Ahh, the beauty of the Thanksgiving table! The bounty! The rich fall colors! The delicious aromas wafting their ways teasingly to your schnozzola!
Of course, all this waxing poetic isn’t going to help much if you’re still poring over your cookbooks looking for the best side dishes at this eleventh hour. If I may, I have a couple recipes that may answer a maiden’s prayer deliciously and easily. Both are tasty and super simple. In fact, one of them requires about three minutes, one knife, and a food processor. Let’s start with that, shall we?
Last week I mentioned my favorite cranberry, orange, ginger relish, and the ever-delightful dinazad requested the recipe. Well, here it is in all its three-minute glory:
12oz fresh cranberries
1 small navel orange cut into wedges. Leave unpeeled.
1/3Cup crystalized ginger, roughly chopped. Don’t be afraid to be generous with this.
1Tblsp granulated sugar
dash salt
Put all the ingredients into a food processor. Process until coarsely ground, scraping down the sides once or twice. Put into the prettiest bowl you can find, and refrigerate covered until it’s time to serve.
How easy is that?
The other is a little more complicated, but still a lot easier than people will assume when they taste it. It’s the one recipe I still have from my mother, and it tastes like the holidays to me.
Patrician Potatoes
1 1/2lbs. potatoes
3Cups cottage cheese
3/4Cup sour cream
1 1/2Tbsp grated onion (I like to be a bit generous, here)
salt and pepper to taste
1/4Cup melted butter
1/2Cup chopped toasted almonds
Preheat oven to 350F
Peel potatoes and cook in boiling water until tender, about 20 minutes. Drain and mash thoroughly. Stir in cottage cheese, sour cream, onions, salt and pepper. Spoon mixture into a buttered 2qt. baking dish. Drizzle melted butter over the top, and sprinkle with almonds. The dish may be made up to a day in advance to this point. If you do this, keep it covered in the refrigerator until ready to bake.
Bake for 30 minutes. Serve to delighted dinner guests. Have copies of the recipe on hand, because I can virtually guarantee you that someone will ask for it.
OMB, those potatoes sound delicious!
Comment by ZaftigWendy — November 20, 2011 @ 4:15 am
Electric toothbrush? Seriously, trolls.
Comment by the misfit — November 20, 2011 @ 12:39 pm
The relish has ginger in it?!!!!! Oooh, I have to make that immediately! Thank you! AND the potatoes! Yum!
Comment by dinazad — November 21, 2011 @ 4:53 am
Yes, it has ginger. Mr. Twistie and I are both huge ginger sluts.
You’re welcome.
Comment by Twistie — November 21, 2011 @ 12:02 pm
The relish was absolutely delicious! I put my 10 yr old daughter/sous chef in charge of it and she was so happy to have something on the table she made all by herself. She’s happy to cut veggies and stir things, but it was much nicer for her to have her own dish.
Comment by Sarah G. — November 24, 2011 @ 9:19 pm
Thanks for the cranberry recipe! We had our Thanksgiving dinner yesterday (after Michigan beat OSU!! thankful!) and everyone raved about it.
My mom would have loved it – she loved all things cranberry and we enjoyed it remembering good times with “grammy jane” – she is missed.
Comment by julie — November 27, 2011 @ 10:04 am