

Any thoughts? I know it's pretty safe and traditional but I don't think Thanksgiving it a time to get too risky. What's on your Thanksgiving menu?