Stuffed!

And tired!

I've been up since 6:30 am.  I rinsed and stuffed the turkey and got it in the oven by 8:30 am, and it was ready at 1:30 pm on the dot.  Amazing!  And the brining was a success - my father could not stop saying how wonderful the turkey was, which made me so happy!  I thought I was the last person on earth to get on the brining bandwagon but, if I'm not, and you haven't brined, you have to try it.

The kale and brussels sprouts salad was challenging, even for me.  I think the kale was too chewy for my taste, others found it too bitter.  My husband very politely avoided it.  I have some of the greens left that didn't get tossed in the dressing, I will likely cook them up sometime.  Maybe add them to some soup... which I need to make with all that leftover turkey.  Hopefully tomorrow, before I have to go to work.

The mashed potatoes were made with buttermilk this year, also successful.  Almost everyone chose the cranberry habanero sauce over the plain sauce, the spiced crabapples were a hit, and between the 10 of us we ate one and a half pies.  I totally missed out on the beets and eggs, they never even made it to my end of the table.  The kids were at their own table; there were lots of giggles and not a lot of eating going on.  But they did make a big dent in the pumpkin bread.  I froze the second loaf - we had, as usual, WAY too much food.  My fridges (I have 2) are full of food.  I do not need to cook for a week, I think.

I talk a lot about food, but the best part of the day was just having my family around.  My sister called during the festivities and joined in long-distance.  My brother and his family hung around for a while after dinner and it was fun just to sit around and talk.  That's what I'm thankful for - all the people in my life!

Thanksgiving Soup

Did you have a good Thanksgiving? We did. Turkey and stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potato casserole, Brussels sprouts with pancetta, cranberry sauce (plain or with habaneros); squash soup, fig-pancetta rolls, and shrimp cocktail for appetizers; pumpkin and pear-plum pies for dessert! We hosted this year so had lots of leftovers to eat. I love turkey sandwiches with stuffing! We are almost done with them all, except for the mashed potatoes - we always make lots more than we need...

Anyway, I've been trying to get the time to make turkey soup and stock. This morning I had a few hours so got to it - the turkey bones with some meat, and 12 pints of water, with salt, pepper, thyme and a bay leaf. Usually I skim off the stock before I make the soup, but I wasn't sure I was going to can any stock so I made the soup first, and then when it became clear I had too much liquid, I skimmed off 2 pints of stock while I was canning the soup. Here's the soup recipe:

Bones of a 15 pound turkey, with some meat
2 medium onions, diced
1 c. diced carrots
2 small sweet potatoes, diced
3 potatoes, diced
6 celery ribs, chopped
12 pints water
kosher salt and pepper
thyme
1 bay leaf

I ended up with 3 quarts of soup and 2 pints of stock in the pressure canner. Clearly, 12 pints of water was too much to add! I suppose I could have added more vegetables.... The amount I canned was actually limited by the number of empty jars I had at the moment. Had I simply looked on the drying rack, I would have found 2 more. Oh, well.

I put all 5 jars in the pressure canner and processed for 90 minutes at 10 pounds of pressure. I had to leave at a very specific time, and managed to get the canner going with exactly the right amount of time. Which meant I turned it off and walked out the door. 4.5 hours later, I returned and opened the canner and everything was just fine. That was reassuring! One of the first times I used the canner I left it to cool overnight and had to use a screwdriver to pry the lid off because I waited too long.

Much Delayed Thanksgiving Post

Normally, I don't mind working over Thanksgiving. We've always held our Thanksgiving get together on a different day: "It doesn't matter when, just as long as we get together." This year, through a series of progressively more complicated events, that didn't happen. And I just finished working every other night (3 12-hour shifts in 5 days) through the actual holiday. Despite all this chaos, we managed to have some fun. Such as:

My wonderful husband cooked the turkey while I slept on Thursday, and he did an awesome job. Chestnut stuffing and everything! Even though it was just the 4 of us (and the 4 year old ate 4 bites of pumpkin bread and declared the meal over) we had the fancy china, candles, tablecloth, and the good silver. So thoughtful! (Astute readers will note the canned cranberry and cranberry habanero sauces in the foreground and, fyi, the pumpkin bread is made with my canned sugar pumpkin from last fall.)

To escape the turkey leftovers we went out one night to have crazy huge burgers at one of the most famous burger places in Cambridge, Bartley's Burger Cottage. (I had the Keith Lockhart, in case anyone is wondering!)

Yesterday afternoon, before my shift, the weather was nice enough that we went on a 10 mile bike ride. Even our 8 year old managed it! We did have a good halfway point destination - dim sum. I love the little carts! It was nice to get out and enjoy the good weather and get some exercise, and we rarely have this kind of family adventure.

Speaking of the 8 year old, I was perusing the local paper and saw a drawing printed there from OUR 8 year old! It was Thanksgiving themed and summed up the weekend nicely: "I am thankful for love."

Every day is Jam Day

One of the advantages of having a wide variety of jams in the house is that we get to have something different every day. The other day it was toast with cream cheese and the Carrot Cake jam. Today I had toast with chive/onion cream cheese and the Cranbanero. Our 3 year old likes Nutella with Blackberry jam, while my husband prefers peanut butter with some kind of berry jam. Today it happened to be Blackberry as well. The 7 year old is not as into jam as we are and opted for cinnamon toast instead.