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An Anthology of Turkey Day Helpful Hints and Recipes

Republished from November 18, 2012 because it’s that time of year again.

PhotobucketOver the last couple of years I’ve shared some of the recipes that I served at the annual Turkey Feast. There have also been diaries about cooking the bird, whether or not to stuff it and suggestions about what to drink that will not conflict with such an eclectic meal of many flavors. It’s not easy to please everyone and, like in my family, there are those who insist on “traditions” like Pumpkin Pie made only from the recipe on the Libby’s Pumpkin Puree can slathered with Ready Whip Whipped Cream. For my son-in-law it isn’t Thanksgiving without the green bean casserole made with Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom Soup. Thank the cats we have a crowd that will eat just about anything on the table that looks pretty. Rather than reprise each recipe, I’ve compiled an anthology of past diaries to help you survive the trauma of Thanksgiving Day and enjoy not just the meal but family and friends.

  • What’s Cooking: Stuffing the Turkey Or Not
  • Health reasons why not to stuff that bird and a recipe with a clever decorative way to serve the dressing.

  • What’s Cooking: What to Drink with the Turkey
  • Suggestions on wine and beer pairings that go with everything including brussel sprouts.

  • What’s Cooking: Sweet Potato Mash
  • A great substitute for those sticky, over sweet, marshmallow topped tubers that goes well with pork or ham and breakfast.

  • What’s Cooking: Autumn Succotash, Not Your Usual Suspect
  • Hate those gritty, tasteless lima beans in succoatash? I do but this recipe using edamame change my mind

  • Pumpkins, Not Just For Carving
  • Includes a great recipe for Pumpkin Cheesecake that will please even those diehard traditional pumpkin pie lovers.

  • What’s Cooking: Pumpkin Soup
  • Any squash can be substituted for pumpkin in this recipe. My daughter is using butternut served with a dollop of cumin flavored sour cream.

  • What’s Cooking: Don’t Throw That Turkey Carcass Out
  • Besides making turkey soup or hash with those leftovers and the carcass, there is also some great recipes like the mushroom risotto in this essay.

    May everyone have a safe and healthy Thanksgiving.  

    What’s Cooking: Turkey Technology

    I can’t believe it’s that time already.

    Revised from November 20, 2010 for obvious timely reasons.

    I never went to cooking school or took home economics in high school, I was too busy blowing up the attic with my chemistry set. I did like to eat and eat stuff that tasted good and looked pretty, plus my mother couldn’t cook to save her life let alone mine and Pop’s, that was her mother’s venue. So I watched learned and innovated. I also read cook books and found that cooking and baking were like chemistry and physics. I know, that was Translator’s territory, but I do have a degree in biochemistry.

    For you really geekie cooks here is a great article about the “Turkey Physics” involved in getting it all done to a juicy turn.

    Cooking a turkey is not as easy as the directions on the Butterball wrapping looks. My daughter, who is the other cook in the house (makes the greatest breads, soups and stews) is in charge of the Turkey for the big day. Since we are again having a house full of family and friends, one the two 13 to 15 pound gobblers will get cooked outside on the gas grill that doubles as an oven on these occasions. Her guru is Alton Brown, he of Good Eats on the Food Network. This is the method she has used with rave reviews. Alton’s Roast Turkey recipe follows below the fold. You don’t have to brine, the daughter doesn’t and you can vary the herbs, the results are the same, perfection. My daughter rubs very soft butter under the skin and places whole sage leaves under the skin in a decorative pattern, wraps the other herbs in cheese cloth and tucks it in the cavity. If you prefer, or are kosher, canola oil works, too.

    Bon Appetite and Happy Thanksgiving

    Penny for the Guy

    Remember, remember the fifth of November

    When
    Daily Kos went to pot

    Because they thought the Dems were all that

    When really, they were not.

     photo guy-fawkes-mask_zps402bb1b0.jpgAs a former (by compulsion) member it gives me great pleasure (in a schadenfreud way) to report that in the wake of last night’s debacle the Great Orange Satan is divided into roughly 4 camps.

    The first, represented mostly by Mr. Moulitsas and those beholden to him by salary, contends that this is merely a bump in the road of inexorable demographic victory, only to be expected and predicted countless times by him and his “experts”.  Work harder, contribute more, go 2016 and Hillary Clinton!  Nothing to see here.

    La, la, la, la, la.

    The second group is the delusional suicidal types.  Those nasty voters.  How can they not recognize our vast accomplishments?  Don’t they realize the Republicans are evil?  Evil, evil, evil, evil, evil!  Voters is teh stoopid and until we get them to think gooder we are Doomed!  DOOMED!

    This is my last post until the stoopid people think gooder.

    The third group is the die hard Obots.  You see those spineless cowardly Democrats ran away from this good President and his tanking poll numbers and insurance mandates and Lilly Ledbetter (did we mention Lilly Ledbetter?) and all the other wonderful things he’s done like the Catfood Commission (sorry about your Social Security, those T-Bills aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on because we have to pay off these other T-Bills that Billionaires own), Bailing Out the Banksters (with no prosecutions), a Jobless Recovery fueled by easy money (not that there’s anything wrong with easy money) and Speculative Bubbles in the great FIRE casino, and being tough on Foreign Policy by increasing domestic spying, deporting more immigrants, killing citizens without due process, continuing our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and starting 7 or 8 new ones (it’s just a co-incidence that they’re all against Muslims, we’re not the racists, you are), and covering up W‘s torture regime.

    Ingrates.

    And finally there are what remains (on Daily Kos) of the democratic wing of the Democratic Party and their argument goes something like this-

    Given the choice between a Republican and someone who acts like a Republican, people will vote for the real Republican all the time.

    Needless to say I sympathize most with the last.  As for “inexorable demographic victory”-

    Obama Manages the Rare Triple Play of Bad Politics on Immigration

    By: Jon Walker, Firedog Lake

    Friday October 31, 2014 10:26 am

    Politics is fairly simple. There are actually only a few ways to disappoint a group that cares about a particular issue. The simplest is you can fail to adopt the policy they want.

    Second, you can be caught lying to them. This raises hopes only to crush them. That can feel even worse than knowing a politician has always been opposed in a principled way to your idea.

    Third, you can make them feel not valued or listened to. Voters can still respect politicians they disagree with, but being treated poorly is different.

    With his recent decision on immigration Obama managed to do all three at the same time. He failed to take executive action on immigration reform like most Latino voters wanted. He lied about it by promising action by the end of the summer. Finally, Obama broke this promise for what seemed to be purely political reasons. This sends a message that Latino voters aren’t valued and Democrats think they can be taken for granted. It is a statement about where a group fits in the priorities of the party.

    The final sin is that it was ultimately ineffective.  It didn’t save a single seat.  Cowardice never does.

    The stoopid voters say things like this-

    To Angry Voters, Washington Comes Out the Biggest Loser

    By ADAM NAGOURNEY, The New York Times

    NOV. 4, 2014

    When asked if her vote would change anything, Ms. Dempsey glanced back at the empty sidewalk leading to the polling place. “I don’t know,” she said. “I really don’t know.”



    “I feel like I’m in that class of people that’s kind of getting left behind in this whirlwind,” said Etrulia Byrd, 37, a waitress from Anchorage.  “I’m in that economic class of people that works really, really hard and will probably never get too far ahead, barely makes it, and kind of gets punished for it.”



    “There’s no such thing as a good politician, I’m sorry,” said Christi Miller, 43, an Obama supporter from Hot Springs, Ark.  “They may start out that way, but I think once you get in and once you get painted with bribes, and you have to take care of the people who contributed to you. … ” Her voice trailed off. “They would care if they were actually running for office for the right reasons,” she said. “They’re running for office for money and power.”



    “Since they’ve allowed all the money in politics, it’s gotten much worse,” said Scott Hasson, 40, a photographer who lives in Denver. “Everyone says our vote matters, but until we can check the system and start taking a lot of that money out, I feel like it’s just power, people with money have the power.”

    The Democrats are spineless and cowardly-

    A Victory for the Left

    By William Saletan, Slate

    Nov. 4 2014 11:25 PM

    Republicans won big in the 2014 elections. They captured the Senate and gained seats in the House. But they didn’t do it by running to the right. They did it, to a surprising extent, by embracing ideas and standards that came from the left. I’m not talking about gay marriage, on which Republicans have caved, or birth control, on which they’ve made over-the-counter access a national talking point. I’m talking about the core of the liberal agenda: economic equality.



    Republicans picked up other liberal themes, too. They harped on the injustice of cutting Medicare, the importance of educational opportunity as “the great equalizer,” and the folly of gambling pension money in the stock market. They endorsed health care as a fundamental right, ridiculed the description of wealthy people as “middle-class,” and championed midnight basketball.

    No, Republicans haven’t become liberals. They still hate taxes and blame everything bad on President Obama, Obamacare, and big government. But their focus on wage stagnation and class stratification reflects the economy and the political climate. And when you use egalitarian benchmarks to indict the opposition, those benchmarks endure. In the next election, Republicans, too, will be measured by median income, black unemployment, and what they pay women. They’ll have to account for the poverty rate, the tax burden on low-income people, and the widening gap between investors and laborers. It’s these underlying benchmarks, not the partisan composition of Congress, that signal the fundamental direction in which the country is heading.

    Ahem-

    No Scapegoats. Time to Face Facts.

    by Dallasdoc, Daily Kos

    Wed Nov 05, 2014 at 07:47 AM PST

    So here we are once more.  Another electoral drubbing at the hands of the most cartoonishly evil, corrupt, inept gang of thugs politics has served up since the days of Mark Hanna.  And we’re all shocked.  How could this have happened?  How can we possibly have lost to these freakshow escapees yet again?  

    It must be the fault of the voters, for being stupid.  Or the non-voters, for being too lazy and stupid to show up.  Or the media, for always being in the tank for the Republicans.  Or the purist progressives, because they said bad things about Obama.  Or Ralph Nader, for who the fuck knows anymore.  Yeah, those guys are to blame.



    Progressives and liberals have long hitched their wagon to the Democratic party, maintaining the delusion that it’s still the party of the New Deal and the Great Society at heart.  I’ve done this too.  But the New Deal was eight decades ago.  Our view of the party is almost as outdated as that of old African Americans in the 1960s, who stuck with the Republican party because it was the party of Lincoln.  Actually, they had better contemporary justification than we do, at least until Nixon’s Southern Strategy.  The New Deal Democratic party is as dead as the Whigs.  Our latter-day version is one more vehicle of corporate influence:  the Goldman Division of America, Inc.  We are locked in phony battle with the Koch Division for spectacles of Potemkin democracy, which offer changes and choices that cost the owners of this country nothing and usually improve their quarterly numbers.  Nothing can be done anymore that doesn’t pay off billionaire sponsors first and last.

    Our political system is comprehensively corrupt, and it is almost impossible to participate in it, certainly not as an officeholder, without wallowing in that corruption.  In Washington those who have held themselves apart can be counted on your fingers.  Both parties are creatures of this corruption, and their bases know it.  Ask any average American if they think politics is corrupt, and you’ll get a resounding “No shit!” nine times out of ten.  Conservatives know this as well as liberals.  It’s only devout party followers who seem blind to the obvious.

    Corrupt parties have to find ways to get their voters out, despite most of those voters knowing how corrupt they are.  It is almost impossible to make a positive, affirmative case for oneself when everybody knows your pockets are stuffed with cash.  Therefore, you have to point over there at how terrible the other guy is.  Hence we have almost exclusively negative campaigning.  Republicans are awfully good at this, and are bounded by neither truth, shame, nor basic human decency.  Democrats suck at it, despite having a lot more material to work with.  The problem for Democrats is that too many of the things they can truthfully say about the Republicans are just as true of them.  Want to point out how beholden Republicans are to the Kochs?  Yeah, just try it, when you’re getting so much “support” from Goldman Sachs or BP or Lockheed Martin.  Voters aren’t as stupid as most professional pols think they are.



    The Democratic party will not change until it has absolutely no other choice.  The leadership has proven over and over again that it would rather lose to a Republican than permit a progressive Democratic insurgent to win a primary.  Losing to a Republican doesn’t threaten the leadership’s perks and position, for some unfathomable reason.  Seeing the Warren wing gain power within the party is a much more direct threat to most of their jobs, on the other hand.  The chimera of fighting the battle in the primaries is a lost cause:  they’ll make sure we lose.  When was the last time we won one?

    Markos, Markos, t’was his intent

    To Crash the Gates of government.

    A big old blog of orange you know

    To prove the DLC’s overthrow

    But by his hubris he was catch’d

    A sold out has-been and a site to match

    Samhain: The Thinning Of The Veil

     photo imagesqtbnANd9GcQEwHqP5KFEss9J3qL13_zpsc1fb25b2.jpg
    Samhain is one of the eight festivals of the Wiccan/Pagan Wheel of the Years that is celebrated as the new year with the final harvest of the season. It is considered by most practitioners of the craft to be the most important of the eight Sabats and one of the four fire festivals, Imbolc, Beltane and Lughnasadh. Beginning at sundown on October 31 and continuing through the next day, fires are lit and kept burning to recognize the shortening of days and the coming of winter’s long cold nights.

    Many of the traditions practiced in the US have come from Ireland, Scotland and Whales. The carving of gourds and pumpkins used as lanterns, the wearing of costumes and masks, dancing, poetry and songs, as well as some traditional foods and games can be traced back to medieval times and pre-Christian times.

    Two Roman festivals became incorporated with Samhain – ‘Feralia’, when the Romans commemorated the passing of the dead, and ‘Pomona’, when the Roman goddess of fruit and trees was honoured. The Halloween tradition of bobbing for apples is thought to derive from the ancient links with the Roman fruit goddess, Pomona, and a Druidical rite associated with water.

    It is also the time of the year that we reflect and honor our ancestors and especially those who have departed since last Samhain. According to Celtic lore, Samhain is a time when the boundaries between the world of the living and the world of the dead become thinner, allowing spirits and other supernatural entities to pass between the worlds to socialize with humans. The fires and the candles burning in western windows are believed to help guide the spirits of the departed to the Summerlands. Like all Wiccan festivals, Samhain celebrates Nature’s cycle of death and renewal, a time when the Celts acknowledged the beginning and ending of all things in life and nature. Samhain marked the end of harvest and the beginning of the New Celtic Year. The first month of the Celtic year was Samonios – ‘Seed Fall’.

    The Catholic church attempted to replace the Pagan festival with All Saints’ or All Hallows’ day, followed by All Souls’ Day, on November 2nd. The eve became known as: All Saints’ Eve, All Hallows’ Eve, or Hallowe’en. All Saints’ Day is said to be the day when souls walked the Earth. In early Christian tradition souls were released from purgatory on All Hallow’s Eve for 48 hours.

    We decorate our homes with candles, gourds and dried leaves. Meals are traditionally lots of veggies, fruit, nuts and breads served with wine, cider and hearty beer. We make a hearty stew that is served with a whole grained bread and deserts made with apples, carrots and pumpkin. One of the sweet breads that is traditionally served is barmbrack, an old Irish tradition. The bread is baked with various objects and was used as a sort of fortune-telling game. In the barmbrack were: a pea, a stick, a piece of cloth, a small coin (originally a silver sixpence) and a ring. Each item, when received in the slice, was supposed to carry a meaning to the person concerned: the pea, the person would not marry that year; the stick, “to beat one’s wife with”, would have an unhappy marriage or continually be in disputes; the cloth or rag, would have bad luck or be poor; the coin, would enjoy good fortune or be rich; and the ring, would be wed within the year. Today, the bread usually contains a ring and a coin.

    What ever you believe or not, Samhain has meaning for us all since the Wheel turns for all of us. So light a fire or a candle and dance with us as the Veil Thins.

    The Veil Is Getting

    As I went out walking this fall afternoon,

    I heard a wisper wispering.

    I heard a wisper wispering,

    Upon this fine fall day…

    As I went out walking this fall afternoon,

    I heard a laugh a’laughing.

    I heard a laugh a’laughing,

    Upon this fine fall day…

    I heard this wisper and I wondered,

    I heard this laugh and then I knew.

    The time is getting near my friends,

    The time that I hold dear my friends,

    The veil is getting thin my friends,

    And strange things will pass through.

    Blessed be.

    Pumpkins, Not Just For Carving

    Re-posted from October 22, 2011

    When most of us think of pumpkins, we think of the orange orbs that get carved up for Halloween and pumpkin pie with gobs of whipped cream for dessert at Thanksgiving but pumpkins come in all shapes, colors, sizes and varieties. Some are good only for decoration, while others are not only decorative but very tasty in pies, soups and stews.

    According to Wikipedia pumpkin “is a gourd-like squash of the genus Cucurbita and the family Cucurbitaceae (which also includes gourds). It commonly refers to cultivars of any one of the species Cucurbita pepo, Cucurbita mixta, Cucurbita maxima, and Cucurbita moschata, and is native to North America.” Some of the fun activities besides decorative carving for Halloween are Festivals and competitions with pumpkin chucking being among the most popular. Chucking has become so popular that some competitors grow their own special varieties that will survive being shot from catapults and cannons. The festivals are most dedicated to the competition for recipes and the competition for the largest pumpkin. This year that honor went to a 2058 pound beauty from Northern California will be on display this weekend at the Half Moon Bay Pumpkin Festival in San Francisco.

    The pumpkin is one of the main symbols of Halloween and the Wiccan holiday of Samhain, which is a celebration of the end of the year, the final harvest and the coming of winter. The earliest that a craved pumpkin was associated with Halloween is 1866. Throughout Britain and Ireland the turnip has traditionally been used at Halloween, but immigrants to North America used the native pumpkin, which are both readily available and much larger, making them easier to carve than turnips.

    In cooking, the the fleshy shell, seeds, leaves and flowers are all edible. Canned pureed pumpkin is readily available in stores, as are the small, sweet variety of fresh pumpkin for the ambitious cook to make their own puree or for stews. When it comes to pies, the easiest is the canned, my favorite being Libby’s with the recipe on the label, label, label. It’s the only recipe I have ever used for pumpkin pie and I’ve never has a complaint.

    Pumpkin and all it parts are also very nutritious, containing many vitamins, minerals and anti-oxidents. There is also an interesting medical study of pumpkin extract on type-1 diabetic rats:

    (P)ublished in July 2007, suggests that chemical compounds found in pumpkin promote regeneration of damaged pancreatic cells, resulting in increased bloodstream insulin levels. According to the research team leader, pumpkin extract may be “a very good product for pre-diabetic people, as well as those who already have diabetes,” possibly reducing or eliminating the need for insulin injections for some type-1 diabetics. It is unknown whether pumpkin extract has any effect on diabetes mellitus type 2, as it was not the subject of the study.

    One of my favorite recipes is Pumpkin Cheesecake with Bourbon Sour Cream Topping that is more popular than pie with my family.

    Photobucket

    Recipe and baking tips are below the fold
     

    Carving Pumpkins 101

    First published 10/27/2012

    Rather than try to explain how to carve a pumpkin here is a video that is a handy 5 minute guide.

    How to Carve a Killer Pumpkin with Leah D’Emilio

    And for the more ambitious and artistic pumpkin carvers among us, here is some inspiration with seasonal music.

    Amazing Halloween Jack-O-Lanterns

    Just Visiting

    I’m not much of a road warrior and those familiar with my habits and the writings of Rex Stout are likely to identify me with a certain sedentary detective whom is no more likely to skip a meal than he is to miss an appointment with orchids.  He would say that if an eccentricity is easily foregone simply out of convenience it becomes mere petulance.

    It’s hard for me to say which is less desirable, to be visited and suffer the preparations necessary to ensure the happiness of the guest, or to visit and subject to the whims and vagaries of one’s host.

    In any event while some may call it flexibility and adaptation in tones of admiration, I’ve never been attracted to novelty for it’s own sake.  Having determined the best course, why would one pursue any other?

    Yet there are obligations to friends and family whom seem anxious for the amusement I provide and having delayed and temporized as long as decently possible I find myself removed from my customary haunts and activities.

    In short, on vacation.

    Now for me, it’s not so bad.  I see interesting things, I have entertaining conversations, I eat differently and well in new and exciting places.  Still my routine is under suspension and my work desultory at best and non-existent at irregular and unpredictable intervals.

    I delude myself that among my dozens of readers there are a few who have been puzzled by this phenomena and that is your explanation.

    You know, we also do elections.

    Not a complaint, mostly an observation.

    Personally, as a writer, I find it very hard to get enthused about elections.  Frankly I find horse races boring and gossip petty.  I like writing about issues when I can find a hook and my lighter pieces- Sports, Open Threads (c’mon, you think I’m that into Betty Boop because of the Adult themes and curves?  Nothing off topic with me ever.), the only “news” worth watching, etc. are here as a framework and because I’m a good humored guy (want to see what’s in the back of the truck?  Ice Cream!) and like to entertain people; and I delude myself that my audience is well apprised of the grim reality of our situation and is seeking diversion.

    We are the ‘fun’ site, the place where you don’t have to tuck your hair up under your hat.

    But your muse is not mine and just because I amuse myself to pass the time while I’m counting down to the apocalypse shouldn’t make you feel that any particular topic is off limits except one-

    Israel/Palestine.

    And that’s ok too provided you submit your copy for pre-approval.

    Anyway to cut to the quick (because I feel a long winded dissertation on the fundamental nature of blogging coming on and need to lie down until it passes), I hope you don’t think you can’t contribute posts of a political nature.  If we thoroughly disapprove and you’re not openly abusive or hateful you’ll simply languish without promotion, but we do promote a lot of material with which we don’t necessarily agree for informational and discussion purposes.

    If you have any question at all if your piece is suitable drop us a line or just give it a shot.  It’s not like I don’t keep track of what’s happening.

    Bill Maher’s New Rules: Past and Furious

    Adapted from Rant of the Week at The Stars Hollow Gazette

    Bill Maher’s New Rules 2014 05 23: Past and Furious

    Bill Maher’s new rules about GM recalling cars, new trilogy replacing Fifty Shades of Grey, 63 year old Michigan man arrested on child porn charges, fishing trophy that looks like a dick, dehydrated meat, and political correctness getting out of hand.

    “I moved left just by standing still.”

    In a recent interview with Peter Dreier at The Progressive, Bill Moyers, host of PBS’s popular Moyers and Company, was asked:

    You seem to have moved steadily to the left in the past decade-not only in your public comments and articles but also in your public ties to progressive groups. Is this an accurate assessment? If so, what inspired this leftward shift?

    His answer:

    Journalism’s been a continuing course in adult education for me. And I’ve lived long enough to see the triumph of zealots and absolutists, to watch money swallow politics, to witness the rise of the corporate state. See the party of working and poor people become a sycophant of crony capitalism. Watch the union of church and state become fashionable again. Witness the coupling of news and entertainment. See everyday people cast overboard as the pirates and predators of Wall Street seized the ship of state. I didn’t drift; I moved left just by standing still.

    Like Moyers in that interview, my politics have not changed since I became politically aware in the early 60’s. My views are the same now, as they were then. I have not moved but what passes for “left” has, to the right.

    So where are you?

    Bill Maher’s New Rules: The Power of Language

    Adapted from Rant of the Week at The Stars Hollow Gazette

    Bill Maher New Rules Dead Man’s Party (The Power of Language)

    Bill Maher’s New Rules: Noah’s Ark, God and Religion

    Adapted from The Rant of the Week at The Stars Hollow Gazette

    Bill Maher – New Rules: Noah’s Ark, God and Religion

    “What kind of tyrant punishes everyone just to get back at the few he’s mad at? I mean, besides Chris Christie.”

    “Hey, God, you know you’re kind of a dick when you’re in a movie with Russell Crowe and you’re the one with anger issues.”

    “You know conservatives are always going on about how Americans are losing their values and their morality, well maybe it’s because you worship a guy who drowns babies.”

    “If we were a dog and God owned us, the cops would come and take us away.”

    “I’m reminded as we’ve just started Lent, that conservatives are always complaining about too much restraining regulation and how they love freedom, but they’re the religious ones who voluntarily invent restrictions for themselves. On a hot summer day, Orthodox Jews wear black wool, on a cold winter night Mormons can’t drink a hot chocolate… isn’t life hard enough without making shit up out of thin air to fuck with yourself?”

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