Thanksgiving 2014

Another Thanksgiving has come and gone, and another terrific meal was had in the company of family.

As much as I love to try different things, Thanksgiving is the one holiday that I don't want to mess with too much; everyone has an expectation of what should be served, and to not meet those expectations seems like a sacrilege I am not willing to undertake. So turkey and all the trimmings it is...

The meal, of tried and true standards, along with a new recipe of two, was as follows:

• A 24 pound fresh Butterball turkey, simply prepped and roasted in a Reynolds oven bag. I have gone to a lot more trouble with turkeys over the years, brining and basting and trying all sorts of different things, but you really can't beat the combination of ease and great moist turkey that you get doing it this way. Turkey. Bag. A little butter and oil. Salt and pepper. Sage and rosemary. Throw it in the oven at 350 degrees and forget it for 3 hours. With gravy of course.
• A spiral carved ham. Adding a little pork to the festivities never hurts. A good store bought one requiring no effort other than to pull off slices and put it on the platter.
• Stuffing - a new recipe this year; an Anne Burrell online recipe for cornbread and sausage stuffing. This was better than other cornbread stuffings I have tried. It had the usual homemade and dried out cornbread and sausage meat, but these with a combination of walnuts and dried cranberries made for an excellent dish. Between this and the Bobby Flay mushroom stuffing we did last year, there are now two stuffing recipes I would gladly make again.
• Mashed potatoes - The classic. Five pounds of yukon golds, milk, butter, salt and pepper. Grace would eat a huge bowl of this and nothing else for dinner if we would let her.
• Sweet potatoes and apples - Much like I need to try a new stuffing recipe every year, Amparo needs to tinker with with the obligatory sweet potato dish. This year was a great one; boiled and sliced sweet potatoes (like a gratin prep) and sliced apples in a sweet sauce, layered and baked. Yum. Better than mashed potatoes, whipped sweet potatoes and everything mashed...
• Cranberry sauce - Homemade from Jasper White's Cooking from New England. A simple cranberry, caramel, orange and ginger recipe that I have been making for close to 20 years now I guess. Grace loves this too.
• Corn.
• Green beans.
• Chardonnays, Rieslings and a Cotes du Rhone
• A bunch of different desserts courtesy of Brother Dave and his Darling Wife.

Thanksgiving, as intended, is a time to be thankful for the gifts we have, and I am luckier than most, and far more blessed than I deserve. It is a joy to be surrounded by family, eat some good food, watch a little football, and reflect on things. Thanksgiving no longer comes without a twinge of sadness, however, as it is the reminder that it has been 4 years since Dad passed. Four years ago today we laid him to rest. I remember, and I am thankful.

Spaghetti with Brussels Sprouts and Mushrooms

I have a few days off around the Thanksgiving holiday, and had the Food Channel on in the background while doing some things around the house. Something that caught my attention was Giada de Laurentiis making Spaghetti with Brussels Sprouts and Mushrooms. It looked interesting, easy and quick to make, and used an ingredient I am not all that familiar with. Brussels sprouts have a bad reputation with many people, but as I believe is often the case, that is because people are used to certain things being badly prepared. If you boiled these little guys and stuck them on a plate, they wouldn't be very good. In my limited past experience with them, I have found them to be similar in taste and texture to cabbage. Cabbage, to my mind, also isn't something inherently delicious, but can be if prepared properly.

With all that being said, and with the turkey, ham and starchy-side-dish fest on tap for tomorrow (and days after), a light pasta dish with veggies seemed like a good idea. I had no idea whether any of us (me included) would like it.

Brussels Sprouts, Mushrooms, Onions and Garlic

The recipe itself couldn't be much simpler. First, thinly sliced brussels sprouts, mushrooms, onions and garlic are sauteed for 6-8 minutes in olive oil (seasoned with salt and pepper).

Wilting the veggies

When the veggies have wilted down, the juice and zest of a lemon are added along with a cup of creme fraiche and some vegetable stock. With the local Whole Foods being picked over because of the holiday and no creme fraiche being available, I substituted a little sour cream and some heavy cream. This is simmered for just a few minutes to bring everything to temperature.

Add cream, lemon juice and veggie stock

Spaghetti is mixed into the sauce, and then plated with a healthy dose of grated/shredded parmesan or romano cheese. The recipe called for whole grain pasta. I hate whole grain pasta. Can't stand the stuff. I used regular old spaghetti.

Spaghetti with Brussels Sprouts and Mushrooms

As I expected, Grace wouldn't eat it (we had marinara waiting in the wings), but everyone else thought it was terrific. Julia claimed the leftovers for lunch tomorrow. So I guess that says something.

The sauce was light, the veggies were delicious, and the lemon particularly brought out the flavors. A whim of a recipe turns out to be a keeper. High marks for flavor, ease of making, and simple inexpensive ingredients.

But now...turkey and a plethora of starches.

Giada's Chicken Piccata

Grace and I made a Chicken Piccata in June of last year without a recipe after watching an episode of Diners, Drive Ins and Dives on the Food Network. It was good.

Last weekend, we wanted to make it again, but figured we'd find a real recipe. For anything that is an Italian staple like this, we go to our Giada de Laurentiis cookbooks as a first choice. This time we used the Chicken Piccata recipe on page 153 of her first book, Everyday Italian (Clarkson Potter, 2005).

The recipe couldn't be easier, and the result couldn't be better. The ingredient list is ridiculously short, and almost everything is a pantry staple. Chicken cutlets, salted and peppered, dredged in flour and sauteed in olive oil and butter. Sauce made from pan drippings, butter, chicken stock, capers and lemon juice. Flat leaf parsley to garnish.

Chicken Piccata (Giada de Laurentiis)

Ten minutes of prep, 20 minutes of cooking. Served with white rice, asparagus, and a nice unoaked California Chardonnay.

A 9.5 out of 10. Very high marks for low cost, minimal prep, ease of cooking, simple clean up, and most of all, great taste. Given that this is so easy as to be a good weeknight dish, and that the kids loved it, I can see this getting high rotation on the family meals menu.

Emeril's Chicken and Smoked Sausage Gumbo

I looooooooove cajun/creole food. Let's be perfectly clear about that. Unfortunately, to do this kind of cooking right, you need a lot of time, as these recipes are often long and slow-cooking endeavors. Fortunately for me, I had some time today around the house (while working on a remodel of daughter Julia's room) to do just that; a long slow-cooked cajun meal the correct way. The recipe used was Emeril Lagasse's Chicken and Smoked Sausage Gumbo. Yum. Since it is readily available on the Internet, I will walk you through it here...

First and foremost, this isn't  quick recipe; it states 30 minutes prep time and 3:30 total time, and it is all of that. First you brown smoked sausages in a dutch oven. Then you brown highly seasoned chicken (boneless thighs of course).

Sausage, Chicken, Onions and Peppers

When the sausage and chicken have both been browned (and removed from the pot), you take the next 20-25 minutes making a chocolate brown roux from the drippings, oil and flour. This is the key flavor step for the whole dish and cannot be skimped on.

Starting a chocolate brown roux

When the chocolate roux is done, you add onions, celery and peppers, and soften them. Then you add seasonings and the sausage back in.

Onions and peppers go into the roux

You add chicken stock, bring this to a boil, and then simmer it for an hour.

Ready for a long simmer

At the end of the first hour of simmering, you add the browned chicken to the pot and then simmer it for another hour and a half.

Chicken and smoked sausage gumbo

At the very end, you add in green onions, chopped parsley and a bunch of file powder (not easy to find, but one of the things that gives the dish its authentic gumbo flavor).

This should be served with, or over, white rice (what else?), but I always want to have a nice crusty bread on hand for sopping up the sauce.

This takes an afternoon of commitment to make, but it is not difficult by any means. I can't recommend it highly enough. I have been to New Orleans several times over the years, and this recipe tastes like New Orleans. Very highly recommended.

Chicken Cacciatore

We needed something relatively easy to put together for dinner last night, and we had chicken, peppers, onions and mushrooms that needed to be used, so that looked like Chicken Cacciatore to me. I'm not the biggest fan in the world of tomato sauce dishes in general, but this is a dish that the whole family likes.

When I have made this in the past, I have tended to wing it, with decent but not spectacular results. This time I thought maybe I should actually use a real recipe. I Googled Chicken Cacciatore, and the first link at the top of the list was a Giada De Laurentiis recipe from Food Network. We have made a few dozen Giada recipes and have never had a bad one yet, so this was an obvious choice.

The recipe was simple and straightforward, and the end result was better that I generally think Cacciatore is. I am sure this is because of the sauce. The sauce here was a combination of tomato, white wine and chicken broth, and was lighter than the intensely tomato sauce that I am more accustomed to.

Total prep time was 10-15 minutes, and cooking time was closer to an hour. This is longer than listed, but we made a larger batch, and most of that extra time was the initial browning of chicken in batches.

Which brings us to step 1 - dredging bone-in chicken pieces in flour and browning them in batches. Salt and pepper. Olive oil. Easy. Remove the browned chicken from the pan.

Dredged and browned chicken

Step 2 - Add chopped peppers, onions and garlic to the drippings in the pan. Add some white wine and reduce it a bit.

Onions, peppers and garlic

Step 3 - Add chopped tomatoes and juice, broth, capers and oregano. Bring to a boil. Return the chicken to the pot. Lower to a simmer.

Tomatoes, white wine and chicken broth

Half-cover and Simmer 20-30 minutes until the chicken is cooked through and the sauce has thickened somewhat.

Chicken Cacciatore

This was another good Giada recipe, and better by far than I have made when going without a recipe. The lighter and yet still richer sauce was the difference. The stock added some lightness and took away the overly tomato taste, and the white wine added some depth of flavor.

Yes, I did forget the mushrooms. I was making the recipe by the book, which doesn't call for them. After dinner, I sauteed the mushrooms that needed using, and added them to the leftovers in the pot. Even better...

Chicken Tikka Masala

The kids requested Chicken Tikka Masala for dinner tonight, so who am I to argue. Tikka Masala is our "go to" Indian dish, as it is richly flavored, but not overly spicy, so the kids love it. The recipe we use for this is on page 447 of More Best Recipes (The Editors of Cooks Illustrated, 2009). The New Best Recipe and More Best Recipes are two of our most used cookbooks, containing a wealth of bullet proof recipes on all sorts of classic dishes. Chicken Tikka Masala is a fragrantly spiced dish of chicken in a tomato cream sauce.

But before we get to the CTM, we need to make raita, because you can't have an Indian meal without raita (at least in our house you can't).

Raita prep (Chardonnay optional...)

Raita is the simplest side dish ever, and is especially good when paired with some of the very spicy Indian dishes, as the coolness of the yogurt and cucumber serves as the perfect counterbalance to the heat and spice of the entree. We use the raita recipe from Alford and Duguid's Mangoes and Curry Leaves; Culinary Travels through the Great Subcontinent (Artisan, 2005). This is one of my all-time favorite "travelogue cookbooks", but that is a story for another post.

Suffice it to say, you can make a great raita by simply peeling and dicing a seedless (English) cucumber, adding a sufficient amount of plain yogurt to give a consistency like pictured below, and then adding some salt and chopped cilantro. Make sure it is well chilled. Simple.

Raita

The Tikka Masala begins with dry rubbing the chicken in cumin, coriander, kosher salt and cayenne pepper, and setting it aside for an hour or so to marinate.

When you are ready to cook, a bunch of diced onions go into a pot to soften. After 8-10 minutes, garam masala (a store bought Indian spice blend), tomato paste, fresh grated ginger, garlic and a finely minced jalapeno or two are added.

Onions, spices and tomato paste

After the onion-tomato-spice paste has cooked for a few minutes, crushed tomatoes are added along with some sugar and salt to make a nice fragrant tomato sauce. This simmers for about 15 minutes.

Crushed tomatoes added to spice paste

While the tomato sauce is simmering, the dry rubbed chicken is dredged in a yogurt, garlic, ginger, and oil mixture and then grilled until mostly cooked. It is then set aside to rest while the sauce finishes.

Grilled dry-rubbed and yogurt-coated chicken

After the tomato sauce has simmered for a while, a bunch of heavy cream is added, and the sauce is simmered to bring it to heat.

Tomato sauce with heavy cream added

The cooked chicken (grilled or broiled) is chunked up and added into the sauce. Once everybody is in the pool, simmer for 5 minutes or so just to blend the flavors and make sure everything is nice and hot.

Chicken Tikka Masala

Easy. A little bit fiddly, but not difficult. Flavorful. Pretty inexpensive. A winner all around.

Jacques Pepin's Sweet and Sour Steak Sauce

I have tremendous respect for Jacques Pepin, and have many of his cookbooks. Over the weekend, I made filet mignon (a treat that Grace especially loves - "soft steak" as she calls it). Anytime I make a nice elegant steak like this (as opposed to a dry rubbed Fred Flintstone brontosaurus steak on the grill), there is only one sauce the family wants - Jacques' sweet and sour sauce.

The recipe is a very simple one from Jacques Pepin's Table (KQED Books, 1991, page 289), and is from a recipe called Venison Steaks in Sweet-Sour Sauce. I don't make it with venison, obviously, but it is the perfectly complement to virtually any red meat.

For the indoor (non-grill) version of this, I sear both sides of the steaks in a large skillet, and then put the steaks in a different skillet to finish in the oven (a nice medium rare of course). While the steaks are finishing, a sliced shallot or two are put into the original pan with the drippings, and stirred for half a minute or so. Two tablespoons of red wine vinegar are added to deglaze the pan. This is cooked over high heat until most of the liquid is gone. To this is added a mixture of 1 tablespoon of black current jelly, 1 tablespoon of ketchup, 2 teaspoons soy sauce and 1/4 cup cold water. This is stirred around and brought to a boil (just a minute or two to heat and thicken), then strained into a bowl to remove the solids. Super easy and made entirely from pantry ingredients.

Part of an onion can be substituted for the shallots if necessary, and when we don't have black current jelly (which we usually keep in the fridge just for this), you can use blackberry, blueberry or raspberry instead. All will be a little different in character, but will give the sweet counterpoint to the salty soy and the tangy vinegar.

Make twice as much as listed above. You'll want it...