Comments on: Thanksgiving Thoughts #2

By: La BellaDonna

La BellaDonna — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 23:46:36 +0000

I’ve done Rock Cornish Game Hens, and I’ve done duck three or four times. Mmmmm…. duck!

By: Twistie

Twistie — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 19:38:50 +0000

Dang, Kimks! That sounds fabulous.

And you should have seen the look on my butcher’s face the first time I asked him if I could get suet. I needed it for a steamed pudding. As things stand, I have to plan a week in advance if I want to make one because that’s how long the special order takes. Sigh.

By: Kimks

Kimks — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 19:18:01 +0000

My Husband found a South Western Thanksgiving feast in a Magazine we subscribe too the first year we were married. I normally don’t follow a complete menu from a magazine, but this just looked SOOOOOOOOOOOOO good that I gave it a shot. It was a lot of food, so we opened our home to those who needed a place to have Thanksgiving- mostly people from our church, but there have been other people in our Circle of friends that show up, and we are grateful for their presence. The Turkey has a tamarind glaze and is stuffed with Poblano and Guajillo Chiles, the sweet potatos are made into a savory tamale, we have roasted corn and Chipolte mashed potatos and sauted green beans with a manchengo and white wine sauce, corn bread, bacon and chipolte dressing. The dish de resistance is a poblano and cauliflower gratin made with cotija and monterey jack cheeses. Ohh- and the roasted pablano gravy- INSANE!! I make pies and bread pudding for dessert and my grandmothers cranberry sauce. It is a lot of good food, and as we are living on the East Coast and we are from the West, it brings a bit of the flavors from home here. The hardest thing to do is to convince my butcher that, yes, we need 5 pounds of Chorizo and my produce guy that really, we will use the 5 pounds of poblanos. Every year I order the ingredients, every year they look at me in disbelief, and every year I invite them to join us- maybe this year they will take me up on the invite.

Never once has anyone said to me that they miss the green bean casserole. I personally think that casserole looks like a dead frog when you serve it.

Oh- we have a huge post Thanksgiving leftver party on Friday- everyone brings their leftovers and we have a lot of fun.

By: Kai Jones

Kai Jones — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 19:05:30 +0000

This year we’re having a turkey breast, salmon, rice, green beans with lemon zest, baked sweet potatoes, sauteed kale with garlic, and for dessert pecan pie.

By: Nancy

Nancy — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 00:02:37 +0000

Our family tradition is spaghetti! We have an ice cream turkey for dessert (drumsticks are ice cream cones).

By: Elizabeth

Elizabeth — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 03:37:37 +0000

Nobody in my family really loves turkey that much, so we haven’t had turkey for years. For a long time, we had chili (a family fave) and gave the turkey money to the food bank. Now we tend to celebrate Christmas at Thanksgiving, so I’ve made lamb for a couple of years. I’ve also made lasagna once, and roasted cornish hens once.

By: Nomie

Nomie — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 03:09:22 +0000

Why would you put marshmallows on sweet potatoes when you could make a sweet potato pie? SO much better than pumpkin, which I always finds tastes soapy. I admit to being a total sucker for the traditional menu, but I'm eyeing this turnip gratin recipe. Mmm, gratins.

By: Twistie

Twistie — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 22:40:13 +0000

@Tropical Chrome: could you not ask for a side order of stuffing to go?

By: TropicalChrome

TropicalChrome — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 19:58:10 +0000

I’m making the same thing I’ve made for the past couple of years for Thanksgiving: reservations.

I really don’t like most of the foods served at the traditional Thanksgiving feast – I don’t hate them, but I’d honestly choose something else over most of them. Except stuffing.

And even though yeah, I can cook them all and cook them well (with the exception of sweet potatoes which I consider an abomination no matter how they’re prepared), I don’t like cooking them. Especially when there’s only two of us because there’s no better way to ruin a holiday than spend it with my family.

So I let someone else cook, I get to have something like a yummy steak which most restaurants will happily serve with a side of stuffing because they’re always serving some variant on the traditional meal, and I get chocolate for dessert.

About the only thing I miss is the leftover stuffing.

By: Twistie

Twistie — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 18:03:37 +0000

@zanthine: I, too, have a deep and profound love of Buffy, the Vampire Slayer. And ritual sacrifice with pie.

@B.S.A.G.: Broccoli and bacon salad??? Recipe, please!