Post-Thanksgiving Day Soup

Last night, I caught Bobby Flay preparing the perfect chicken stock on TV. He emphasized that the poultry must be roasted first, bones, skin and all. Good thing we did all that on Thanksgiving with the 18-lb. turkey.

Making turkey soup from scratch is tedious, sometimes dangerous work. First you have to break apart the turkey carcass. Carcass contains lots of sharp ends from the broken bones. Plus, try doing it with greasy, turkey fat hands and a dull knife, like the idiot I am. No worries, I lived. After stuffing the biggest stock pot I had with the broken pieces of carcass, I threw in coarsely cut-up pieces of carrots (whaddya know, we had even more when Eddie thought we were out!), celery, onion, garlic, parsley (Bobby Flay says use the stems!) and thyme sprigs, peppercorns, salt, a bay leaf, basil, blah blah. You know the drill. Add cold water (Bobby Flay says cold water heats faster than hot water but he didn't know why) brimming to the top, put on stovetop, and heat on high until it reaches a gentle boil, then turn it down low to simmer.

Simmer for at least four hours (again, Bobby Flay's orders). I did mine for five, while I worked on my soap columns and flirted with an old high school friend on Facebook (yeah, I'm a slut, but I'm a middle-aged slut).

Don't be like me and start this shit at 6 p.m. Start early, like, in the morning. Because it's 2:36 a.m., and I'm still finishing the soup by cooking off the homemade noodles (from the For the Love of Cooking blog), which had to dry after being rolled out and cut, for an hour.

I've made the old-fashioned chicken noodle soup from that For the Love of... blog before, several months ago, after I got real sick. But I didn't do so well with the noodles. I didn't make sure I had enough flour to milk ratio before carefully rolling out the dough as evenly and as thinly as I could. This time, I did better. I also remembered to cut the long lengths of noodles in half.

A tedious step in the making of turkey soup comes when you have to pour the hot soup (it's hot because I started late and didn't have time to cool the broth) over a large colander sitting over a large bowl or pot. I saw a few gallons spraying out sideways onto the stove and floor (Aieee!), sprayed bits and pieces of turkey meat on myself, and had a little trouble like I always do finding the right combo of bowl to colander to 2nd pot, to handle the sorting through of the turkey meat and the throwaway bones, sinew, giblets, sprigs, peppercorns. I swear this process took the longest time.

But it's done and I'm gonna eat the ever-loving shit out of this cauldron of turkey soup. I'm also gonna share some with my friends, the ones who weren't lucky enough to have slaved over a kitchen stove for Tday.

Happy Tasty Thanksgiving

I know I sound catty and conceited, but it's the God's honest truth: We make a better Thanksgiving meal than you. Or you and you. My husband Ed and I always thought it'd be perfect to bring our own Thanksgiving meal, complete with sides, to someone else's party, and have them clean up afterward. Maybe they can provide dessert.

We've been at family and friends' Thanksgivings, and while we were grateful to be included, we missed our home cooking. I've had dry, leathery turkey, flavorless green bean casserole and gravy, and inedible gooey stuffing. Once, my mom invited me to her boyfriend's aunt's house in Hawaii for Christmas and all she served as a main course was ham. I hate ham. I'd rather eat geoduck raw washed down with natto than have ham.

The good news this year is I had the presence of mind to invite my friend Christina and her family over for Thanksgiving. Christina being the gem that she is, brought three desserts (a Costco pumpkin cheesecake, her own homemade apple and cranberry pie and another homemade lemon tart), and her son Kris, who started culinary school, brought a potato gratin he whipped up from a base recipe from his school.

We never made it to the cheesecake, we were so stuffed, but I get to have lemon tart later on tonight as my midnight snack. Her apple-cranberry pie was delicious with vanilla ice cream. My favorite side dish wasn't even anything me or Eddie made, it was her son's potato gratin, which smelled like the best French onion soup. On my second helping, I piled way too much of it on my plate. But that's what midnight snacking's for. Tomorrow, I have to be good. Today, I'm bad, I'm very very bad. Wear the loose-fitting sweats, eat like a pig, like the rest of America, and forget the treadmill.

Lucky for me, I have a husband who loves to take care of most of the Thanksgiving meal. I only had to do the stuffing, green bean casserole (which a monkey could do in his sleep), and take care of our finicky eater son with his corn and his rolls (or croissants, in our case, thanks to Christina). While I slept in, blissfully, he was downstairs early in the morning preparing the 18-pound turkey, then later, as I rolled out of bed and farted around online, he was busy cleaning up. Last night we prepared most of the sides -- the creamed spinach, the mashed potatoes, the stuffing -- so he could concentrate mostly on the turkey and the gravy.

We decided to apply some turkey tips we learned from the Food Network. More than one cooking show celeb advised to put some chicken stock or white wine in the bottom of the roasting pan, stuff the cavity of the turkey with cut-up onion and garlic, and rub flavorings under the skin. We were impressed with the results. The turkey was juicy throughout. Ed never had to foil it halfway to prevent burning, because the bird never burned. It had to be the liquid flavoring the bottom.

My stuffing was a hit. I made it from Ina Garten's herb and apple stuffing recipe. Eddie wanted my dad's usual heavy, intense, moist bread stuffing, but with all the heavy, dense sides like the mashed potatoes and creamed spinach, I wanted to lighten my stuffing up. Apples and cranberries really lighten it up. I also like the meaty balance from the Italian sausages. Whether he likes it or not (he did like it in the end), we're going with this recipe from now on.

We also repeated a cranberry sauce we'd had at a friends' house two years ago. It's from Trader Joe's. Eddie just added Mandarin oranges to it. It's necessary to balance off all that rich food.

Having friends over for Thanksgiving is and was far better than just the three of us. We felt normal. Time flew by. We relaxed. We ate. We laughed. We didn't have to deal with any extraneous assholes. We didn't have four weeks of leftovers, because our friends took away more than half at our request. We didn't have to make everything. And these friends are fantastic cooks.

I'm still in love with the potato gratin Christina's son made. Got the recipe:

Yukon Gold potatoes (8 - 10)
1 1/2 pints heavy whipping cream
8 ounces Gruyere cheese
3 large cloves garlic - minced
salt & pepper

Butter a casserole dish. Peel the potatoes and cut them thin like potato chips. Put one layer of them on the bottom of the dish, overlapping them slightly. Pour on the cream, but don't cover the potatoes. Sprinkle with cheese. Salt & pepper.
Do this until the potatoes, cream and cheese are gone - finishing with the cheese all over the top. Bake at 375 (convection) for about an hour until the cheese is really bubbly and the top browns.

I put a piece of foil over the top when I saw it getting too brown.

Happy Thanksgiving. Here's hoping you all ate until you almost puked, then ATE SOME MORE. It's the American way.

My Beef Stew Birthday

I guess it was around my husband's birthday (September) that I thought of my own in November and what I'd like to do when I turned ... {gulp} 45. It wasn't too much later when the thought of a nice hot heaping bowl of beef stew, ladled over buttered white bread -- just like my Irish-American, Catholic dad used to make -- came into my head. At first, I wanted beef stew, just me and my husband, with our son eating the bread, he's such a bread boy.

Then, I thought of the women in my life who've helped me through some difficult times and/or who've helped change me for the better. I wanted them there to share the beef stew love; besides, I can't eat all this stew by myself, I'm on a diet every day other than my birthday, right?

So, I sent out an evite to my girlfriends, some whom I haven't physically hung around with in ages, some I disparaged because of my own stupid shit and came around later when I grew the fuck up. Bev, Carol, Christina, Beth, Sheila, ali-Ca, Barb. These are women I sensed or outright knew wouldn't give a shit whether I ate stew in my sweats or half naked with my hair in a disarray, they loved me anyway, and they've seen me at my worst. These are the special women who would appreciate a good, hearty bowl of beef stew and not expect me to entertain them up on the big glamorous stage of cocktail chatter. And they know I suck at that bullshit anyway.

Ed and I got into a few testy arguments over the making of beef stew. I kept worrying that he wasn't up to the task, mostly because he'd get this scared look on his face when thinking out loud about the logistics of which recipe and going on about how he only made it once and the meat smelled burnt at the end. A week ago, he started up again, wondering aloud if maybe he should make the beef stew a day ahead. I asked him for the 100th time if he was sure he wanted to make this beef stew, and he blew up at me, "Why do you keep asking me that?!" "Maybe because you keep indicating that you aren't sure you can!" I fired back.

After that blow-up, I left it alone. Ed researched some beef stew recipes online and decided on using Ina Garten's version as the base. He left out sun-dried tomatoes, any kind of tomato, added just a tinge of red wine, and snuck some very macerated celery stalks in there, knowing how much I loathe celery in my stew. He also didn't flour the beef cubes, like before, opting to thicken the sauce later.

After cutting the beef, potatoes, carrots and onions into bite-sized chunks, Ed looked up at the mountain and realized we didn't have a big enough pot to cook this in. So he went out and bought a jumbo-sized Calphalon and another gigantic soup pot for my birthday. He thought about a Creuset, but those are heavy as hell. Receiving a stock pot is the best gift I can think of, seeing as I'm more into cooking and baking lately.

The day of, I went to Food Emporium and bought rolls and Franz's white bread. My dad would serve his beef stew, which cooked on the stove all day, over buttered white bread. It's my favorite way to have it. Without intending to, I felt years younger on my birthday because of the beef stew and later, the gingerbread cake my friend Beth made me, complete with Cool Whip.

Can I just say? This beef stew was better than my dad's. Sorry, dad, but it's true.

This is the food I remembered from childhood. Eating my fill, then eating some more, back in a time where there weren't treadmills or trans-fat fears.

Me, my husband and my girlfriends devoured half of the beef stew that was in the big pot. Most of us had seconds until we felt like throwing up in our mouths. Then, we had dessert. I ate about half the gingerbread cake, piled high with more Cool Whip than cake, just like I used to do as a little girl.

Turns out, beef stew on my birthday was a very good idea. I'm going downstairs for a late-night refill.

Nutella-Swirl Pound Cake

When I first heard about a Nutella-Swirl Pound Cake -- a recipe being passed around from a Food & Wine issue -- I couldn't wait to get my hands in it and make it for Soteria. Because it's my birthday today (Sunday, Nov. 22, 2009), and because I unnaturally love Nutella, I decided to make the loaf for service later on this morning.

I made it but it didn't come out okay.


Somewhere between overflowing my blue 9x5" glass loaf pan (which worked fine last Monday when I unmolded perfectly baked pumpkin bread), undercooking the middle even though my cake tester came out clean, and having the end result fall massively apart on me, I sensed the entire baking process for me would be jinxed.

Sure enough, when I went to bake the two pumpkin loaves I'd baked just fine last Monday, as backup and in addition to the few slices of the Nutella-Swirl I'd salvaged (the pieces that chunked off were delicious nonetheless, if a bit greasy with butter)... the one in the blue glass got stuck so only 3/4ths of that loaf came out clean. Argh.

I kept the one that fell apart, but will give the intact pumpkin bread to church. I changed up the ingredients from the original, plain recipe by adding pumpkin spice and some vanilla extract. I just needed it to taste more like pumpkin and less like sugar cake.

I also made communion bread like I always do (I've made it at least six prior times without incident), with my son's help. I'll know in a couple of hours, when I bake those off, if I'm just plain jinxed for the rest of this day.

I won't give up, though. I plan to transform the loaf pan recipe into a bundt cake recipe with thinner Nutella layers, maybe even a quick mix of Nutella within the batter.

Pumpkin Loaf

I've been dissatisfied with food lately, oh the past three, four days. It's driving me batty, trying to figure out what it is I actually want to eat. Meals aren't the answer. I still want something else. I don't think it's junk food, seems too dry and gross to me. Fruit alone isn't enough.

Whenever I get like this, I can do one of two things: 1) load up on a meal that is so filling my mind can't fathom eating anything else, not even a crumb more... like thin spaghetti with arrabiata sauce (a mix of San Marzano tomatoes, sliced garlic, olive oil, basil, and a jar of Rao's version) with French bread, or 2) hunt down the extra special food unit I'm yearning for through a process of elimination.

1) and 2)... I hope. 2) pumpkin loaf. I made two loaves today. I think I'm craving slices of this stuff, first latched onto when I'd go to Starbucks for my fix. We'll see.

In the meantime, I offered to give away the second loaf (this RecipeZaar recipe makes two) on Facebook. And now two of my friends want their loaves, pronto. Maybe I should go into business.

It's too bad I couldn't find sugar pumpkins anywhere. What happens, the day after Halloween, they dry up?!

Something's Missing

The Land O' Lakes pumpkin pound cake I made for Soteria church this morning came out easily, moist, sweet, yet I was dissatisfied. I did taste one small leftover slice afterwards. Moist and sweet, but lacking any discernible flavor, pumpkin or otherwise.

Maybe I should've put vanilla in the batter and lemon zest in the glaze. I thought about it. Wasn't sure lemon zest went with pumpkin. Seeing as the recipe was from a butter company, I guess I could've done better and known what I was in for. But overall, I can't complain, the cake came out of the bundt pan without sticking.

I was going to pre-make the batter, leave it in the fridge and finish baking it off on Sunday morning before service. Then, thought, hey, pound cake can stay out overnight in room temperature (after searching and finding something on the Internet about it being okay). Plus, I'd save the 55 to 60 minutes of baking time. More sleep! I almost made the glaze too, but that's fresh milk. So I made the glaze the morning of. I goofed up and put one tablespoon of milk in the powdered sugar and butter mix, then realized the recipe called for teaspoons at a time until the right glazing consistency. I gave up measurements and just added until my eyes said it was glazey enough.

The only problem appeared when I spooned the glaze over the naked pumpkin bundt cake. I noticed specks of butter dotted throughout. I dusted powdered sugar over it just to kind of distract from the specks, then reasoned out that people dab butter on muffins all the time, should be fine.

As you can see, it was. Everything was gone except one small slice, which I just ate for late breakfast, with my leftover vegan blueberry scone.

Wonderful Mistake

I prepared the pumpkin muffin batter last night (for Soteria church service this morning), but made a huge mistake toward the end of combining ingredients in the electric mixer. My mind was somewhere else -- a birthday party my son was late to because I spaced on the start time -- plus I had to double the recipe as I went along. After I tossed double the salt in the batter, I went for the cinnamon, and then shortcircuited.

You see, the cinnamon was supposed to go into the sugar topping, not the batter, and I'd just put two teaspoons of the stuff in there, along with the pumpkin spice. In a daze, I spied the leftover fresh sugar pumpkin puree sitting nearby and scraped those in there, thinking the extra pumpkin would dilute the effect of the strong cinnamon. That, and it was fresh pumpkin, not canned (as the recipe called for), and I read on a Martha Stewart page that if you use fresh, you need to double the spices.

This morning, I was in even more of a daze, so when I had extra batter (the recipe--from Muffin Top), I threw those in as fast as I could as time was winding down for my husband to leave early and put the last baking tin in the oven. Four minutes into the baking time, it hit me that I forgot to sprinkle the cinnamon-sugar on top, ran in there, sprinkled last-minute and prayed for a save.

I had no idea how the muffins turned out, or if I'd baked them enough (not sure about Pampered Chef's metal tester, doesn't wood detect doneness better with the batter sticking to it?). Although, I did taste the raw batter after the cinnamon mix-up, and it wasn't too strong at all.

My husband Eddie reported back that the moist, fully baked pumpkin muffin mistakes were a huge hit, all 28 of 'em were gone in 60 seconds flat, or thereabouts. A daughter of the guitarist in the worship team even asked if I'd give her a baking lesson.

Like I know what I'm doing.