for my birthday

but it was a lovely drive…… so instead we did some investigating next door….

untitled

i drove home today across countryside

fall’s vibrant change

burning hues

orange, red

every well worn, yet apt analogy

autumn’s calico quilt

the season’s last, fiery exhalation

before winter draws her first icy breath

our thanksgiving meal was really good

my dear friend randi and her husband tom came over at 1 for dinner. they brought a faboo sundried tomato torta with crackers and the vegetable dip in the bread bowl mmmmmmmmm- yum(not to mention a lot of wine!).

i made:

pumpkin soup

turkey and gravy w/ pancetta sage

stuffing

cranberry orange relish

peas

mashed potatoes (tom and randi made ‘em – yummy!)

fatty fruit salad

and the piece de resistance – the white chocolate tiramisu trifle. which to me implies espresso and liquor. it had pears, lady fingers and white chocolate mousse. go fig.

let’s make stuffing!

my mom made the best stuffing ever! it’s very simple sage, bread stuffing – no oysters, no sausage, no weird stuff. just lots of butter and onions and bread crumbs. yummy! HERE WE GO!!

JUDITH ANN’S DELICIOUS STUFFING RECIPE

1. remove giblets/neck from turkey, cover with water in a saucepan and put to med. simmer on a back burner   
2. melt 2 sticks unsalted butter in (ideally) a large saute pan. when butter is meltedadd ~ 1 pound coarsely chopped yellow onions. could add celery too, if you are bored (as i was this morning)

3. keep at low to medium heat until onions just begin to brown – takes ~ 30-45″

3. meanwhile, take 3 bags of pepperidge farms seasoned stuffing mix and put in a large bowl.

go ahead and mix in about half the jar of dried sage and blend

4. remove gibble juice from heat. strain the gibble juice into a container to use to moisten

stuffing crumbs. attempt to dice the gibbles and neck meat that you can pick from the

neck part (if you can do this without barfing). usually the liver-esque piece will dice up

small, but the rest is kind of funky, so give it to your dog or cat..

combine ingredients, and wet down the mixture a bit more with stock or broth..

5. add butter/onion mixture to bowl and combine – my mom would do this with her hands, but then you have to wait for the onions to cool and i don’t have time for that! now the art of the stuffing making comes in here – you must add (mostly melted butter) to the mixture to create the correct consistency. for 3 bags of mix (i made stuffing for 30! there were just enough leftovers), this batch ended up with 3 ADDITIONAL sticks of butter and nearly the whole stock container, plus my 2 1/2 cups of gibble juice.. also, you will add in most likely the entire jar of that sage you bought – for 3 bags, i should’ve used a jar and a half. also salt and pepper to taste while stirring, but the crumbs are seasoned, so there doesn’t need to be a lot going on here pepper wise..

when its done, it will be “mixable” but would hold together in a clump in you grabbed a handful and squeezed it (like pastry dough)

6. since we can’t shove it in the turkey anymore, spread it out in a casserole pan. you could dot with more butter and/or pour on some more broth. this is not soupy stuff – it’ll go in the oven to heat/brown – usually a lower temp, say 45′ ish at ~325′ – to warm, brown and bubble, but it isn’t something that has to “firm up”. when nice and bubbly and brown, remove and enjoy!

http://movies.aol.com//movie/enchanted/24547/video/trailer-no-1/1918368

connersville, in: a trip report

i came. i saw. i conquered.

not really. i got in thursday afternoon, rented a car and went to my mamie and poppa’s house…. the weather, though cool, was really nice and fall-y.

we got to visit, then my bro and his wife came out from california late thursday, so by friday, it was almost like “old times”! mamie (and her friend needed a nap).

on saturday, most of my mom’s side of the family were able to make it and we did a little family thanksgiving action – including football in the cornfield (um, ya) and smores!

that thing on a stick is a mushroom that bill and his daughter, ciarra, found in the woods..(big as her head!!). naturally they killed it.

yummers! betsy carved the turkey! i cooked it along with stuffing and gravy. alyshia made the mashed taters which were excellent. the side dishes rocked – especially katies salad and aunt glenna’s deviled eggs – which we always scarf up in about 5 seconds..

thats the reflection in the pond. my mom grew up here. it’s the only “family home” me and my bro have, as both our parents are deceased. we used to spend every summer here from california….

just a little thing we like to call “jazz hands”. angie was cold. pete and john were just being dumb boys! (but we love’em anyway)…

a lot of fun. family. i wish we were all a lot closer, physically i mean. and i wish i were a HELL of a lot better at keeping in touch, remembering birthdays and letting the small stuff roll of my back.

update: i have been back for 4 hours. i ate so much yesterday, that my stomach was insane and i was miserable!!!!! I WANT STUFFING AND MASHED POTATERS! YUMMY!!!!!!!!!

feliz dia de los muertos!

today is the day of the dead - a “holiday” that i think is so super cool and utterly missing from the dominant culture dialog here in the US. as someone who has lost all 3 parents (remind me to explain that one sometime), the image of my mom wearing a 49ers t-shirt and cooking lasagna or my dad playing acoustic guitar and singing “the day the music died” or jim wearing khakis and a blue and gold striped rugby shirt (go bears!) and feasting with other friends and family makes me smile!

today let’s remember those we have lost and missed – but really picture them in their next “life” – however you define that – LIVING and ENJOYING!!!

update: my rowing club has a great day of the dead/american gothic graphic for the HOTL race every year – but i can’t seem to download the image alone!