A thankful month - Day 9

Today I am thankful for my in-laws - okay, i kid i kid :)   In all seriousness, today I am thankful for my wonderful sisters (my real blood sisters, Ill make it to the sorority later on this month).   We fought plenty as youngsters and even had hair pulling fights as teenagers, but as young adults we have all grown to become friends.    We still have our times where we would love to strangle each other, but I couldn't imagine life without them.    

I know I'm quite different from my sisters, both in looks (I had a former co-worker think that the professional picture I had on my desk was me and my sorority sisters when I said it was my sisters) and personality - but there is never any doubting that we all love each other and will be there for each other.   Even though I've been blogging for a year and a half, and sometimes can be great with my words, Im not so great with my words when it comes to matters so personal sometimes, so Im just gonna say: Aimee and Lauren - always know I love you very much and always will - no matter the distance or "issue" I will always be here for you!

A thankful month - Day 3 and 4

In continuing with my thankful month (since I didn't do it in November)

Day 3:  I am thankful for Charger - our first "child". 

They say a dog is a man's best friend - and man does Charger show it.   Charger is always there for a cuddle when I'm upset and really knows how to just be my side and try and cheer me up.    His energy and love is enough to make the world smile.   He especially cheers up a room when he (of 80lb weight) jumps up on my lap, lathers my face and head with kisses and rubs his entire body all over me - as some of you have borne witness to :)  Trust me - it's an interesting and entertaining scene.    Charger is a big part of our lives and I can't wait for him to get more used to the kids so I can see the joy that he will put on their face and they on his!

Day 4 - I'm thankful for Kalas, our second "child".   Although he was supposed to be a she, and he can be a big PITA, he is such a lover and cuddle-bug.   And I love it when after playing with each other, he and Charger cuddle up with each other!   He also loves the kids and can be commonly found lying next to them and watching over them.

Best Buds...

It's always Thanksgiving...

I started a post on Thanksgiving morning, and am just getting back to it now, so most of this is written as if its Thanksgiving - cause I didn't feel like going back and changing everything :)

Thanksgiving a year ago, I had no clue how much life would change - and how Thanksgiving week would unknowingly be the beginning of those changes (add 34 weeks - learning lesson: first two weeks of your pregnancy, you aren't actually pregnant, its from the end of your last period) .   We have been through many ups and downs, but still came out on top - and for that I'm very thankful.

Over the course of November, I have been watching different facebook friends start their month of thankfulness - and I feel like I missed out since I didn't pick up on it until about 10 days in - so since I waited til Thanksgiving to start, and here we are on December 2nd and Im finally getting back to the post, Im gonna turn December into my month of thankfulness, and today, Ill just include two days of thankfulness :)   Now lets see if I can get to the blog everyday to write this.   

Day 1 - I'm thankful for my mom and dad.   They are ALWAYS there whenever you need anything and did an amazing job raising 3 beautiful and smart daughters!   My mom and I have always been close, but over the past few years (and especially the past year or so), my mom has been my best friend and someone I can confide in and just get all my feelings out there with.   Thank you mom and dad for everything you do - I love you more than words can say!

Day 2 - I'm thankful for my husband, Adam.   We have had our ups and downs, but we always figure out a way to come out on top.    Thank you for putting up with all my quirks and compulsiveness and still loving me in the end.   If that's not a true test of endurance and love - I'm not sure what is :)

The Thanksgiving Feast - Dessert Edition

Yesterday I reviewed the recipes I made for the main meal, and today I wanted to share some of the desserts we had on the dessert buffet table.   I had my guests provide the desserts, but then as I was procrastinating on cleaning the house on Wednesday and couldn't start the turkey and sides until Thursday morning, I decided to make some sweet recipes that Ive had my eyes on.

A couple weeks ago, I gave some ideas of what to do with leftover halloween candy, and I couldn't wait to make to make the recipe for leftover halloween candy bark.   So while I was doing my food shopping for Thanksgiving, I decided to also buy the ingredients I didn't have to be able to make this.   Instead of using bittersweet chocolate, I had dark chocolate chips on hand, so I used those instead.   Other than that, I followed the recipe.   It was good, but the idea sounded better than the product for me - but others really like this one - which was evidenced not only by the response, but also by the minimal amount left.

That wasn't the only candy bark I made though.   I also saw this recipe for halloween candy corn bark on one of the blogs I follow, and since I LOVE LOVE LOVE candy corn and white chocolate, this was right up my alley.   I have to admit - I can't wait to make some more!   Its almost gone and it was really good.   My one sister found this to be too sweet, but she also admittedly has the same issue with white chocolate  which accounts for this.    With that being said, I love the level of sweetness, but it could definitely go for a little less oreos (maybe 10 instead of 14) and a little more pretzels (maybe 2 cups)

The last thing I made was this recipe for pumpkin cookies with a few substitutions.   My turkey day surely was not a kosher affair (although it was a kosher turkey) so there was no reason to use margarine in place of butter, as butter is yummier, bakes better and isn't full of the trans fats that margarine is.  Also, I don't like walnuts, so I substituted macadamia nuts as they are a great compliment to white chocolate.    There also was another change to the recipe that wasn't on purpose.   While making the cookies, I was grinding sea salt into the recipe for the small amount of salt when my salt grinder broke and the sea salt went pouring into the batter.   I was able to pick most of it out, but there were plenty of sea salt rocks that I did not get out, so there was more salt than should be and it was in the form of rocks and not ground.   Many of the cookies do not give that salty flavor, but the ones that do still taste good, but I also like salted caramel and such.

But even better than these recipes were some of the desserts my guests brought.   Hubby's Aunt and Uncle (FILs brother) made two AMAZINGLY DELICIOUS pies that she made last year as well.   From here on out - this is what they will always be bringing :)   If you want to try your hand at these recipes, you can find them on her blog here: Apple Pie and Pumpkin Pie.

Another of hubby's aunts (MILs sister) brought her yummy brownies.   I don't know this recipe - but she has been to three of our gatherings and brought these brownies each time - and I wouldn't have it any other way.   I am not a big chocolate lover - but these are nice and fudgy and perfect for chocolate lovers and chocolate not-so-lovers!

And for the healthier options, my mom brought some delicious fruit, which amazingly was the first thing taken by two of the kids (even before the "dinner").   To accompany the fruit, I made a healthy pumpkin dip - it tasted good, but was overlooked by the yummy, unhealthy stuff - which just means more for me when I try to get back on diet today (or more like Monday when I can "dump" all the unhealthy food on my co-workers).

A Thanksgiving Feast

For the second year in a row, Hubby and I hosted Thanksgiving at our house, with a lunchtime buffet, for our family (minus MIL and FIL) and in addition to having a great time with our family, we had some yummy (and not so yummy) food, and I wanted to share the recipes I made and the reviews.

Hubby carving his first turkey

The center of any Thanksgiving is (supposed to be) the turkey.   Although we hosted Thanksgiving last year, my parents graciously made the turkey last year, so this was my first time making the turkey and hubby's first time carving the turkey.

"Grilling" our turkey

For our turkey, I was searching different recipes, when I randomly found this one for BBQ Turkey.   I really don't know how I found it, but it really caught my eye and sounded really interesting, so as soon as I saw it I knew it was the one, so we grilled our turkey.   As you can see from the picture, although it cooked on the grill, we really didn't grill it, in all reality the grill was just an outdoor oven, as it was cooked in the roasting pan.

Some of the turkey plated - YUM!

As for the recipe, I did make some adjustments.   I couldn't in my right mind include 2 - TWO! - cups of butter in and on the turkey.   That's EIGHT (correction - this is FOUR, which is still a lot of) STICKS!    I think in the end, I used 1/2 stick to a stick, so about 1/8 cup to 1/4 cup - much more reasonable.    For the chicken soup base, I was going to use chicken stock, but all I had was chicken broth, so I used that.   For the onions and apples, I cut all that up, but I barely crammed 2/3 of it in, so I just threw the rest around the turkey to add to the gravy flavor.   I also only used about 1/2 of the bottle in the turkey, so I also put that in the roasting pan to keep everything moist and add flavor.   Then I just let it cook.     I set my alarm for 4 hours, but for some reason it never went off and 45 minutes after it was supposed to go off I realized I never took the turkey off.   The sugar in the (dry) wine caused some burning, but it didn't burn the turkey or anything - and it all turned out delicious!   I actually would probably overcook again to add that flavor to the turkey and the gravy.

Now, although the turkey is the center of Thanksgiving, everyone really fills their plates up with the sides (as I just ate a plate of leftover sides - YUMMY!), so that is really where I put a lot of my thought and time.   I had everything planned out for the recipes and then the night before when I started one of the sides that could be made early and reheated, I realized I didn't look at the recipes to see how many the recipe was able to serve - UH OH!!!  With that, I used what I had on hand to increase the serving sizes, all of which worked out fine but one of which could have been better, so without further ado - the sides:

The soup simmering...

Butternut Squash and Apple Soup - My sister is allergic to apples, so I substituted pears for apples.   That same sister is also a vegetarian, so I used veggie broth instead of chicken broth.   Other than that, I followed the recipe (btw - its missing the step where you are supposed to saute the leeks in step 2) and it was AWESOME!





Mashed Cauliflower - You can follow any recipe, but here is just a sample.   I made way more of this than needed - what can I say I have that jewish gene in me that makes me provide way more food than necessary.   For this, there really is no need for the reserved liquid, and you just need a tiny amount of oil for liquid and flavor.   I also then baked it to try and crisp the top and remove some of the extra liquid.   I thought this came out great and I got some good reviews.

Cranberry-Pear Sauce

Cranberry Pear Sauce - Typically we just have canned cranberry sauce, but I really wanted try to make one this year.   I was very pleased with this recipe.    Also, my brother-in-law made a gelatin cranberry sauce that was really good, so if I get that recipe, I will share.




Sweet Potato Casserole - This is one of the recipes that I realized I might not have enough, but I happened to have a can of Yams, so I used that to supplement the sweet potatoes.  I also didn't add the pecans because Im not a fan of them, and I also killed the health factor by doing a little more than scattering the marshmallows.   But with that, I also made a smaller one without the marshmallows for the vegetarian family members and those that don't want all the sweetness.   I think the fact that this was pretty much gone sums up its rating.

Spinach Gratin - I kinda screwed this one up - and I wasn't a fan of it, and I don't think others were either.   There were tons of leftovers, but I do have to say it was better the next day, but still not something I would make again.   Now with all that being said, I really didn't follow the recipe and did some other things to mess this up.

• I didn't think it was gonna be enough so I added an extra package of spinach and then guess-timated what I needed to add from the other ingredients without actually sitting down and doing the math
• I put the spinach in the fridge overnight to defrost, but forgot to take it out in the morning to fully defrost.   Because of that, the spinach was still pretty much frozen, and I decided to take my chances and rush it and didn't take the time to defrost it under hot water and squeeze out all the liquid.   I tried to soak some of it up with some extra flour
• I used 1% milk instead of 2% because I knew we would never drink the extra milk leftover if it was 2% (I usually buy skim milk)
• I put A LOT of parmesan cheese in there to again soak up the extra liquid - which it didn't do at all.
• I didn't bother to measure the cheese on top and just loaded it up

I might give the recipe another shot later on following it more accurately, maybe add a little more salt and nutmeg because it still needed some flavor - possibly add another spice, just not sure what.

Beer Cornbread - would go great with Chili

Beer Cornbread - I made this using yeungling.   It was good, but probably would have been really good with a lighter beer like a Hefeweizen (Blue Moon).








Check back tomorrow for some of the dessert recipes...