Thanksgiving In a Pinch

You already know I love the food blog Serious Eats. They are for serious foodies, but they are so not above regular old non-gourmet grocery store food. Sometimes you do just need to go with what's easiest. And when you do, who doesn't want to buy the best-tasting of the many options available?

So I just love that they did this:

In a perfect world, all of your dishes would be homemade next Thursday. You'd toast the bread crumbs yourself, roll out the pie crusts, maybe even churn the butter (ha!). But just in case it's Wednesday night and you're having an I'm-so-screwed moment, or know that'll be you and want to stock up at the market this weekend, here are the winners of all of our taste tests for store-bought Thanksgiving foods: cranberry sauce, stuffing, frozen pumpkin and apple pie, pie crusts, gravy, chicken stock.


Click here to see all the results.

Turkey Day? There's an App For That

No but really: of course there is. I'm sure there are hundreds! But there's only one Thanksgiving helper app by the amazing foodie folks at Chow.

It just so happens I have one of those two-degrees of separation connections to the great founder of Chow, and she's really excited about this new app. So I'm helping her push it out a bit.

BUT, the truth is, I love Chow! Whenever I need restaurant advice or cooking advice, that site and its forums are where I turn to first.

So even though I don't have a smartphone, I'm downloading this app into my iTunes. Because you never know what kind of help you'll need come The Big Day!

A Sweet and Summery New Year

Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, begins tomorrow evening. This is the beginning of the High Holy Days and a time of introspection, retrospection, atonement, forgiveness, and hope.

The ten days between Rosh Hashanah -- a very joyous, sweet occasion -- and Yom Kippur -- a more solemn occasion, the day of atonement or 'at-one-ment,' the most important Jewish holiday -- are called the Days of Awe, and they are our opportunity to make right the wrongs of the past year, and to set hopes and dreams for a sweet year to come.

But what does all this have to do with food? It's also a time for eating and enjoying food with our loved ones, of course! It is a Jewish holiday, after all. (The typical and traditional dish of Rosh Hashanah is apple dipped in honey -- to help you taste the sweetness of life and mark the beginnings of a sweet new year.)

What's lovely about the High Holy Days in 2010 is that well, they start "early" this year. As one of my fave websites for all things Jewish, www.jewfaq.org, puts it: There is a joke about the Jewish calendar that goes something like this: "While sitting in synagogue, one man turns to his friend and says, ‘When is Hanukkah this year?’ The other man smiles slyly and replies, ‘Same as always: the 25th of Kislev.’" It’s a joke, but it makes an important point: The date of Jewish holidays does not change from year to year. Holidays are celebrated on the same day of the Jewish calendar every year, but the Jewish year is not the same length as a solar year on the civil calendar used by most of the western world, so the date shifts on the civil calendar. 

And as this wonderful post from one of my new favorite Jewish literary magazines, Tablet, puts it: This year, Rosh Hashanah, which typically falls a little later in the year, begins in early September, when summer fruits and vegetables are still overflowing.

So this Rosh Hashanah, we've got a great chance to put the 'sweet' and 'succulent' into our wishes and dishes for the new year, with bounty from our gardens and Farmer's Markets. Tablet has got some great recipe ideas, including this one (how GOOD does that look?!?):

Beet 'Carpaccio' With Wild Arugula, Goat Cheese, and Orange Vinaigrette 


1 pound large loose beets, golden, red and/or candy striped
4 cups wild arugula
¼ cup goat cheese, crumbled
1 orange, segmented and juiced, separated
1 tablespoon good quality local honey
¼ cup olive oil
¼ teaspoon sea salt
¼ teaspoon black pepper
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

1. De-stem and scrub beets. [Dena's note: save those beet greens and saute them with some olive oil and garlic for a deeeeelicious side dish! Beet greens are hubby's very favorite.] Wrap in foil and place on a sheet tray. Bake for 50 minutes or until tender. Transfer to a bowl, cover with saran wrap, and refrigerate for at least two hours.

2. After beets have cooled, peel all beets. On a mandoline or slicer, slice beets very thinly. This may be done with a knife, but will take a little longer. Keep all different color beets separate so that the color does not bleed.

3. Arrange beets in concentric circles in any pattern you wish on a serving platter.

4. To make the dressing, combine the orange juice (1/3 cup) and honey, whisk in the olive oil, and season with salt and pepper. Reserve.

5. Right before serving, toss arugula in the reserved dressing and place in the center of arranged beets. Top with crumbled goat cheese and orange segments. Serve immediately.

Yield: 4 servings


A Greenmarket Rosh Hashanah from Tablet Magazine on Vimeo.

Contemplating Passover

Honey


Luxury itself, thick as a Persian carpet,
honey fills the jar
with the concentrated sweetness
of countless thefts,
the blossoms bereft, the hive destitute.

Though my debts are heavy
honey would pay them all.
Honey heals, honey mends.
A spoon takes more than it can hold
without reproach. A knife plunges deep,
but does no injury.

Honey moves with intense deliberation.
Between one drop and the next
forty lean years pass in a distant desert.
What one generation labored for
another receives,
and yet another gives thanks.

"Honey" by Connie Wanek, from On Speaking Terms.

My First Post / Cashew Chicken

My first post over at The Jew & The Carrot, that is!

I just posted my recipe for Cashew Chicken, which I have to say is really delicious and easy to make. When I start to crave Chinese food (which is often), I grab my trusty iron skillet and some eco-kosher chicken and whip out this recipe.

I am so thrilled to be blogging over at The Carrot -- it's a really wonderful blog and I'm so honored to be a part of it. I had to screw up my courage and get over my intimidation that everyone else blogging over there was "more Jewish" than I am and had "more eco-kosher" food cred than I do. So I just posted my recipe and now I'm a long way over that intimidation. Someone even left a comment! :-)

Dena's Cashew Chicken & Snow Peas

I am lucky enough to live in Eugene, Oregon. I’ve got it pretty good here – great weather, great outdoors, great Jewish community, great abundance of local organic food. But Chinese food? Not so much here in Eugene.

As a Bay Area transplant, I crave Chinese food. I often feel like I literally NEED it. After months searching for something that would quench my Chinese food tastebuds – and realizing that to keep my version of kosher (which is eco-kosher: less about what is and what is not treyf and more about eating only meat that is ideally organic and pasture-raised – and if not, is absolutely free-range, never given hormones or antibiotics, and was humanely slaughtered) – I came to the conclusion that I’d have to make it myself. For both taste and my personal kashrut reasons. Which is some kind of a life lesson right there, I’m sure.

I stumbled upon a recipe for Cashew Chicken from the inimitable Martha Stewart and decided to give it a whirl – and my own flair. And to tell the truth, it is delicious and happily graces our Friday night Shabbat table pretty often.

Read more...

Great Expectations

So tomorrow, for Christmas Eve dinner (really it's more like a Chrismukkah dinner), I'm going to roll up my sleeves, spend the better part of the day in the kitchen, and make Julia Child's Boeuf Bourguignon. Fun! And YUM.

I went to my butcher today and picked up my special order of three pounds local, free range, sustainably raised, and humanely slaughtered lean stew beef, cubed into 2-inch pieces. I have my onion, carrot, mushrooms, and pearl onions. I have (similarly local and eco-kosher) bacon. I have German Butterball potatoes from the Farmer's Market. I have a remaining bottle of Beaujolais Nouveau and a local Willamette Valley Pinot Noir on hand. YUM.

Because really, what's not to love about slow-cooked beef with bacon, mushrooms, a little carrot, onions, and red wine? And served over roasted potatoes? Heaven.

I will certainly be taking photos and posting them here. Comfort food awaits....

Happy holidays to all of you, my dear readers. Hope you get a chance to eat something delicious and homey that warms your tummy and your heart.

What To Cook for the Holidays?

Okay well now that Thanksgiving's come and gone (hah), what will we cook for the holidays?

It drives me crazy how as soon as September comes, it's the High Holidays and all-Halloween, all the time. Then November 1st, it's Thanksgiving-o-rama. Then you barely come up for air between cranberry and stuffing and it's Hanukkah-Christmas all over. Then New Year's is right around the corner.

However.

I have been contemplating what I'll cook this holiday season for the bounty of holidays we have to celebrate in our family (as we are a Chrismukkah kind of family, with me about to convert to Judaism and my husband, well, not), as I have some recipes stored away that I'd like to try out. So here's what I'm thinking:

Hanukkah (begins December 11th): Winston's Minimalist Latkes (my little brother will be here visiting -- yay! -- and I think it'd be fun to make latkes with him. Plus they're muy, muy delicioso.) and Green Beans with Crispy Shallots. Part of the miracle in the story of Hanukkah is that a single drop of oil lasted eight nights, so it's customary to cook with oil on this holiday. L'chaim!

Christmas Eve: I am thinking I just might tackle Julia Child's Boeuf Bourguignon. !!! Kinda scary, kinda really fun.

New Year's Eve: Hubby's mom will be in town, so I have to figure out what she might like. Perhaps my Company Dinner?

Got any ideas for good holiday meals? What are you going to make?

Still the Best

Happy Thanksgiving!

I am away celebrating with hubby and dear friends, but I couldn't leave you without a little something for Turkey Day -- not to mention I WILL NOT BE VANQUISHED, NABLOPOMO.

I also wanted to take a moment to give thanks for you, dear patient reader of this blog, who sticks with me and reads about my food rants and raves, my made-from-scratch recipes, and what we're eating weekly. Knowing you're out there means a lot to me. It's nice to have an audience, ya know? And it's nice to feel like the ongoing conversation about food and eating that happens on this blog isn't just with myself.

Without further ado, here is my Thanksgiving treat to you:

At this point around these parts, Thanksgiving would not be Thanksgiving in Casa Dena without Paula Deen's Thanksgiving special. Year in and year out, it never fails to please. And crack us up.

Check out the whole episode online while you're waiting for your cranberry sauce to chill: I promise you will not be disappointed. From "the boys" deep-frying a turkey to the pre-dinner appetizers to the turducken to the sweet potato balls to the pie out of which she simply cannot resist sneaking a bite, it is just Thanksgiving TV at its best.

Getting Ready for Thanksgiving: Brining

Hey all of you out there who will be cooking a turkey this year: don't forget to brine!

Check out my recipe for a well-balanced turkey brine, as well as info on why brining does what it does.

Go get your kosher salt now! Two years ago I had to go to like three different grocery stores to find any in stock the day before Thanksgiving.

Bon appetit!

James' Root Cellar Smash

My dear friend James is a fantastic cook. The kind who doesn't even really have to work at it, you know? Who just like throws stuff together and it looks and tastes divine. Someday I'll get there. Til then, I keep working at it.

So of course I had to ask him for a recipe to share during this crazy month of NaBloPoMo. And he responded with a great little recipe that will likely come in handy next week as our nation prepares to eat as a way of giving thanks.

Reading it through, YUM is all I can say. I might need these to show up on our Thanksgiving table!

James' Root Cellar Smash

• Three white sweet potatoes (sometimes called Japanese sweet potatoes at the grocery store)
• One large, orange sweet potato (any more and it would be too sweet)
• A couple of your favorite potatoes (Dena's note: russets always work great in mashed potatoes)
• A large turnip would be exciting as well, but I haven't tried that variation yet

This recipe is very forgiving -- you can make changes to the ingredients as you see fit and based on what you might have in your root cellar.

Peel and cut up into similar-sized chunks all of the above. Boil them until they are fork-tender.

When done, smash it all up -- I like things lumpy.

Pour in that stick of butter and cup of half & half you've been heating up in a small pan on the back of the stove. Season liberally with salt and pepper (taters need gobs). Here's the totally inspired part -- add a goodly dash or two of cinnamon.

What Is Your Favorite Thanksgiving Dish?

Now that we're less than a month out (I am so excited; Thanksgiving is my FAVORITE holiday), I've been starting to ponder Thanksgiving food and my favorite dishes.

Which made me wonder: what are YOUR favorites?

Mine are (in no particular order):

1. Cranberry sauce
2. Mashed potatoes or potato side dish of any sort
3. Stuffing that hasn't been cooked inside a turkey, preferably with cranberries and apricots in it. And definitely WITHOUT oysters -- blech.
   
4. Brussel sprouts
5. Green beans

There's more, but then I'd be listing the whole meal and that wouldn't make the dishes especially favorite, now would it?

Post a comment with the dishes you most look forward to on Thanksgiving. And including recipes for them gets you extra super bonus points! Also let me know if you wouldn't mind my sharing your recipe here; this is a recipe exchange, after all.  :-)

A Quick Post in Honor of Approaching High Holy Days

Okay so I'm still not able to blog as much as I'd like (house-buying is going well but dude it is exhausting), but I saw this fantastic article in The New York Times today about a New Hampshire dramatic recreation of "early settlers’ celebration of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, cooking traditional meals."

With Rosh Hashanah fast approaching this Friday, I had to share with you. How I would love to visit this little slice of Jewish and culinary history!

Enjoy and l'shanah tovah!

Happy 5770!

Cooking with Bubbe Winston, Part Deux: Flourless Almond-Pear Torte

As promised, here is the grand finale to Winston's wonderful Passover feast: the flourless but no less delicious almond-pear torte. Believe me, you'd never know the flour was missing!

Almond-Pear Torte
Makes one 9-inch torte. No flour or leavening so good for Pesach; at other times you could replace some of the almond meal with whole-wheat flour.

olive oil
1 pear
3 eggs, separated
1/2 cup and 1 teaspoon turbinado sugar
1 cups almond meal
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon orange or other liqueur
dash of salt

Set oven to 325’ and lightly oil a 9” cake pan. Cut a piece of parchment paper large enough to cover the bottom and sides of the pan and fit to the pan and lightly oil and sprinkle teaspoon of sugar across bottom of pan.

Core and quarter pear and quarter those pieces and fan pieces in a circle in the pan.

Beat the egg whites and dash of salt just until they form soft peaks; beat whites first because you need a completely clean bowl, and transfer to another bowl.

Then beat egg yolks and sugar for 1½ minutes. Add almond meal, vanilla, and liqueur and mix briefly until combined.

Take bowl off mixer and use spatula to mix in 1/3 of whites into the batter to lighten it and then add remaining whites and gently mix until completely integrated, and pour over pear slices in pan and gently even out with spatula.

Bake for 35-45 minutes until golden brown. Place dish over pan, invert, and peel back parchment slowly to reveal pear pattern. Serve warm or reheat slightly before serving later.

A Passover Feast with Bubbe Winston

The last time I was in San Francisco, my dear friend Winston had a little surprise in store for me: a preview of a Pesach (Passover) feast!

Knowing I am on my path of conversion to Judaism -- and knowing I don't have a Jewish grandmother of my own to teach me her secret recipe for matzoh ball soup and other Jewish culinary delights -- Winston decided to play bubbe and share his love of Jewish food and culture with me.

Boy, am I a lucky girl. Today, I'm sharing with you almost all of it -- I'll post his amazing flourless dessert tomorrow. Stay tuned!

Bubbe Winston's Pesach/Passover Feast (minus dessert)

Now remember: Passover is the holiday when, according to the wonderful JewFAQ, Jews remove all "chametz (leaven) from our homes. This commemorates the fact that the Jews leaving Egypt were in a hurry, and did not have time to let their bread rise. It is also a symbolic way of removing the 'puffiness' (arrogance, pride) from our souls."

Because Passover is the commemoration of the Jews' exodus from Egypt and slavery. The word for Egypt in Hebrew is mitzrayim, which also happens to be the word for "the narrow places." So we're contemplating not just the historic exodus from Egypt, but our own personal coming through and out of our own personal narrows. DEEP.

Spring Matzoh Ball Soup

Matzoh Balls
2 eggs
1/4 cup seltzer
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 bunch fresh dill
salt and pepper
1/2 cup whole-wheat matzoh meal

Soup
1 quart home-made or store-bought chicken broth
1 boneless, skinned chicken breast
Mix of asparagus, zucchini, carrots, fresh shitakes, fresh ginger, lemon
Salt and pepper

Rinse, stem, and loosely chop dill; reserve some for serving.

In a large bowl, beat the eggs until they are pale and frothy. Add seltzer, olive oil, and dill; season and mix well. Add matzoh meal and mix well, cover, and refrigerate at least one hour to overnight.

Bring a large pot of salted water to a rolling boil. Oil or wet your hands and form very small, loose ½” balls (they will at least double in size). Gently drop matzoh balls directly into boiling water and cook for 15 minutes or until they all float to the surface. Taste one for doneness. Rinse original bowl, and use slotted spoon to remove matzoh balls and reserve in bowl.

Empty pot and place stock and chicken breast in pot and bring to a boil; lower to a simmer for 10 minutes. Thinly slice asparagus diagonally, and thinly julienne zucchini, carrots, shitakes, ginger, and lemon peel. Slice lemon wedges for serving.

Check chicken breast for doneness and remove and cool. Add vegetables and peel to the broth and simmer for 10 minutes. Thinly slice chicken and add with matzoh balls to re-warm briefly and serve with dill garnish and lemon wedges.

Will serve 4-6 people.







Minimalist Latkes
Because these have no eggs or flour, they are also fine for Pesach.

2 large russet potatoes
6 scallion bulbs
1 shallot
salt and pepper
olive oil

Either by hand: grate potatoes, cut scallions into 3” lengths and thinly slice, and peel and thinly slice shallot; or use feeding chute and grating attachment on food processor to grate halved potatoes, 3” lengths of scallion, and peeled shallot.

Season well and mix together in large bowl and let sit for at least half hour to allow potatoes to release their starch—that starch is what holds these latkes together. Heat olive oil at a depth of 1/8” in a cast-iron pan until shimmering. Set oven to 200’ and line an oven-safe platter with parchment paper and paper toweling.

Mix potato mixture again, and use a stainless steel fork to place about a tablespoon of mixture in the oil and use the fork to spread out into a lacy pattern; do not crowd pan. Use spatula and fork together to turn when golden and to transfer to oven until ready to eat. Add oil and heat before adding new mixture. Serve with applesauce and Greek-style yoghurt.

Yields approximately four dozen latkes.







Coleslaw

½ head red cabbage (or green, or savoy, or any combination)
1 carrot
1 pear (or apple, peach, mango, papaya, according to season or availability)
salt and pepper
1 tablespoon mayonnaise
1 tablespoon white balsamic vinegar
1 tablespoon Greek-style yoghurt
1 teaspoon mustard
1 teaspoon honey

Core and finely slice cabbage, grate carrot, and core and julienne pear. Mix in large bowl, salt and pepper well, and add remaining ingredients and mix. Cover and refrigerate overnight; toss, taste,and adjust before serving.



Don't forget: dessert tomorrow! Yum yum.

Top Ten Green Culinary Holiday Gifts

My friend Kerry sent me this list of Top Ten Sustainable Culinary Gifts, and I had to pass it on! I love some of their ideas. These would make great gifts for the holidays coming up....

Some highlights:

• Heritage Foods USA - I love them! I made a heritage turkey for Thanksgiving last year and contrary to what some say, it was not gamy at all and was delicious.
• Seed Savers Exchange - Love them too! They're like the seed version of Heritage Foods. So many delicious and different foods are being lost in favor of the same old, same old. If I had room for a garden, you can be sure I'd be growing heritage breeds of veggies and fruit. Someday, someday....
• Green Pan - Okay this is the only one I take issue with. I came very close to getting a Green Pan because I was so over my teflon non-stick pan with its off-gassing and unhealthiness. But my dear friend Winston convinced me to go with the old-school non-stick: a cast-iron skillet. And I followed his advice, and I am so glad I did! It cost me all of $20, I think, and works like a charm. Plus it can absolutely go from stovetop to oven, is completely green, and you even get your daily dose of iron when you cook with it! All you need to do to make sure it stays in tip-top shape and keeps its non-stickiness is to never, ever, ever, EVER use soap on it. And keep it properly seasoned. More on this to come in another post.
• Heifer International - I love their ideas of buying a family a goat or a cow. But this year, I found out about some of their projects here in the U.S. and was very moved -- they're helping struggling farmers stay afloat and low-income communities in 28 states get connected to real food. I love that.
• The Malibu Company Bamboo Products - I love bamboo stuff. I have a bamboo cutting board and I use it every day. It is awesome. And very eco-friendly. I even have a shirt made of bamboo -- how can one plant be so hard in one iteration (cutting board) and so soft in another?
• Frog Hollow Farm - One word: yum. They have a store in the San Francisco Ferry Plaza and their stuff always looks AMAZING. Now I am drooling, thinking about it.
• Bacon of the Month Club - Holy moly. I have no words. There are several folks who read this blog who I know are, as they read this, clicking through and signing up.
  

New Thanksgiving Plans

Well, as it turns out, hubby and I got invited over to a friend's house for Thanksgiving. So.... I won't be making the menu I had planned. Which is kind of sad, but also totally fine!

I will, however, be making my beloved green beans and cranberry sauce to bring over. And I'm making extra cranberry sauce so I can make the Morning-After Muffins.

Speaking of green beans, my mom is making them this year, too -- except she's serving hers warm. Which will still be totally delicious.

What are you doing this year?

Thanksgiving Planning

As I get ready for a week from today (!), my first step is to plan our menu for Thanksgiving. Keep in mind this is meant to be a simple dinner for two.

And here are my thoughts so far:

• Turkey Roulade with Wild Mushroom Stuffing (I am looking for the recipe for this specific dish online; currently it only lives in my November Everyday Food magazine.)
• Some sort of potato dish -- trying to decide between creamy mashed potatoes or something more like the Pioneer Woman's creamy herbed potatoes (like scalloped potatoes).
• French Green Beans with Crispy Shallots and Mustard Sauce
• Cranberry Relish
  
• Winston's Peppermint Brownies with Straus Vanilla Ice Cream

And, of course, for Black Friday:

• Cranberry Sauce Morning-After Muffins
  

What am I missing/forgetting? Do you have any recipes that I simply cannot miss this year?

My Favorite Thanksgiving Food Network Special

Hands-down, it is Paula Deen's Southern Thanksgiving episode from 2005.

And apparently the people over at the Food Network know how special this Special is, because they re-play it every year.

I've already set our DVR to record it -- run out and set yours now, too! (Only two more showings left, my friends! Nov 20, 2008 @ 3:00 AM ET and Nov 23, 2008 @ 4:00 PM ET!)

You do NOT want to miss Paula and the boys cooking up the most insanely un-healthy-looking meal of all time. How does this family not have diabetes, high cholesterol, and heart attacks every day?!?

And you really, really do not want to miss hearing Paula say "sweet potato balls!" over and over. That line is a classic in our house, no matter the season.

Plus you get to see her make a turducken, which...holy moly has there ever been a weirder and yet awesomer idea for a dish? I thought it was an urban myth until not too long ago. And then I saw Paula make hers and WOW. Just wow. It is real. Very real. If any of you out there have ever made one, I want to know: does it really turn out like hers does? Can you really just carve into it and get a helping of tur, duc, and ken all in one?

My brother has been obsessed with turducken for quite some time. Maybe this is your year to GO FOR IT, bro. Seriously. If you make one, I want pictures!

I also love how she sneaks bites from all her dishes, including her pies, and covers it up with icing or a strategically placed garnish. That is so me.

Thanksgiving Mashed Potatoes

There really are so many different authorities and recipes for the "perfect" mashed potatoes.

I really appreciated this article from last year's New York Times which breaks it all down and tells you what the really important components are, and which variables don't matter.*

And that really, perfect mashed potatoes don't have to be difficult or time-consuming to make.

*(Hint: you can use whichever kind of potato you prefer, but you can't use whichever kind of masher you prefer.)

Thinking Thanksgiving

Speaking of Thanksgiving, it is now officially 2 weeks away, and I am feeling the pressure of needing to figure out what the F we're going to do around here at Casa Dena.

I am lucky enough to get the week of Thanksgiving off from work this year, so I am torn between wanting to cook up an amazing feast that takes me all week to prepare and wanting to keep it simple and to one day of cooking, making something new instead of the traditional old bird.

As I find great-sounding recipes for The Big Day, I will post them here. For now, here's a roundup of some great recipes I've seen so far, including some I am pondering cooking up myself this year:

• Turkey Roulade (the recipe I've got my eye on is from Everyday Food with a wild mushroom stuffing, but the one from Gourmet linked to here also looks delicious.)
• Cranberry Sauce Morning-After Muffins (um okay you know how cranberry sauce is my most favorite of Thanksgiving dishes.... these muffins are so genius!)
• The awesome Pioneer Woman has a GREAT round-up of her amazingly rich and buttery Thanksgiving recipes... I am seriously considering making her Creamy Herbed Potatoes.
• And what list of recipes would be complete without something from Martha?

What are you making this year? Are you going traditional or new? Any favorite recipes you'd care to share?