Thanksgiving Recipes?

[Mara]

Okay here''s my pre-Thanksgiving update. I did the Brined Turkey recipe from Emeril...the turkey was just put into the bag into a metal party cooler bucket in the fridge.

One question...the recipe called for 2 gallons of water, 1c of salt and 1c of brown sugar with oranges, lemons, thyme, and rosemary.

Because I was paranoid about it being too salty (I have heard that from various people...)...I added another 1/3c of brown sugar to the mix.

Does anyone feel like that will totally make the turkey too sweet? I''d prefer sweeter vs salty because you can always add a bit of salt to the gravy or similar...but too salty and I think it''s harder to fix.

Any comments?

The turkey is 99% submerged in this container inside of a brine bag, just the top of the breast is exposed so I will turn it tomorrow morning to give that a chance to get the mix inside it as well.

Just so you all know I have never handled a raw turkey in my life.

The recipe said to remove the neck, liver and giblets so I hope I got it all, I did remove three things, one gross looking bloody back, a long curved thing which I assume is the neck and a small chunk of something which is giblets? Bizarre!!

So the plan is to let it rest til tomorrow at around 6pm then make it. This is our own personal turkey..the family is having a turkey Mom is making but I wanted to try this on my own this year just to see if it turned out well.

 

[diamondlil]

All these recipes are fantastic!

Mara, I don''t think adding the brown sugar will be too sweet -- of course, I have a swee tooth so it sounds good to me. I can''t wait to hear how your first turkey comes out.

We decided to make our turkey a day ahead this year (since a large turkey takes FOREVER to smoke). My husband brined our 15 lb. turkey beginning yesterday afternoon. We are on the east coast, and it''s getting pretty cold at night here. He put Mr. Turkey in a bag (white trash bag actually) with the brine and placed it inside a 5 gallon bucket, sealed the bag, poured a bag of ice around the bag, and put the sealed bucket on our back patio. Hopefully the wild animals aren''t strong enough to haul the bucket off into the woods.

This morning (bucket still there), he wrestled the turkey into the smoker, and it will be done tonight. After it cools a bit, it can be carved easily off the bones. Cooking the bird a day ahead, we''ll have the whole day tomorrow to relax and socialize and we can have early dinner rather than waiting for the turkey to be done.

Today''s agenda is making apple pie, pumpkin pie, pumpkin spice cheesecake, and cookies for the kids.

 

[Erin]

Broccoli cheese and rice Casserole

3 cups water
3 cups rice
1 stick butter
1 small onion chopped
1/2 cup chopped celery(yum yum)
1 can cream chicken soup (or sub cream celery instead of chopped celery)
1 large jar cheez whiz
1 can evaporate milk
1 packs frozen "chopped" broccoli

Skillet, saute butter, onion and celery

LARGE deep pan, boil water, add rice, cover.

Boil brocolli with some water just to soften, drain well.

In rice pan, add butter mixture, cheeze whiz and mix.

Mix in evaported milk. Salt generously. Mix well. Mixture should be very wet and pourable.

Add brocolli and mix together.

Pour into large 9x13 deep cake pan or 2 smaller pans.

Bake 350 for 45 min or until top is brown.

 

[FireGoddess]

Date: 11/23/2005 9:23:34 AM
Author: diamondlil

Today''s agenda is making apple pie, pumpkin pie, pumpkin spice cheesecake, and cookies for the kids.

Mind if I fly on over and ''help'' eat, I mean make those yummy desserts??

Mara, I think your brine will be fine - it won''t be too sweet. Taking the neck and giblets out is the worst - I usually rinse the insides out as well afterwards - helps to see if I missed anything. It sounds like you got it. Sometimes they put all the giblets in a little bag and then you just have to pull out the bag and the neck. Boiling the neck with a bag of bouqet garni makes an awesome turkey stock, BTW.

 

[DonaBella]

Date: 11/19/2005 3:59:27 PM
Author: MC
My husband is cooking the turkey this year. Neither of us have ever made one. Any tips?

Thanks!

Hi MC!
Happy Thanksgiving to you...I cook a turkey of any size in an oven cooking bag. It''s easy and the turkey turns out moist and delectable everytime. The instructions on how to use the bag come with it and its located by the foil in your market. Now, if you are not keen to that method, you can prepare it to be cooked in a roasting pan with you basting it from time to time and a foil tent over it. I have done this as well along with the basting and this method turned out a tasty bird. The key thing I found is to turn the bird downward to cook, with the breast upside down. By positioning the bird this way, you will more than likely have more moist white meat. After you clean your turkey out of the giblets and such, you rinse out the turkey thoroughly all the wya through for several minutes. I put disposable or vinyl gloves on for this if I am doing it. Most of the time, in our family, my husband is in charge of the clean out part. Next, you put the bird in your roasting pan and allow it to rest. Follow this with getting together 1 large brown or sweet walla walla onion(if you can find it, which is the one I prefer), celery, fresh herbs--sage and flat leaf parsley, and 2 oranges. If you are not stuffing the bird, you use the previously listed ingredients to put in the cavity of the bird to give it a wonderful taste. You would coarsely chop up the onion, the celery and peel the oranges, seperating into sections. The herbs are put in last wherever you can put them. I like to make a glaze for the turkey to baste with to crisp and brown the skin during cooking. If you are wanting to make dressing, you would get a cheesecloth that is found in the area of the store where either foils are or baking goods are located and put that into the cavity of the bird first, position it and then fill the bird with dressing, stuffing the dressing into the cheesecloth. The cheesecloth acts as a sort of container to hold the dressing inside the bird, capturing the juices to add additional flavor without having the dressing be loose in the bird. It also makes it easy to remove the dressing after its cooked. You just pull out the cheesecloth along with the dressing, put the dressing in your serving dish and wa-la!

I have other helpful suggestions if you or anyone else is interested...just pm me...

 

[Mara]

Okay I turned the turkey this morning, the brine smells yummy, citrusy...I can't wait to see how it turns out. Greg was like 'WOW that turkey is all for us!' It's the smallest they had, a 10lb free range one from WF.

I've actually found the brine to be pretty easy so far... just wrestling it into the brine bag and the fridge was a pain..and from what I have read it will be very flavorful. I also intend to cook breast side down for an hour and then turn it to cook the rest of the way top up to 165 degrees.

So we'll release it from the brine tonite, wash it off and then pop it in the oven, I think that the recipe called for a few other prep things so I'll have to check that out.

One Q.. it seems like most recipes call for stuffing the cavity with things, aka I think this one said lemons and thyme with some veggies, why is that necessary? I don't intend to make the stuffing in the turkey. If you don't intend to eat the veggies and stuff, do you really need to fill the cavity? Is it just to slow cooking time? If someone can shed some light on this...it'd be great. I just don't want to do it if we're going to waste the stuff later.

I want to try ALL the recipes here!!! Thanks everyone for participating. We bought a mini pecan-pie last nite from WF to start out the season a little early.

 

[widget]

Author: Mara
We bought a mini pecan-pie last nite from WF to start out the season a little early.

Really? They must be branching out. I thought they only sold diamonds/jewelry!

This thread is making me SO HUNGRY! Everything sounds wonderful!

I'm doing Aljdewey's Corn salad later today...I was so excited when I learned that our local truck farm is still open (closes for season today, actually) and I got wonderful fresh picked sweet corn and tomatoes....yum...

widget

 

[FireGoddess]

Mara,

I put halved lemons and onions and even a halved garlic bulb in the cavity of the turkey - not to slow the cooking time but because it infuses the meat with even more flavor as everything cooks. When the bird''s done I just toss those right out into the garbage.

 

[Mara]

yeah i wish WhiteFlash gave you a pie with every purchase, how fun would that be!!

FG..I wondered if the stuffing of the cavity was just for additional flavor, but then I wondered because there doesn''t seem to be much MEAT on the bones there so wondered if it was really doing anything or just more for that mental of it doing something. i do have lemons and onions so maybe I''ll throw some slices in there with rosemary too.

 

[FireGoddess]

I think as the bird cooks the juices from the lemon and onion seep into the bird, as well as into the pan juices...which makes for yummy gravy too.

But the most flavor I count on is a lemon zest/garlic/butter/thyme mix I smear in between the breast meat and the skin.

 

[diamondlil]

Date: 11/23/2005 12:10:47 PM
Author: FireGoddess

Date: 11/23/2005 9:23:34 AM
Author: diamondlil

Today''s agenda is making apple pie, pumpkin pie, pumpkin spice cheesecake, and cookies for the kids.

Mind if I fly on over and ''help'' eat, I mean make those yummy desserts??

Sure, FG, come on over. Of course, there may not be anything left by the time you get here.

The house sure smells good today! And our backyard is is smelling like smoked turkey. We just brought Mr. Turkey in. Maybe I should take a picture. He looks soooooooo good.

 

[Mara]

Oh Lil yes I would love to see your brined smoked turkey wonder!!

 

[diamondlil]

Yummmmmmmmm. Mr. DiamondLil is carving him up right now!

 

[Mara]

YUM!! That looks fab, can I have some wine?

I just went and picked up our pies from this 50 year old bakery up the street, it was swamped but I managed to get in and get parking and not wait too long for my # to be called. I also picked up a chocolate chip loaf, YUM.

Greg is at BevMo stocking up on wine and beer for the family tomorrow, he LOVES going there.

Tonite we''ll make the turkey and the stuffing, and then tomorrow I just have to do the mashed potatoes, my side dish (whatever it is, I still have not decided), my apple-citrus salad, and the artichoke dip for appetizer.

 

[diamondlil]

Carving a turkey is an art on its own.

 

[diamondlil]

And we''re done.

 

[Kaleigh]

Oh that looks sooo yummy diamondlil, I can almost smell that smoked turkey. I can''t wait for tomorrow. How did your pies turn out?? You should take pics of them too.

 

[belle]

ohmygosh that looks soooooo good diamondlil! yum yum yum

 

[Mara]

Wow Lil that looks fab!! Great job.

Our turkey is in the oven in it''s 2nd half of cooking and I just put the dressing/stuffing in. I made a walnut, sage, sausage, apple stuffing with celery, onions, butter etc. YUM!!!

 

[Mara]

Ta Da! Here's the turkey. It turned out GREAT...the top was roasted to a nice brown (a little darker than in the picture..we had the big oven light shining down on it for the picture, hee hee) and we used some Creole seasoning on top of the skin which made the skin awesome to eat, it was crisp and brown and spicy...we carved it and dug every bit of meat out that we could (the small stuff for Portia!)....and we had a great time doing it. Definitely a success. Oh and the meat was VERY juicy, not salty at all, and lightly flavored. I think even a bit more brown sugar would have been fine.

Thanks so much for everyone's help!! We're already planning what to do next year. Oh and we also did a walnut, apple, sausage, sage stuffing and it turned out great as well. Made some mashed potatoes just for us with lots of butter and had a few rolls and it was a pre-Thanksgiving celebration with just us and our rat...tomorrow is the big family thing so it was fun to do this just us two.

Happy Thanksgiving!

 

[Lorelei]

That looks great Miss Mara, well done

Wish I could try some

Glad your culinary endeavors have been such a success! Happy noshing

 

[Kaleigh]

Wow, you did a great job. It looks just yummy!!! The dressing sounds delicious too. Good job!!!

 

[begin ing]

style="WIDTH: 89.98%; HEIGHT: 1454px">Date: 11/17/2005 10:03:52 PM
Author: aljdewey
Title: Cucumber and Avocado Salad

1 ea English Seedless Cucumber 1 x Slices, Sweet Red Pepper
1 x Salt 1 x Lettuce
1 x Chili Pepper 1 ea Ripe Avocado, sliced
1 tb Fresh Lime Juice 1 x Fresh Parsley
1 ts Minced Onion

Peel and slice the cucumber paper-thin. Season with salt, chili pepper and lime juice. Sprinkle with onion and red pepper slices. arrange lettuce on
6 serving plates. Pile cucumber mixture in center of each plate. Add avocado slices and parsley. 6 servings.

--------------------


Thank you for the recipe! it was a success at the new in-laws buffet

 

[widget]

Aljdewey''s corn salad recipe turned out great, and received rave reviews!

Here''s a picture:

 

[aljdewey]

Date: 11/25/2005 9:51:41 AM
Author: widget
Aljdewey''s corn salad recipe turned out great, and received rave reviews!

Here''s a picture:

YAY - SO SO glad it was a help. Gee, you did a MARVEOUS job - it looks GORGEOUS plated!

 

[Kaleigh]

OMG widget Alj''s salad looks amazing. I''ll have to try it, it looks sooooo yummy!!

 

[Mara]

NICE widget...presentation and everything!!

We''re eating the Turkey Hash recipe I posted earlier in this thread for breakast today, it turned out yummy and nice and crispy. The egg on top is the crowning glory and extra salt..yum.

Then we''re off for our sole black friday shop experience at Orchard Supply so Greg can get his tool bench (my Xmas gift to him) and I can look at all the Xmas stuff and sneak some items into the cart.

Later today I have a massage scheduled, and oh do I need it!!

 

[ello]

Hi Ladies,

Question:
I would like to host a dinner for my boyfriends friends shortly after New Years. Most of their wives are vegetarian.
No Chicken, No seafood, No meat. No to Chicken broth, or any animal related product.
However, YES to milk, cheese and pasta as well as eggs.
I NEED HELP! Can you guys please help me with a few impressive dishes?

Thank you!

 

[Lorelei]

Ries, I think this may deserve it''s own thread, I am a vegetarian so will try to find some good recipes for you later!

 

[ello]

Oh - thank you so much! I really appreciate it.