All Things Thanksgiving
Hey, guess what? One week till Thanksgiving. What is your favorite dish? Mine has to be the candied sweet potatoes, I make them every year, although this year I am going with the sweet potatoes with marshmallows on top, still dee-lish.
What will your family do this year to show thankfulness? Do you simply say your prayer before the meal, or do you go around the table and share your blessings with each other?
Do you like jellied cranberry sauce or whole cranberry sauce? Or homemade?
Do you like to cook?
Does this meal stress you out?
Have you ever accidentally cooked a turkey upside down? hee.hee. that's a big yes right here.
Do you serve green salad?
Do you order any part of your meal out? i.e. pies from a bakery? turkey from ?
These are all questions that roam around in my head this time of year.
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My sister Becky loves to go back and read my Thanksgiving week routine having to do with preparing the turkey. And because I am a goober and links to my past blog stuff don't seem to work I will just post it for you here to save the trouble of cutting and pasting my link, that is if you were going to cut and paste my link. If not feel free to just move on at this point. But for those of you who want my guidance in Turkey Preparation feel free to take notes as you read below. Call me Spaz Stewart a.k.a. Martha's nemesis.
This post was from Thanksgiving week 2006. I can vouch for myself here. This is EXACTLY how I feel about the beloved turkey.
1. Buy the Turkey. Walk around the grocery store one week before Thanksgiving. Go to the dairy aisle to buy the only thing on your list, 1 gallon whole milk (yes we drink whole). See the turkey's piled up in the frozen food section. Calculate how many days until Thanksgiving (eek, only one week away). Pick out biggest turkey in pile, heave into basket. Read the sign, ".39 cents a pound with $10 purchase." Continue on to the dairy aisle to select milk. $3.29. Wander aimlessly around the store to decide what other items I can buy to get to $10. After walking through the snack aisle, quota is met. Buy groceries and go home.
2. Look at the turkey, count the days until Thanksgiving again, decide the turkey needs to go into the freezer.
3. 3 days before Thanksgiving, panic because the Turkey is still in the freezer.
4. Leave turkey in sink overnight (not recommending this to anyone else) to get that deep freeze frozen thawed a bit.
5. Put turkey in fridge to continue thawing for the next 2 days. Note: Still rock solid frozen.
6. Poke turkey with one finger twice a day to see if it has thawed. No luck.
7. Ah...glorious Thanksgiving morning. Wake up to the sound of my alarm clock at 5am to get the turkey in the oven.
8. Look in fridge, cry for my departed mother, I wish she was the one making the turkey, not me.
9. Take a deep breath, heave partially thawed turkey out of fridge and drop it in freshly scrubbed sink.
10. Cut open plastic to reveal a fleshy, white, 22 lb. turkey, partially frozen.
11. Cry again for my mom, why me? Why do I have to touch this huge hunk of raw bird? Think pretty thoughts. Go somewhere else, ahh, the beach,....
12. Turn water on to complete thawing process, grab knive to start prying turkey legs from the metal leg holder device.
13. Jab legs with knive, pry, grab turkey as it is doing a 360 degree turn, and hopping around in sink from me jabbing at it.
14. Get large ziploc bag, (bread bags work best), stick hand in ziploc bag and go to that pretty place in head again while I put my ziploc covered hand and forearm into turkey. YUCK. Dig around feeling for the neck. Pry the neck loose, pull it out. What ever you do, don't look at it. This alone could cause one to never eat turkey again.
15. Turn turkey around and feel around neck area, still with bag on hand. Turn on faucet, steaming hot to melt ice around turkey flap to open up other end and pull out a bag of something I will not even mention here. Again, do not look at it!
16. Finish rinsing turkey. Plop in big pan that hasn't been used since last November. That 10 minutes before had dust bunnies in it, until washed out.
17. Pour oil over turkey. Cover all turkey with oil, you can use 1 tablespoon and rub it around, or half a bottle and never have to touch anything, just drizzle till all covered.
18. Salt and cover with foil. Ahhh...raw dead bird out of sight.
19. Bake for 4 hours pull foil, smell delicious aroma, let turkey brown for another 45-1hr. make sure popper thing is popped, take out of oven. Let cool a bit so as not to burn fingers when hacking or carving as I like to call it.
20. I will spare you the details of carving a turkey, but just know I try only to touch what looks like belongs on your plate. Anything that looks a little iffy, I go to my happy place and just throw that part away.
21. Serve the turkey to loved ones, and give them big hugs because all the raw bird touching was worth it to see the smiles on their faces when they eat their Thanksgiving meal. Thank you God for my family.
22. I thank God for you too! Happy Thanksgiving Day.
p.s. my daugher who is now 7 years old has prepared our turkey for 3 years now. She double crossed me and spent the night with her grandma to hang out with her cousins who are in town for the holiday. She loves the turkey experience, but not enough to give up a night with cousins. Go figure.
What will your family do this year to show thankfulness? Do you simply say your prayer before the meal, or do you go around the table and share your blessings with each other?
Do you like jellied cranberry sauce or whole cranberry sauce? Or homemade?
Do you like to cook?
Does this meal stress you out?
Have you ever accidentally cooked a turkey upside down? hee.hee. that's a big yes right here.
Do you serve green salad?
Do you order any part of your meal out? i.e. pies from a bakery? turkey from ?
These are all questions that roam around in my head this time of year.
--------------------
My sister Becky loves to go back and read my Thanksgiving week routine having to do with preparing the turkey. And because I am a goober and links to my past blog stuff don't seem to work I will just post it for you here to save the trouble of cutting and pasting my link, that is if you were going to cut and paste my link. If not feel free to just move on at this point. But for those of you who want my guidance in Turkey Preparation feel free to take notes as you read below. Call me Spaz Stewart a.k.a. Martha's nemesis.
This post was from Thanksgiving week 2006. I can vouch for myself here. This is EXACTLY how I feel about the beloved turkey.
1. Buy the Turkey. Walk around the grocery store one week before Thanksgiving. Go to the dairy aisle to buy the only thing on your list, 1 gallon whole milk (yes we drink whole). See the turkey's piled up in the frozen food section. Calculate how many days until Thanksgiving (eek, only one week away). Pick out biggest turkey in pile, heave into basket. Read the sign, ".39 cents a pound with $10 purchase." Continue on to the dairy aisle to select milk. $3.29. Wander aimlessly around the store to decide what other items I can buy to get to $10. After walking through the snack aisle, quota is met. Buy groceries and go home.
2. Look at the turkey, count the days until Thanksgiving again, decide the turkey needs to go into the freezer.
3. 3 days before Thanksgiving, panic because the Turkey is still in the freezer.
4. Leave turkey in sink overnight (not recommending this to anyone else) to get that deep freeze frozen thawed a bit.
5. Put turkey in fridge to continue thawing for the next 2 days. Note: Still rock solid frozen.
6. Poke turkey with one finger twice a day to see if it has thawed. No luck.
7. Ah...glorious Thanksgiving morning. Wake up to the sound of my alarm clock at 5am to get the turkey in the oven.
8. Look in fridge, cry for my departed mother, I wish she was the one making the turkey, not me.
9. Take a deep breath, heave partially thawed turkey out of fridge and drop it in freshly scrubbed sink.
10. Cut open plastic to reveal a fleshy, white, 22 lb. turkey, partially frozen.
11. Cry again for my mom, why me? Why do I have to touch this huge hunk of raw bird? Think pretty thoughts. Go somewhere else, ahh, the beach,....
12. Turn water on to complete thawing process, grab knive to start prying turkey legs from the metal leg holder device.
13. Jab legs with knive, pry, grab turkey as it is doing a 360 degree turn, and hopping around in sink from me jabbing at it.
14. Get large ziploc bag, (bread bags work best), stick hand in ziploc bag and go to that pretty place in head again while I put my ziploc covered hand and forearm into turkey. YUCK. Dig around feeling for the neck. Pry the neck loose, pull it out. What ever you do, don't look at it. This alone could cause one to never eat turkey again.
15. Turn turkey around and feel around neck area, still with bag on hand. Turn on faucet, steaming hot to melt ice around turkey flap to open up other end and pull out a bag of something I will not even mention here. Again, do not look at it!
16. Finish rinsing turkey. Plop in big pan that hasn't been used since last November. That 10 minutes before had dust bunnies in it, until washed out.
17. Pour oil over turkey. Cover all turkey with oil, you can use 1 tablespoon and rub it around, or half a bottle and never have to touch anything, just drizzle till all covered.
18. Salt and cover with foil. Ahhh...raw dead bird out of sight.
19. Bake for 4 hours pull foil, smell delicious aroma, let turkey brown for another 45-1hr. make sure popper thing is popped, take out of oven. Let cool a bit so as not to burn fingers when hacking or carving as I like to call it.
20. I will spare you the details of carving a turkey, but just know I try only to touch what looks like belongs on your plate. Anything that looks a little iffy, I go to my happy place and just throw that part away.
21. Serve the turkey to loved ones, and give them big hugs because all the raw bird touching was worth it to see the smiles on their faces when they eat their Thanksgiving meal. Thank you God for my family.
22. I thank God for you too! Happy Thanksgiving Day.
p.s. my daugher who is now 7 years old has prepared our turkey for 3 years now. She double crossed me and spent the night with her grandma to hang out with her cousins who are in town for the holiday. She loves the turkey experience, but not enough to give up a night with cousins. Go figure.
Comments
I love the turkey, dressing (my mother's cornbread/biscuit), and gravy the best! Must also have whole berry cranberry sauce, and yeast rolls.
As for dessert, yummy fruit pies or pecan pies are my favs.
We really make an effort to talk to our kids about practicing thankfulness all year long, but it is always very meaningful to circle up as a family and have the "patriarch" lead a special Thanksgiving prayer. So much to be grateful for!!
Sharon Winkler
Karise