last picture

Finally - the last picture I have from Thanksgiving. Here is Karl carving the turkey. There was much fuss over the knives. Mommy has two antique carving sets that her father used - and possibly also his father - but the knives aren't very sharp anymore. Adam's father - my uncle - used to be a butcher so Adam knows how to properly sharpen a knife. So he sharpened Mommy's "chef knife" that you see in this picture. It's not quite a carving knife, not really a chef's knife. But she prefers using paring knives for everything so it doesn't bother her. There's only ever a problem when I come over and complain about her lack of a proper knife for anything. Then again - it isn't my kitchen.

dinnertime!

We get things started with a picture of me and Mommy. You can also see my pumpkin and Alison's tomato Le Crueset. Always a Thanksgiving tradition.

Unfortunately, the pictures took a nose dive after this one and forced me to create this research paper on:

Reasons the long table shot picture needs to be eliminated.

Exibit A: Can't see my face or Mommy's that clearly - although if you look closely, you can see that Mommy is not smiling as she is unprepared for the picture. Brenda and Shelly look cute, but it's a harsh angle for most people. And Gerri is completely lost. Bad all around.

Exhibit B: Jake is referred to alternately as a tree or as a giant. Here you can see why. I'm fairly average sized and have a large head, yet I look quite petite with a tiny head next to Jake. Again, this is the result of the long table shot. There wasn't anyone else left on Jake's side of the table while we were taking pictures and that would have been an especially sad shot. Jake all by himself. So I jumped in. If we were doing orchestrated pictures, there would have been no need for the Jake the Friendly Giant shot and we would have all looked like normal-sized people.
Exibit C: Candid shots don't work so well when combined with the long table shot. Brenda vaguely sees that my mom is about to take a picture, but is completely unprepared.
Exhibit D: Again, no one is ready for this picture. Alison and Shelly are prepared, but still, it's not an ideal angle and Alison is way too far away.


One good thing this shot is for is highlighting the tomato and my adorable new green apple. My pumpkin was cut out of this shot, but that's okay. Alison already ruined the surprise for herself by asking if she was going to get a mini of her own for Christmas and me being the horrible liar that I am said no, but with a huge grin on my face. But she will not find out what type until 12/25. I can at least keep that part a secret!
I have one last picture to add, but am having issues. I will try again tomorrow.

side note...

I know I should continue updating the actual day, but I ran across this on the Washington Post's Going out Guru's Blog. Anyone who knows me knows that I'm obsessed with the various chats on the Post's website. I reference them all the time. Now, most of these are not terribly exciting, but I fully laughed out loud at the first one. I only wish I had read this earlier because my brother-in-law so would have done that. And it would have been hysterical.

The Gurus' Favorite Thanksgiving Things
1. Getting all '70s retro at the dinner table by constantly referring to the roasted, basted bird as a jive turkey. Example: "Can I carve anyone another slice of jive turkey?"

2. Making garlic mashed potatoes with my sister, then indulging in a two-to-three hour food coma courtesy of two Thanksgiving dinners -- one at my parents' house, the other at my boyfriend's parents' house. (Courtesy of Julia)

3. Replenishing my Tupperware collection after folks send their hapless bachelor friend (me) home with leftovers. (Courtesy of Rhome)

4. After she's been spent half the day making a huge meal, asking my mother, "How come we can't just have popcorn like Charlie Brown?"

5. Continuing my decade-long streak of never once catching the ball during my friends' annual "Toilet Bowl" touch-football game.

Picture time!

Karl was being grumpy about taking a picture so I decided to do a test shot with just Alison. And since she's been with him for so long, she knows where his head would be. This is my sister with her hand as a place-holder for Karl. We thought we were incredibly clever.

And once the test shots were done, all we had to do was get Karl outside. He was happy being grumpy and eating cheese so was ignoring me. I decided to take more pictures. Alison and Shelly were actually not supposed to be looking at the camera. It was a cute pictue with them all focusing on the cheese.
Finally we got Karl to put on his shoes and come outside. And managed to take two pictures. Neither are as good as I'd like, but this one is the better of the two. It's hard to get a picture that doesn't cut off Karl's head, doesn't have too much of his torso and still has some part of Alison's head in the shot. I wanted her to stand on a stool, but that was vetoed.
I think one reason we only got two pictures in is because right after this one was taken, Adam, Brenda and Gerri rolled up and we did the welcome hugs and kisses and then all filed into the house.

Thursday - Turkey Day

For some reason I couldn't fall asleep Wednesday night until about 2am. So it especially sucked when my alarm went off at 8am. And then I was awake. So I showered and started getting dressed. I had bought this great cardigan/shawl thing at the Limited with my mom and really wanted to wear that. Pair it with a brown short-sleeve shell and this brown bead necklace. Very cute. And then since the shell has sleeves, I can easily take off the sweater while cooking and setting up and not look as undressed as I would in something sleeveless.

Sister called at some points saying that she was running late, had overslept and that BIL would probably be the one to pick me up around noon. Mommy wanted us there at 12:30. Everyone else was scheduled to arrive around 1, dinner was supposed to start at 3. Sister and BIL didn't get to my place until 12:45 so we didn't get to Mommy's until around 1. And Sister and BIL had to go back home so Sister could finish getting dressed.

Mommy and I put the leaves in the table and were starting to get a little worried about how we'd fit everyone around. I told Mommy that I'd figure it out and she should just go put her face on.

I scrounged up 11 chairs (including this rickety old one that usually just the cat sleeps on) and quickly figured out that we'd need to add another table. Mommy had the gateleg table to use as a sideboard. I first tried that at the end of the dining table. But with the gateleg down (only way it would fit in the room), the person sitting at the head of the table wouldn't have a place for his legs. And since that person would be BIL who is 6'4", that wasn't going to work. Then I noticed the mission oak desk in the living room. I measured it and it was just 1/4" higher than the dining table. Perfect! Mommy came down as I was hauling everything off of it and moving the gateleg table in its place. She was a little concerned because the desk is an antique (as is the gateleg table, but anyay...) but also realized that it was perfect.

We didn't have a long enough silence cloth so we used this old nubbly tablecloth (think the same material as my oatmeal sweater) at the far end and the real silence cloths at the mission oak end. And had a separate table cloth on each because none of Mommy's cloths were long enough. Not even the super-formal white damask ones from her mother's house. So the real dining table had our traditional green cloth and the desk had this autumn floral one that Mommy's family used to use for Thanksgiving. And that was nice.

Sister, BIL and Friend all arrived. They were eating cheese in the living room and Sister wanted to take a picture for her Christmas card with BIL. So we went outside in front of this tall green bush. It was a nice, bright green and I thought it was perfect. She and BIL wanted to be inside, but there isn't a good backdrop. We noticed that Mommy has this reflector in her yard. This is probably just there to mark where the drain is, but we thought it was hysterical.

I'm having issues adding more pictures so I'll continue this on another entry.

Thanksgiving round up

Thanksgiving's come and gone and I've moved on to Christmas. But I do need to do a final wrap-up of 2005 Thanksgiving.

Wednesday
I took off work this day to cook my sweet potatoes and tart. And also just because I have an excessive amount of leave left for this year. I cleaned my apartment some and made the potatoes. Ellen was on so I decided to cut up the potatoes in my living room. I was happily peeling potatoes and cutting them into chunks when *wham* I sliced open my finger. Totally freaked out. Ran to the bathroom. Blood seemed like it was gushing everywhere. And I didn't know what to do. I rinsed my hand a little but was scared that my lavender scented soap would irritate it. Then I tried to dry off my hand so a bandaid would adhere. But the blood was coming out so quickly. I held some toilet paper against it, hoping that would stop the bleeding a bit, but that didn't really work. Somehow I managed to get out a bandaid and get it on in between the blood rushing out. And then stuck a heavy-duty bandaid on top of the Nexcare one since the smaller one was already getting dark red. And that seemed to stop it. I cleaned up in the bathroom (really didn't get more than a couple drops on the sink) and then went to the coffee table fully expecting blood everywhere and dripping along the floor. But there was nothing. No blood even on the knife. Can you imagine? I couldn't. But I still threw out the chunk of potato I had been working on and cleaned the knife and continued on without incident. Goodness.

The potatoes took such a long time to cook. Probably around 30-35 minutes. Is it my rinky-dink apartment oven or is the recipe wrong? I can't remember what happened in years past so will never know. But if you're looking to do the recipe yourself, allow some extra time.

The rest of the day I lazed away watching TV and doing some minor cleaning. It was lovely. I finally got around to cooking my tart at 9pm and missed most of Veronica Mars because of it. From start to putting it in the oven took 40-45 minutes. And I was constantly in the kitchen, grinding the nuts for the crust, overseeing the cranberries, etc. Although didn't really notice that it took that long. It was fun. I watched Law & Order (or rather, read a magazine while L&O was on TV) waiting for it to cool enough to put in the fridge without getting soggy. Or at least I figured I should let it cool before putting in the frigdge even though nothing said that. But it didn't get soggy so that's a good thing.

Rest of the story to follow.

more people

Now we've added BIL's friend. We'll call him BILF. Doesn't help that he's like a freaking tree he's so big.

Left side of table: me and Mommy
Back side of table: Sister, 13YR, 11YR, Cousin
Right side of table: BIL, Aunt
Front side of table: Wife, Friend, BILF

This is my thought for the table. The room is has too much furniture in it and the table really only seats 8 people. I have no idea how we're going to have 11 people squeeze around it. Luckily I end up being a second-Mommy so will get to sit near the kitchen and won't be as squeezed in. But BIL, BILF and Cousin are all big guys at least 6'4" tall with broad shoulders.

The dining room:
left end: china cabinet, low bookcase under window
top end: sideboard with hutch
right end: door to stairs and living room
front end: tall bookcase, door to kichen

The dining room is not a bad size, the furniture is just too big. And the chairs are even bigger. So when we have a full table like this, it's hard for people to get in and out of their chairs. There is a door in the kitchen so often what happens is that the people at the left side of the table have to go out the kitchen door and back in the front door to get to the bathroom. It's all very funny. Especially when it's cold the way it's supposed to be this Thanskgiving.

Now there's talk of having a kids table in the living room. Sister joked that she'd put me, the girls and BILF out there. Ha ha, Sister - you're very funny.

and more cranberry sauce

Okay, I keep talking about this stuff. But this morning I checked it again and it's even more gorgeous of a red. By Thursday it's going to be so fabulous. I'm very excited about my cranberry sauce.

pumpkin pie

Friend had asked what she could bring for dinner. Sister said "wine, if you want, but you really don't have to bring anything. You're our guest." Friend insisted, she wanted to bring something else. Mommy, Sister and I conferred on this and came up with a pumpkin pie. Mommy never really cares about making this, but feels it's a necessary component of the meal. So this way, we'll still have it, but we don't have to worry about it.

I went shopping with Mommy this weekend. And she asks, "is Friend bringing a pumpkin pie?" I didn't know - and didn't know exactly what Sister had discussed - so I asked Sister this morning. She emailed back "Yes, she is bringing a pumpkin pie. I told Mommy that twice, once in person." Confirmation that our mother is crazy.

If she were here, her explaination would be that since the car accident (three weeks ago), her thinking has been off. That it's getting better every day, but she has trouble remembering things or with split-second decisions. Yeah - she tells me this as we're driving to the mall. Makes me feel real safe.

Cranberry sauce

I made the cranberry sauce yesterday and remembered why I made something different last year. I remembered it being sticky, but it's just ridiculously so. Maybe if I had a full-size food processor instead of just the mini-prep? But I had to do it in something like 10 batches and the little blade just took so long to get everything chopped up small enough. Ugh. And there was red sticky stuff all over the place. The dishes all cleaned up easily enough, but the stuff that got on the counter and dried was another story.

And then when I first made it, it wasn't so much the gorgeous dark red as in the picture below, it was more of a dark pink and looked more like someone threw up strawberry daiquiris. Ew. I really thought I'd have to make something else. But I stuck it in the fridge and let it sit. This morning it is now the gorgeous dark red and has solidified enough to look like something you want to eat, not something that's come back up.

The trials and tribulations of cranberry sauce.

My cooking schedule

Thanksgiving prep takes several days, even if you're only making three dishes the way I am. First you gotta go grocery shopping. In my neighborhood, this is a dicey situation. Safeways in DC have nicknames. Mine is the Not So Safeway because the neighborhood was not so safe. Gentrification has mostly taken care of that, but the produce still really sucks. Luckily the cranberries are fine and bagged, the sweet potatoes are fine and I can always find fresh ginger. Oranges are iffy. Luckily I don't have to get any onions. I have never found a perfect onion there. Usually the white onions aren't too bad, but yellow or red are just awful.

I also still have a bag of cranberries and some nuts frozen from last year. I had decided last minute to not make the tart so just stuck those ingredients in the freezer. I ate the almonds over the course of the year (okay, maybe one desperate week in the summer when I was trying to not have any snack foods in the house). But still - I don't have to buy quite as many nuts for the tart as I normally would.

There is the question of when to go. Weekday evenings are just ridiculous. The lines for the 15 or less aisles are so far back that I pick the one that has the magazines so I can start reading waaaay back there. Either that or I get frustrated and leave. I mean - wait 30 minutes in line to buy 3 frozen dinners? Not a fan.

Weekends are actually better since my neighborhood has so many young professionals. They're all off hiking and riding their bikes on the weekend so I can go to the grocery store. My favorite time to go is around 8pm on a Saturday night. No one is there. Of course, it's difficult to do this when I actually have plans. But I don't for this Saturday so maybe that will work out.

Then I can start on on Sunday with the cranberry sauce. It needs a few days for the ingredients to marry so I can make it early and forget about it. A good thing, too, since I hate washing my Cuisinart mini-prep. Love the thing to death, but cleaning it's a bitch. Especially when making this sauce because the sugar and the oranges and the cranberries make such a sticky residue.

I'm taking off on Wednesday so in the morning I'll make the sweet potatoes. Let them cool completely before refridgerating and then they'll be fine for reheating on Thursday. Before I've made them Thursday morning and then taken them only slightly cooled to Mommy's - but then they get put in the fridge anyway. And this way I won't have to worry about getting up extra-early on Thursday to have time to peel, slice and roast the suckers. I never realized how freaking hard raw sweet potatoes are. It's a chore to slice them up. And then I can wash all the dishes Wednesday or Thursday morning and not come home to dirty dishes. Love that.

Wednesday evening I'll make the tart. That's always fun. Although I remember the first time I made it. It says "cook 'till the berries start to pop" but not how long that will take. It felt like FOREVER and I even called Sister to see if she felt this was normal. Not that she'd ever cooked with cranberries either, but it's nice to talk to someone else in these situations. I do love making this dish. The crust is super easy - just mixing nuts with butter and smooshing it into the pan. No rolling out dough to 1/8" or whatever. Pie crusts intimidate me and I've never made one. And then the bright red berries are so pretty. The whole thing ends up like a goo which is also fun. I've tasted the crust and goo pre-baking, but have never actually had a piece of this tart. Isn't that weird? Maybe this year I'll actually try it. Everyone else always loves it. and I love making it so it works out.

Then I just need to figure out how to transport all of it to Maryland via metro. That's the part that will really suck. Because not only do I have to transport the potatoes, but also my pumpkin Le Crueset for serving them. And that thing weighs a ton. This sucks. Oh - you know, maybe I'll see if Mommy will go shopping this weekend for my Christmas sneakers. Then I can bring over the pumpkin this weekend and leave it there. Then for transporting all, I can put the potatoes in the large tupperware and balance the tart on top after wrapping it in plastic wrap and foil. Then the cranberry sauce can get tucked in the side. All should fit in my medium Boat and Tote. That would be the perfect solution. This is so one of the times I wish I had a car.