We had a great Thanksgiving. We have been in drought conditions for a long time and it rained all day and most of the weekend. It was nice and cold. I've only attempted to cook turkey 2 times in my entire lifetime. This was my third attempt and I must say I was very pleased with myself. I cooked the turkey breast side down, and the turkey was very moist and juicy. It didn't leave a lot to make gravy, but it didn't matter to me. Now my stuffing on the other hand needs some help. I made a cornbread stuffing that came out too dry. I guess when I cooked the bag of goodies the turkey people leave inside the turkey I didn't make enough broth for the stuffing. I'll try something different next year.
My in laws came to visit and it was a nice little visit. I am very fortunate to have a mother-in-law that I truly love and we get along great. I hear so many horror stories from other wives about their relationships with their in laws. My mother-in-law, is a big fanatic of Gone with the Wind, so on Friday we went to Jonesboro, GA where the movie was filmed and visited their "On the Road to Tara" museum. It's just so sad that there isn't an actual "Tara" to visit. It was just a set created for the movie. I was also sad to hear that the trees that line "Twelve Oaks" aren't even real trees. They're greenery wrapped around existing electrical poles. Now every time I watch the movie I'm gonna think about all those silly "fun facts" that have now ruined the movie for me. Oh well, as I quote my Rhett, "Frankly, I don't give a ....."
5 comments:
Congrats on the success of your home cooked Thanksgiving meal...I have yet to attempt it. We hosted at our house this year, but my mom brought all the food over. We are supposed to be hosting all the Quilon's over at our house on Christmas Day, but they all usually bring something and my parents already said that they will buy the ham and make some salads. I haven't been able to figure out yet if they are all just trying to be helpful, or if they are all afraid of the thought of me cooking....
Is cooking something you totally abhore? I don't recall that growing up with you at all. I've tasted your food, you cook well. Cooking isn't fancy at all, heck why do you think they call it "comfort food" If you can read and follow a recipe, you can cook. Practice makes perfect. Laurel introduced me to a cookbook that's easy and fun called "Looney Spoons". One of my favorite cookbooks is "The Quilter's Cookbook" It's filled with comfort food and easy recipes. Guido has a Puerto Rican cookbook that I've been trying to follow.. One side is Spanish the other side is the recipe in English. Of course I've noticed lately that sometimes they forget to translate everything into english. Thankfully I know enough written Spanish to figure out what they missed. I've come to the realization that most Puerto Rican dishes call for 3 things, Adobe seasoning, Sazon, and Sofrito. Put that combination into anything and voila, it tastes like Mama's cooking. I cook my rice like Asian people, sticky. Guido hates my rice. After almost 4 years of marriage i finally learned how to make good dry rice. If at first you don't succeed, try, try, again.
Hmmm... I guess my struggle with cooking started when we decided to try and change our eating habits. All the spices my palate is used to tasting are full of sodium or MSG...the things that taste good are too high in calories.
For example - take a chicken breast. If I take it and put a little butter on it, stuff it with some stuffing, mushrooms and wrap it in bacon - sprinkle it with cheese - bake it.. YUMMO! But take that same breast - no stuffing because of it's glycemic load, no bacon because of it's fat, and low fat cheese which doesn't melt and has an after-taste...not so good anymore.
OR
Arroz con salchichas. Remove the sofrito and sazon because it has MSG. Take out the salchichas because of the fat content, change the white rice to brown rice because of it's glycemic load....not much left that's tasty.
All the "healthy" recipes that I come across just don't taste good to me and after so many tries of cooking and not liking...I just stopped (Arthur ate well, I starved).
You would think I would be a size 3 by now, but oh no... not me.
I have been trying again though. I tried 3 new recipes yesterday of which I definitely am willing to eat 1...that's improvement. I'm trying out the 2nd one tomorrow and as for the 3rd one....that one didn't turn out too good, but Arthur liked it so you can guess what he'll be eating all week.
Thanks for the encouragement in the kitchen :) Congrats on the husband approved spanish rice, I'm sure it's quite tasty.
Look into making homemade sofrito. It is so much better than anything in the supermarkets! It's not hard. If you have a food processor, or even better, a blender it's quick and easy. The fragrance of fresh sofrito verses store bought are worlds apart. You can freeze it in icecube trays for easier handling. In the fridge well stored it last about 2 weeks. And no msg! Try allrecipes.com and type in sofrito. They have a good recipe.
What a great idea! I didn't even think of it...thanks - you rock
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