Thanksgiving Adventures!
The folks and I decided that we had so much fun last year at Amy's for thanksgiving, we'd ask if she'd have us back again this year. She (foolishly?) said yes, so we're back in Minnesota again.
Amy decided that we'd have roast chicken this year instead of roast turkey, which was just fine with me. Turkey is OK, but chicken is very yummy. Especially the dark meat. So we developed a plan of attack for the meal. Cheeseball made and pies baked on Wednesday night, everything else on Thursday morning.
The cheeseball went smoothly (my usual "Thanksgiving Cheeseball") but Amy had some issues with the pie crust. They were using white whole wheat flour and it didn't work as well with Rachel's mom's pie crust recipe as regular white flour did. And then Amy discovered that her sweet potatoes had some bad spots she'd not planned on. Still, by the time we headed for bed, her pie and the apple pie that Rachel had made both looked wonderful. Pre-prep was done. On to Thursday!
This morning we lazed about some before I started on the rolls. I found a nice recipe from King Arthur Flour's website and decided to give it a try. Once the dough was proofing, I turned on the oven to a low heat to get things started.
Amy started by chopping up the root vegetables for roasting (with Rachel cleaning) and I got the potatoes cut for future mashed potatoes. Then mom and I cut up the ingredients for a Pear Cranberry Chutney recipe she'd gotten from WeightWatchers. Since Cilantro tastes of soap to me, we substituted parsley for it. The recipe was claimed to go well with roast chicken. (They were right!)
Amy then started prepping the chicken - she'd found a nice recipe online (I think this was it) that looked pretty easy and that she had ingredients for. She discovered that the chicken wasn't as thawed as it originally looked, but she took care of that hurdle only to discover a bigger hurdle - the oven hadn't gotten any warmer than 150F since we first turned it on. The root vegetables weren't getting roasted and the chicken wasn't going to get so either. Eep!
Dad checked in the basement to see if any of the circuit breakers had flipped (Amy has an electric oven) but flipping them off & on did nothing for the oven. The burners worked just fine. Thankfully, Rachel's apartment isn't too far away, so she and I bundled up the rolls, chicken, and root veg for a trip over to her place. There, we baked everything and played with Charlotte (her kitty) and our phones (we both have Galaxy SIIIs).
The chicken reached it's proper temp with 4 minutes to go on the timer, so we bundled everything back up and returned to the folks and Amy. Turns out the chicken was dripping red (gah - the recipe LIED) so some zapping in the microwave took care of the final cooking. While Rachel and I were baking, Amy was making the rest of the food. She had brussel sprouts going in one skillet and kale in another. And I got to mash the potatoes when I got back. Then Amy made a gravy (with mom's help) of the drippings from the chicken.
Lunch was late (or supper was early) but it was simply wonderful. Despite the setbacks, the food was delicious. The rolls were declared "even better that my mom's" by someone whose identity I will protect, just in case... ;-) So I think we'll be keeping that recipe around for the future.
I am thankful for so much more than I can type, but for now I'll just say that I'm thankful for the family I was born into and the friends that I have chosen in my life. We rock!
Amy decided that we'd have roast chicken this year instead of roast turkey, which was just fine with me. Turkey is OK, but chicken is very yummy. Especially the dark meat. So we developed a plan of attack for the meal. Cheeseball made and pies baked on Wednesday night, everything else on Thursday morning.
The cheeseball went smoothly (my usual "Thanksgiving Cheeseball") but Amy had some issues with the pie crust. They were using white whole wheat flour and it didn't work as well with Rachel's mom's pie crust recipe as regular white flour did. And then Amy discovered that her sweet potatoes had some bad spots she'd not planned on. Still, by the time we headed for bed, her pie and the apple pie that Rachel had made both looked wonderful. Pre-prep was done. On to Thursday!
This morning we lazed about some before I started on the rolls. I found a nice recipe from King Arthur Flour's website and decided to give it a try. Once the dough was proofing, I turned on the oven to a low heat to get things started.
Amy started by chopping up the root vegetables for roasting (with Rachel cleaning) and I got the potatoes cut for future mashed potatoes. Then mom and I cut up the ingredients for a Pear Cranberry Chutney recipe she'd gotten from WeightWatchers. Since Cilantro tastes of soap to me, we substituted parsley for it. The recipe was claimed to go well with roast chicken. (They were right!)
Amy then started prepping the chicken - she'd found a nice recipe online (I think this was it) that looked pretty easy and that she had ingredients for. She discovered that the chicken wasn't as thawed as it originally looked, but she took care of that hurdle only to discover a bigger hurdle - the oven hadn't gotten any warmer than 150F since we first turned it on. The root vegetables weren't getting roasted and the chicken wasn't going to get so either. Eep!
Dad checked in the basement to see if any of the circuit breakers had flipped (Amy has an electric oven) but flipping them off & on did nothing for the oven. The burners worked just fine. Thankfully, Rachel's apartment isn't too far away, so she and I bundled up the rolls, chicken, and root veg for a trip over to her place. There, we baked everything and played with Charlotte (her kitty) and our phones (we both have Galaxy SIIIs).
The chicken reached it's proper temp with 4 minutes to go on the timer, so we bundled everything back up and returned to the folks and Amy. Turns out the chicken was dripping red (gah - the recipe LIED) so some zapping in the microwave took care of the final cooking. While Rachel and I were baking, Amy was making the rest of the food. She had brussel sprouts going in one skillet and kale in another. And I got to mash the potatoes when I got back. Then Amy made a gravy (with mom's help) of the drippings from the chicken.
Lunch was late (or supper was early) but it was simply wonderful. Despite the setbacks, the food was delicious. The rolls were declared "even better that my mom's" by someone whose identity I will protect, just in case... ;-) So I think we'll be keeping that recipe around for the future.
I am thankful for so much more than I can type, but for now I'll just say that I'm thankful for the family I was born into and the friends that I have chosen in my life. We rock!