Holiday extravaganza.

Here is a smattering of various posts all related to the Thanksgiving and winter holidays. (Pictures to follow later, too lazy, spending time with chilluns)

Things I made to eat this year:
Homemade stuffing
Cranberry sauce
Turkey
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Homemade stuffing, no recipe just wing it but guidelines to follow:
One round of rosemary bread, Trader Joe's is pretty good
One loaf of pugliese, Traders Joe's has this too
one fennel bulb
two to four eggs
one large onion of your choice
broth of your choice
butter

cube the bread, dry in oven, place in bowl.
cut up onion and fennel and saute in butta
add beaten eggs and broth together
combine all ingredients in a large roasting pan, add as much butter as you want and roast at 350 till you achieve the desired doneness. Some likes it crispy some likes it soft.
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Cranberry sauce that beats the pants off of the canned stuff.
2/3 cup water
2/3 cup sugar, the real stuff I used organic cane
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, a dash of ground cloves and a few dashes of nutmeg (gives it a bit of heat and smells great)
1 bag of whole cranberries.
Boil the water and sugar, stir, lower heat
add berries and other spices.
wait till berries burst. I take a sieve and fork to mash them down because I don't enjoy chunks in my food.
Simmer for a few minutes more, bottle or place in final dish. Sauce will thicken once cooled.
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turkey
one turkey, size depends on how many you are serving.
sea salt
fennel bulb with fronds
large onion
garlic
olive oil

preheat oven to 350 (if you have HOURS for roasting otherwise 450...)
chunk up fennel, onion and mash hole head of garlic.
take out gizzards/neck etc, replace with onion, fennel and garlic
rub the outer skin with olive oil, massage that baby then add sea salt, rub that in for crunchier crispy skin, yum.
Convection roast or just roast for hours, till juices run clean and the internal temp is what it should be. I don't check temp, I just slit the turkey and look at the color and texture of the meat to determine its done-ness.

Hooch update.

Remember the blackberry hooch? Weeeel, we could have had a great class on the science of propulsion yesterday when I decided to open it. Luckily I was smart enough to place it in the sink and point it away from my face but regardless, a huge explosion ensued creating a splatter of red gooshy blackberry matter for a 5 mile radius.

I got some of the lovely stuff in my eyes and proceeded to run for the bathroom to flush it out. Turns out alcohol in your eyes doesnt fee good. Needless to say the loud sound and subsequent screams on top of the kitchen being sprayed in a gooey red, gore like substance didnt give the husband and kids a warm and fuzzy. They thought I had lost my eyes and rushed around out of concern for my ocular membranes.

Fun time I tells ya.

For those that want to know how it turned out: I was left with a quarter of the bottle in tact and it tastes like a sweet vodka and smells like a lambique. Back into the cupboard it goes till the sugars are fully digested.