My Thanksgiving meal

caseydog - I don't really have a lot of memories of Thanksgiving meals growing up; not because we didn't have them, just that they were pretty unspectacular. Like your folks, we had all the usuals (including the canned jellied cranberry sauce, which I happen to love).

We raised our own stuff, though, so most of the food didn't come from the store. My grandad raised turkeys for several years, so that's where the bird came from.

One thing my mom always bought...those cheap-ass dinner rolls, 12 or 16 to a pack, with the two lines cut across the top, and that was our bread. Mom didn't bake a lot of bread, as a rule.

Except for the turkey, it was like any other meal, really, because we always ate really well. Once everyone moved out of the house, for a period of 10 years or so, Mom would have Thanksgiving, but by then, she'd moved on to buying everything, and she's always been extra-frugal, so it was always a pre-cooked turkey breast, boxed stuffing, canned this and that, frozen pies, and not very good.

Nowadays, my sister has tried to take over, and she's that unfortunate combination of obsessive cook/terrible cook, and she's naturally disorganized and easily put off her game, plus she has serious anger/rage issues, so the moment things start to head just a little off script...look out. She's like a Martha Stewart who can't cook combined with She-Hulk. If we go over to her house, it's a house full of people on pins and needles, hoping not to inadvertently do something to awaken the beast.
 
Happy Thanksgiving and Happy Thursday to those who don't celebrate Thanksgiving.

Up at 5 to prep the rest of the sides - standard fare of roasted veggies, hot house rolls, dressing and stuffing, potatoes prep later for mashed, set the table and put bird in the oven after soaking overnight in water,salt, bourbon, brown sugar and sliced oranges.

Now I am relaxing with a cup of hot coffee spiked with Kahlua Moha Mint :)
 
Happy Thanksgiving! Just about to assemble my contribution to the pot luck.

An onion and a half, sautéed (with sage and salt). Yukon gold potatoes, thinly sliced. Gouda cheese, gruyere cheese, just grated. Waiting for the onions to cool a minute or two, then I'll layer everything into a pan (and with some herbes de Provence), and add some veggie broth. Everything will be topped with parmesan. I will only need 30-35 minutes to cook this, so I won't start that part until about 11:30. In between I need to get outside and do some last minute yard work - the ground should finally be soft enough to plant the daffodils, and I have a short window of time to get them in. Temps will start plummeting again this afternoon.

This Thanksgiving is just down the road from here. So, no re-heating necessary.

The Thanksgiving on Saturday will contain more foodie types, so I will be making a fancier variant of this dish for them, along with bringing my cranberry liqueur. (For today's, I'm bringing a bottle of Pinot Grigio.) Alas, I'll have to re-heat for that one - 2.5 hours from here. And they never eat on time.
 
The potatoes are ready for the oven...

Taking a quick moment here - Parents would always have the turkey and I really WANT to find her stuffing and gravy recipe - it's the only recipe I really like for either. I may try to punt some day, but since the turkey hasn't been my responsibility for years, it won't happen this year.

My ex-sister-in-law hated Mom's turkey - well, not the turkey itself, but the stuffing and gravy. She wanted that white stuff that came out of a jar for the gravy, and something equally as hideous for the stuffing. Mother eventually resorted to making two sets of stuffings and gravies - with the gravy just requiring heating up the contents of that jar. (Reminds me of wallpaper paste.)

Mom would pretty much make the same things each year - turkey, stuffing, gravy, mashed potatoes, either mashed sweet potatoes or a squash dish (NO marshmallows or sugar!), that green bean thing with the mushroom soup and crunchy onions on top, canned cranberry, a salad, a pie or two - pecan (which I never liked ever) and some different one each year, because she knew she couldn't get pecans down me. But by then, I never wanted dessert anyway. Dad would cook, too - usually a variety of appetizers that would vary from year to year at his whim. Mom didn't cook breads, but she did make her own rolls.
 
Our meal will be:

Turducken roulade
Stuffing/dressing of andouille, trinity, bread cubes
Stuffing/dressing of wild rice, onions, garlic and tart cherries
Brussel sprouts some way
Sweet Potatoes Foster (like bananas)
Gravy made from turkey/duck wings and carcasses
Homemade rolls

We don't usually have dessert or at least much of one, always too full. I may make some cookies later, we'll see.
 
Turduckens ready to smoke.

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TastyReuben said:
caseydog - I don't really have a lot of memories of Thanksgiving meals growing up; not because we didn't have them, just that they were pretty unspectacular. Like your folks, we had all the usuals (including the canned jellied cranberry sauce, which I happen to love).

We raised our own stuff, though, so most of the food didn't come from the store. My grandad raised turkeys for several years, so that's where the bird came from.

One thing my mom always bought...those cheap-ass dinner rolls, 12 or 16 to a pack, with the two lines cut across the top, and that was our bread. Mom didn't bake a lot of bread, as a rule.

Except for the turkey, it was like any other meal, really, because we always ate really well. Once everyone moved out of the house, for a period of 10 years or so, Mom would have Thanksgiving, but by then, she'd moved on to buying everything, and she's always been extra-frugal, so it was always a pre-cooked turkey breast, boxed stuffing, canned this and that, frozen pies, and not very good.

Nowadays, my sister has tried to take over, and she's that unfortunate combination of obsessive cook/terrible cook, and she's naturally disorganized and easily put off her game, plus she has serious anger/rage issues, so the moment things start to head just a little off script...look out. She's like a Martha Stewart who can't cook combined with She-Hulk. If we go over to her house, it's a house full of people on pins and needles, hoping not to inadvertently do something to awaken the beast.
Click to expand...


When I was married, we would with holidays every year with the parents. One year, we would go to my parent's house for Thanksgiving, and her's for Christmas, and the next, just the opposite. Her mom was the better cook, but I gained five pounds every time we went to her house.

CD
 
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I meant to take a photo of my dish before I brought it over, but I forgot.
I thought it was pretty good, and it was indeed pretty much gone before the end of the meal.

There was turkey, a very decent stuffing, that horrible white wallpaper paste gravy (I skipped that), mashed potatoes, mashed sweet potatoes (that were amazingly marshmallow-free and unsugared!!!), cole slaw, some kashi and peanut dish, a bowl of steamed carrots and another of steamed corn. There was a homemade cranberry sauce, and then the stuff from a can - since the homemade was available, I took that and ignored the canned.

The green bean dish did not put in an appearance.

There were at least 8-9 pies, and someone brought pre-packaged cupcakes that didn't get opened. I had a slight sliver of pumpkin pie and didn't sample any of the others - I'd already had two plates of the main meal, and I am not one to save room for dessert when the mains are good.

There were 30 of us in attendance. Good conversations and all.

I plan on going to bed shortly. I won't be eating any more today. (Breakfast, btw, was a simple soft boiled egg and some coffee.)
 
My dinner plate. Craig also had some slices of his smoked turkey breast and the andouille/trinity dressing with bread crumbs. The turducken was good and was moist all the way through. Will I do it again? Probably not unless I really, really need to impress somebody. My bread got a little too brown, as did the roast Brussel sprouts. I think the new oven may be running a bit hot because I set timer for just over half the time so I could switch pans. Good thing I did, otherwise bread would have been ruined. I ended up putting some chocolate pieces in some of the bread dough, so that will be our dessert.
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My gingerbread cake:


Gingerbread Cake

Gingerbread Cake


I've mentioned before that cakes and I don't get along. I just don't have the cake gene. Everything that can go wrong does go wrong.

Happy to say, this one came out perfectly. It's light, it's tender, no big holes, no undermixed spots. I'm writing detailed notes next to the recipe, so I may be able to apply it to other cakes.

Yes, that's premade canned whipped cream, but at least it's not Reddi-Whip. It's some "gourmet" kind that costs an arm, but it is pretty good. I rarely whip cream at home because it's just the two of us and it doesn't hold well.
 
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