Thanksgiving!!!!!!

Woo hoo! The best day of the year is here!

OK, forcing myself to post. I was so disappointed when I saw I didn't post at all last year.

The location for the event: my mom's newly (finally!) redecorated house.

The attendees: Everyone! My mom, both brothers, both their wives, one of their sons, one of their sets of in laws, my husband and two kids, and my in laws. Oh, and me! By last count, that's 14.

The meal: I am making the brunt of it, with help from my lovely sister in law, and presumably my mom, but she prefers to wander off and play with the grandkids most days. Which is fine, since I have serious cooking to do and can't be expected to do any serious kid wrangling!

The prep:

We have two 13 pound turkeys in my mom's fridge. I went yesterday and dry salted one of them. The other wasn't fully defrosted, so I did a wet brine with salt and sugar. My mom was supposed to drain, rinse, and pat dry that one this morning, and put it back in the fridge to try to dry out the skin a little.

The turkeys will be made in my mom's fancy new Viking stove. Even though she has the fresh new set up, I like my tools and my kitchen. Her kitchen is sparkly new and remarkably free of basic pantry items and useful hardware. So, I tried to do a lot of the prep yesterday. And, it'll save me stress over certain items that tend to be a pain the day of: namely, desserts.

So, last night I made this lovely looking English toffee pecan pie. If it got a blue ribbon from Martha, it's got to be good, amirite? It wasn't the Martha vote that got me, actually. My mom loves toffee and pecan pie, so I kind of had to make it once I stumbled across the recipe.

I prepped and chilled the pumpkin creme brulee to be. I hate it when I am rushed to chill it adequately, and end up juggling things in the freezer on a special occasion, desperately trying to chill it so the brulee-ing process doesn't heat it up again.

I made kale and pancetta. We will also be having green beans with persimmons and pancetta, and one of the turkeys will have salt pork draped over it for some of the cooking. So, definitely not a kosher or vegetarian friendly meal!

Oh, and speaking of more pork, I browned the sage sausage, and used the drippings to cook a B-52's Chrysler load of celery and onions for the stuffings. I also sliced the bread and let it get stale.

I want this book!

My friends at Home-Ec 101 are giving away the book Notes on Cooking: A Short Guide to an Essential Craft. I loves food science!

Wish me luck.

Frenchees and bisque

I made the most evil sandwiches the other night, based on a recipe from Cook's Country. They are called "Frenchees", and involve taking sandwiches made with white bread, mayonnaise and American cheese, coating them with cracker crumbs and frying them. Uhh, evil.



I tried to balance it out by serving them with shrimp bisque. That's classy enough, right?

Experimental salmon

I usually like salmon with a fruit based or sweet sauce. I love it with mango salsa or with a honey soy sauce. But, I bought a lot of gorgeous diary products from an organic farm, and decided to try something inspired by this recipe.

I have a beautiful Coho salmon fillet. I mixed herbed garlic goat cheese, chili stone ground mustard, mayonnaise, chopped green onions and parsley. Let's see how it turns out.

Review: I thought it was delicious. The topping was gently browned on top and very pretty. And I used to think baked salmon with cheese was a major no-no. Picky scraped off most of the topping and said he only liked a little coating of it. Z liked it. Both S and Picky say they like the honey soy mustard sauce better.

Already excited about Thansgiving

SQUEEEEEEEEEEE!!! I am hosting Thanksgiving at my house!!

I am already getting excited about it. I may go buy this today.

I would love to buy this. I neither need it nor can afford it, but I love to go to the Le Creuset outlet store and lust at it. I may be only going to buy the gravy boat today so I can get a look at the braiser.

Chocolate zucchini muffins

I am praying my zucchini, which has languished in my fridge for a week while I started my new fellowship, is still good. I am making chocolate zucchini muffins. This recipe is fantastic and I have used it before. I am so happy I found it again! I think it's almost healthy, since it has equal amounts of zucchini and sugar.

In fact, if I ever had a food business or a cooking show, I would call it "Almost Healthy." Somehow, I don't think that would work for a medical practice.

Food food food

I have been cooking a lot lately, and it's been a lot of fun.

I am party planning (again). We are hosting a medium-sized pre-Independence Day dinner party tomorrow. I invited five couples over. (I originally called it a small dinner party, but I guess it's kind of relative what size it is.)

So, far, it will be a mostly Latin themed menu. I am planning on making grilled skirt steak with chimichurri, mojo style chicken drumettes, and lime garlic shrimp, also on the grill. I am also going to make two salads on the side, a green salad with tomatoes and red onion, and a "white" salad with marinated mushrooms, chick peas, hearts of palm, artichoke hearts, and minimal green elements. I want to add roasted red peppers to it, but I have a friend who is sensitive to nightshades who may be attending, so I may leave those out.

I have a friend who will help tend bar by making mojitos.

I am trying to not buy too much extra stuff, since money is tight. I have one friend bringing dessert, a trifle with chocolate and kahlua that I am really looking forward to. I heavily hinted towards cheese-y appetizers. I hope we get some. I kind of want to go buy some anyway, because I am that kind of a hostess.

We will be attending 3 (3!!) 4th of July parties on Saturday. Two of them specifically ask for people to bring side dishes or beverages. Picky is pushing me to bring bottles of wine. I was thinking of making extra white salad. He doesn't really consume either.