Thanksgiving 2024 - Sweet Potatoes, Fruit Salad, and Dinner On the Table

 Thursday,  November 28, 2024

I got the sweet potatoes ready while the turkey was in the oven. I halved the recipe on the can.  

Ingredients: 1 29 oz can of sweet potatoes; 1 egg; 1/4 cup milk; 3/4 cups brown sugar; 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract;  1/2 teaspoon salt; 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon. 

Directions: Heat oven to 375 degrees; spray 9x9 in baking pan with Pam; mix ingredients in large bowl; add marshmallows on top. just before baking; bake 30-35 minutes and then take out of oven and let rest for 10 minutes

Mom arrived around 2:00 and Dale got the marshmallows on the sweet potatoes while I entertained her.  He got the sweet potatoes in the oven by 2:10 so they could be out by 2:45 and rest for 10 minutes. 

At 2:30 I got the fruit salad together. Easy to make. Two cans of mixed fruit with whipped cream. Dale got gravy ready using the giblets I cut up. He also got the stuffing ready.

Dinner was on the table by about 3:10 and it was delicious.

Dale seems to think I do a great job carving the turkey. I feel like I'm hacking away with an ax to the carcass but I guess I do okay since there's barely any meat on it when I'm finished. There's gotta be a youTube video out there that shows the most efficient and perfect way to cut it up. Maybe I'll look for that sometime. 

Mom brought over a pumpkin pie that some friends from church had made. She said they usually make about 100 pies every year to sell to people for Thanksgiving. It was delicious and one of the better pumpkin pies I've ever had. That's sayin' something cuz I LOVE pumpkin pie. 

She also brought over some port wine. Dale didn't think he'd ever had any before. I poured some for us after the pie. Mom and Dale didn't like it. They said the alcohol level was too hight (turned out it was 20%) and they just didn't like the taste. I thought it was fine but what do I know. 

Can't believe another Thanksgiving has come and gone.

Dining In: A Golden Hour

Sunday, February 28, 2021

I came across an old recipe that Brenda gave us about 6 years ago when we were visiting them in Grand Junction. 

We haven't made this in a number of years so it was a welcome rediscovery when I found it this morning as we've been in something of a rut with our current rotation of meals. It turned out great. The only thing I would change would be to add an extra cup of cheddar cheese. 

We watched The Days of Wine and Roses starring Jack Lemmon, Lee Remick, and Jack Klugman this afternoon just prior to cocktail hour.

I did a search on Apple Music for the theme song to the movie and came up with an Andy Williams version. We listened to the whole album during cocktail hour. 

Thanksgiving 2020 - Sweet Potato Casserole

Thursday, November 26, 2020

I used Princella canned sweet potatoes for the sweet potato casserole and referred to their website for a recipe. 

I halved the recipe but accidentally put two eggs in instead of one. I thought I had vanilla but didn't so I used falernum instead. I combined steps 2 and 3 and didn't use pecans. Next time I need to drain the canned sweet potatoes just a little more. It wasn't all that noticeable, but still. 

Thanksgiving Day 2020 - Cranberries

Thursday, November 26, 2020

We got the cranberries started first. 

12 oz. cranberries

3/4 cup water

1/2 cup sugar

Dale put the sugar and water in a sauce pan and dissolved the sugar by stirring it over medium heat (5.0 on our stove). He then added the cranberries and stirred them occasionally once they started popping, keeping them at medium. He took them off the heat after 10-15 minutes. 

Christmas Day - Beef Bourginoine

Monday, December 25, 2017

Dale decided he wanted to make Julia Child's beef bourginoine recipe for Christmas dinner. I helped and was more involved in the production I think since the first time we made it years ago.

To start, my job was to slice the onion.

Dale got the meat dried off with paper towels.

I also took care of getting the carrots sliced. The recipe calls for one carrot. We had baby carrots so I used about 7 of them and sliced them into quarter rounds.

Dale got the stove set up.

I cut six (they're doubled up in the photo) good sized slices of bacon into thirds.

Dale had the brilliant idea of each of us frying the  bacon off at the same time. I used the skillet and he used the casserole. 

Then we did the same thing with the meat, searing it on all sides. I'm surprised one of us hadn't thought of this before since it made it go twice as fast.

We then fried the vegetables and then added the bacon and the beef and put it in the oven for about 4 minutes, took it out and tossed it, and then put it back in for 4 more minutes.

When it came back out we added garlic,

thyme,

the wine,

chicken stock,

and about a tablespoon+ of tomato paste,

brought it to a simmer and then put it in the oven for about 2 and a 1/2 hours.

As it got closer to the time to take it out, Dale fried off the mushrooms.

When it came out of the oven,

we drained off the broth,

put what was left back in the casserole,

and added the fried off mushrooms to the casserole.

Dale needed to boil down the approximately 3 and a 1/2 cups of broth we had down to 2 and a 1/2 cups. He said it probably started out as 5 and a 1/2 cups when we put  the whole casserole in the oven and reduced to  the 3 and a 1/2 we had when we took it out.

After the broth was reduced, Dale skimmed off the fat although there wasn't much since the beef was pretty lean to begin with. We added the broth back to the casserole and waited for it to rest a bit. The smell was insanely divine.

Mom came over for Christmas dinner. She got here at 3:00 p.m. and we watched The Bishop's Wife serving appetizers of smoked gouda, pears, and crackers. 

We ate around 5 p.m. with the beef over egg noodles. Dale made brussels sprouts in the oven. Pumpkin pie for dessert.

Thanksgiving Morning 2014 - Pumpkin Pie Recipe Part 2

I used the same recipe as last year from allrecipes.com:

"Ingredients

2 cups mashed, cooked pumpkin
1 (12 fluid ounce) can evaporated milk
2 eggs, beaten
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F

In a large bowl with mixer speed on medium, beat pumpkin with evaporated milk, eggs, brown sugar, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and salt. Mix well. Pour into a prepared crust. Bake 40 minutes or until when a knife is inserted 1 inch from the edge comes out clean."

Note: I left it in the oven 10 minutes longer than stated in the recipe.

Thanksgiving Eve - Pumpkin Pie Recipe Part 1

I decided to make my own pumpkin puree again this year. 

Here's the first part of the directions for preparing the pumpkin puree [with a slight modification of my own] from allrecipes.com:

"Use 1 1/2 pound of skin-on [this year I took the skin off], raw pumpkin to yield 2 cups of mashed. Halve pumpkin and scoop out seeds and stringy portions. Cut pumpkin into chunks. In saucepan over medium heat, in 1 inch of boiling water heat the pumpkin to a boil. Reduce heat to low, cover and simmer for 30 minutes or until tender. Drain, cool and remove the peel. Return pumpkin to the saucepan and mash with a potato masher."

Note: I used a smaller pie pumpkin this year than last and it didn't seem to take as long in the pot.  Maybe it was because I peeled the skin off before boiling. I filled the pot to cover the pumpkin by just a little bit, maybe a half inch. It only took about 15-20 minutes before the chunks were tender enough. 

Top left: The pumpkin. It was a cute one.

Top middle: Halved

Top right: Chunked with skin off.

Middle left: Boiling

Middle: Beginning

Middle right: Draining in a colander.

Bottom left and middle: Mash

Bottom right: Just a little more than enough to store in the fridge until tomorrow morning when I assemble and bake the pie.

Christmas Season 2013/2014 - Holiday Brunch 1

We hosted our holiday brunch today. I made a pistachio rum cake pudding and Dale made an egg-bake. The rum cake is was quite easy and fun to make. The recipe comes from family friend Judy and is as follows:

Pistachio Rum Cake Pudding

1 package pistachio pudding mix

1 package yellow cake mix

1/2 cup light rum

1/2 cup water

1/2 cup oil

4 eggs

Beat all ingredients together at medium speed for 2 minutes. Bake in a Bundt pan at 325 degrees for 55-60 minutes.

Rum Cake Glaze

3/4 cups granulated sugar

1/2 stick butter

1/4 cup light rum

1/4 cup water

During last 10 minutes of baking, combine glaze ingredients in a pan. Boil 2-3 minutes [I stirred it the whole time]. Reduce heat [I continued to stir and removed from burner a couple of minutes before removing the cake from the oven]. After removing cake from oven, poke holes in the bottom with a knife to allow for seepage and then pour glaze over it while still in pan. Remove cake in 45 minutes from the pan.

Pumpkin Bread Recipe

Again the pumpkin bread I made this past weekend was quite divine. The recipe came with the Nordic Ware pan I purchased. Here it is:

Pumpkin Bread
1 (16 oz.) can pumpkin
1 3/4 cups sugar (I used baker's sugar)
2/3 cup vegetable oil (I used canola)
1 tsp vanilla
4 eggs
3 cups flour
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/8 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup raisins or dried cranberries (I did not use either)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and flour pan (I used Pam); set aside. In large bowl, combine pumpkin, sugar, oil, vanilla and eggs; blend well. Stir in remaining ingredients, except raisins. Mix until blended. Stir in raisins. Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake 65 - 75 minutes, until toothpick inserted comes out clean. Cool in pan 10 minutes; remove from pan and cool completely.

Last Night's Dinner - Baked Rigatoni

Dale and I were in great need of comfort food last night.  We turned to our old standby of baked rigatoni.  Dale had chocolate cake for dessert with a chocolate ganache frosting.  I had chocolate with a sea salt and caramel frosting.  I never would have thought salty frosting would work. This worked.

Quiche Part 2

The quiche recipe we use is Mom's. Here it is written in her own handwriting. We've used this recipe for a quite a few years.