Thanksgiving 2009

Well the holidays are officially on, starting with Thanksgiving with the annual feast of turkey and green bean casserole and family gathering. I took off work early on Wednesday to start my cleaning and cooking as the family was coming to my house as usual (my sister gets Christmas and Easter, I get Thanksgiving and Mother's Day).
I thought it would be better to first make the pumpkin pie the night before, just in case I messed up I would have time to make another as I bought back up ingredients such as pie crust and extra can of pumpkin. Now I have never made pie crust from scratch, let alone a cookie pie crust. This was to be made out of gingersnap cookies and almonds (gluten free as one of my friends pointed out). Not having a proper food processor, I took hammer to cookies to break them down enough to resemble crumbs for the crust. I mixed in melted butter and then tried to press it into the pie pan, but it didn't seem to go evenly and still seemed quite crumbly. But I got it in there and baked it for ten minutes and then set aside to cool.
The mixture was easy to put together and included a lot of good smelling spices (cloves, cinnamon and ginger). I poured it into the crust and put it in the oven for over an hour until the middle wasn't moving anymore (they always tell you that it will still jiggle somewhat but will set and it never fully does for me so I just cooked it all the way to make sure). The house started to smell of spices and crust and let me know the holidays were about to begin.
You can find the recipe for the pie at the following link: http://www.oprah.com/recipe/omagazine/recipes/200911-omag-recipe-pumpkin-pie (note that I omitted the cranberry sauce portion of the recipe)

Next day I woke up early to start working on the Turkey (Free Range, Organic Hormone Free Trader Joe already Brined bird). I thought it was completely thawed until I went to remove the innards and of course found ice inside. So as I let cold water run through the bird I started my hours of vacuuming, swifter, sweeping and vacuuming again as my sister likes to make a hobby of pointing out how much dog hair I have in the house. I have two dogs that live indoors, there will be dog hair no matter how much I clean.

Dogs banished outside for the day

Finally the bird was ready for it's herb rub bath. I watched a lot of Food Network before today and found a herb roasted turkey by Ina Garten that looked easy and sounded too tasty. (http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/herb-roasted-turkey-breast-recipe/index.html) She used it for turkey breast but I figured it would translate to a whole turkey just fine. After cleaning, drying and removing all the unwanted parts of the bird, I slowly worked my hands under the skin with the olive oil mixture. It was much easier than butter which I usually used. I then put some white wine, sage and garlic in the bottom of the roasting pan and placed it all in the oven.
It only took about half hour before the house filled up the with the most wonderful aroma. I can't even describe how good it smelled, but I knew I had picked the right herb mixture for the bird. It took about 3 full hours to cook the 13.5 pound turkey, but once I brought it out of the oven I knew I had cooked the best bird YET!
While we let the turkey rest mom, Fonda and grandma cooked up their side dishes in the oven. The classic menu of green bean casserole, candied yams, stuffing and homemade cornbread. Everything came out perfect and tasted the best it could. I guess that is what happens when everything is made from scratch and with love.... After the meal we settled down on the couch and watched the movie Up. We played Mastermind (which wasn't as difficult as I remember, except for mom). After dessert Fonda and I defended our winning streak at Pictionary against mom and Jasmine. It came down to the closest game yet as both teams were on the final spot, but Fonda and I won the game like the true champions we are. But still Jasmine is getting a little too good now at these games. I guess that is what happens as they get older. She can still kick all our butts at any Wii game though. Which we will find out on Christmas. I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and now the holiday season officially begins.....

We get ready to feast