Thursday, November 24, 2005

Happy Thanksgiving

Thank You for Being Such a Great Audience.

photograph picture of some blueberries from Rainbow Orchards at the Alemany farmers market in San FranciscoI am somewhat culturally detatched from Thanksgiving and find it difficult to have any true depth of feeling about it, because of my lack of personal history and experience with it. I like to learn about it though, and this year we are lucky enough to have been invited to spend it with some American friends and their family. It's my job to take some dessert, I hope my choice will be suitable enough for the occasion. I am sorry, but I just can't bring myself to make pumpkin pie.

Turkey Tip of the Day
If you have a frozen turkey, don't forget to leave enough time for it to defrost slowly. Allow 24 hours of defrost time per 5lbs of meat. That means, if you have a 20lb turkey, you need to start defrosting it no less than 4 days in advance. If you forget, then just be thankful for the Fresh fish counter at Wholefoods.


Finally, I wanted to echo the words of Kalyn, who in response to a lovely message from Shauna, on Food Blog S'cool, summed up my sentiments, on this day, about the food blogging community. She wrote: "I am thankful to be prosperous enough to be able to participate in such a fun hobby, and to have found so many like-minded people to share it with." Hear, hear, Kalyn!



Archive Alert! On Thanksgiving Day in 2004, Fred and I ate our dinner at Osteria del Circo in the Bellagio. Yes! We were in Vegas, baby!

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Happy Thanksgiving

8:43 AM  

16 Comments:

  • At 24/11/05 09:28, Blogger Nice Guy said…

    Ack, we are still defrosting our turkey!

    http://happy.thanksgiving.customsigngenerator.com

     

  • At 24/11/05 11:59, Blogger Kalyn Denny said…

    Hey, thanks for mentioning me. We are all really so lucky aren't we? Hope you have a great thanksgiving. I'm with you, pumpkin pie is highly overrated. Of all the "Thanksgiving" foods, my favorite would be stuffing. And of course, banana cream pie!

     

  • At 24/11/05 13:00, Blogger Sam said…

    oh shit - should I have made banana cream pie? I have no idea of the thanksgiving protocol - here i am trying to put together a toffee apple pie & a maple pecan pie.
    I am not sure about the latter. The recipe didn't say whether the breadcrumbs should have been dry or fresh. I used dry, now I suspect fresh may have been better. I hope it is going to be ok.
    I am about to whip a batch of cookies in case everything else is a total disaster!

    (I made a couple of mini pies so I can test them [and perhaps, erhhm, photograph them;) )before taking their bigger brothers to our friends' house this afternoon)

    nice smells coming from the oven at least.

     

  • At 24/11/05 14:50, Blogger Farmgirl Susan said…

    Well, I was just going to say "Thank you for being such a great blogger" and leave it at that, but then I read your comment.

    Okay:
    1. I think you are safe without the banana cream pie. I am a fifth-generation California girl and have never ever had or heard of banana cream pie on Thanksgiving. Assume it is a regional thing, so you should be fine there in CA. (Unless of course your hosts are from Utah like Kalyn, and then you're in trouble. I don't even think you can get a banana cream pie at Whole Foods.)

    2. Um, should any kind of bread crumbs really be in a pie?

    3. That's an awful lot of dessert you're making. I will gladly take the toffee apple pie off your hands. (Or, barring that, the recipe please? : )

    4. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner (whether you want to celebrate it or not : )

     

  • At 24/11/05 16:21, Blogger Ced said…

    I'd say pecan pie -as you're making- or pumpkin pie would be the traditional thxgiving pies. But banana cream pie sure is good any time of the year.

    Happy Thanksgiving!

     

  • At 24/11/05 20:03, Blogger Rose said…

    Wow! I applaud you're ability to do all that dessert making in ONE day (or two). I'd be puckered out after making the first pie.

    I third that comment on thanksgiving. I'm happy everyday reading all this wonderful commentary on one of my favorite interests and able to share my them with like minded others.

     

  • At 25/11/05 03:10, Blogger Monkey Gland said…

    Funny thing is, I was in Vegas last thanksgiving...

    I was in the poker room at the Luxor all day but I was there and celebrating in my own way..."I give thanks for this full house, kings full of fives!"

     

  • At 25/11/05 09:06, Blogger Sam said…

    Farmgirl -
    1) my choices seemed to go down ok. There were people from all over the country there.

    2)think outside the box, - yes they should be in a pie. It turned out great. The british have a great tradition of desserts using bread:
    Bread & Butter Pudding
    Summer Pudding
    Treacle Tart
    Bread Pudding (aka Chester Cake)

    I defy you to tell me any of these are not good! (ok, ok I know I personally dont like bread & butter pud or chester cake, but that's because of the icky raisins, not the bread element)

    3) Yes I made too much. I didnt even tell you about the cookies. You could have warned me sooner, huh! I am not sure I can publish the recipes becaue they belong to Jamie Oliver, but I can give you hints on how to make them that you will be able to follow easily. It's not rocket science! Check back on Monday.

    Ced - thanks - I think they worked perfectly.

    Rose - I made one of the pastries the night before and I took several hours, it was all very leisurely and non-stressful - I didnt have anything else to do!

    MG - no way! We were at the Palms. We didn't manage to make our money last us all day in any poker room.
    (so we went indoor sky diving instead)

     

  • At 25/11/05 10:29, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    Dear Sam,
    just like Farmgirl said, thank you for being such a great inspiration :) We'll be having our Thanksgiving dinner today, as most of our American friends have been out of town on the actual Thanksgiving day... And I, too, was tasked to prepare some desserts, including some variations of pecan pies as well... Toffee apple pie sounds like a divine idea, wanna share some more details about its toffee part?

     

  • At 25/11/05 10:55, Blogger Sam said…

    check back on Monday when all will be revealed. I preferred the pecan maple, but everyone else seemed to love the toffee apple more. I found it a bit rich and sickly but it didn't stop me from eating it for breakfast!

     

  • At 25/11/05 10:57, Blogger Sam said…

    oh - and I almost forgot - and PS thank YOU too, for sharing your most amazing and beautful of blogs!

     

  • At 25/11/05 11:00, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    Sam -- I am confused by the breadcrumbs in your pie. I make pecan pie every year; this year I did a maple version (hoping my mother and grandmothers would not hurl lightning bolts at me for breaking the Karo tradition). The resulting pie was wonderful, with or without crumbs. Please explain how and where they are included in your recipe!

     

  • At 25/11/05 11:50, Blogger Sam said…

    Hi Kudzu - I will reveal all when the post is scheduled on monday.
    In the meantime I will just say it was a jamie oliver recipe based on an English treacle tart but made more North American by the inclusion of pecans and maple instead of treacle.
    so its not really a "pecan pie", its a "treacle tart". And treacke tarts are made with breadcrumbs.

     

  • At 25/11/05 11:52, Blogger Sam said…

    if you can't wait til Monday you can check out the recipe here

     

  • At 25/11/05 18:03, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    Thanks, Sam. Now the inclusion of crumbs makes much more sense. Will have to try Jamie's recipe, but only after the overconsumption of Thanksgiving sweets loses its effect.

     

  • At 25/11/05 21:47, Blogger Shauna said…

    Sam: I was away for a couple of days, engorging myself on sweets and starches. (And skipping the turkey, since my loving brother actually put flour on it before he put it in the baking bag. Sheesh. I'll put more about this in my post later.) So I just saw that you mentioned me. Thanks, my dear. Leaving that message at FBS was one of my truest acts of gratitude. I just can't believe the beauty and generosity of this food blogging community. Thanks for being an inspiration.

     

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