Happy National Pig-Out Day! The kids are watching the Macy’s parade, the turkey is ready to pop into the oven and the temperature in Austin has finally dropped low enough to wear long sleeves. Life is good.
I did most of my food prep last night – cooked the potatoes we will mash today, made the dressing and have it in a pan ready to bake, prepared the pumpkin pie filling so all I have to do is pour it into the crust and bake, even made some brownies for the girls since they aren’t pumpkin pie fans (yet). I’m going to steam some asparagus, but that’s easy. The turkey is prepped and ready. My mother-in-law makes the gravy and my husband makes the “toybok” – which is how his family tortures the word “zwieback” (his mother’s family is Mennonite, Russian via Holland and Germany. Or something like that.) We’re aiming to serve The Big Meal around 5pm, so I’m putting out a variety of cheeses and crackers and fruit in lieu of lunch. Oh, and ruffled potato chips with store-brand french onion dip, which I think is nasty but Mike insisted upon. Today’s wine selection is Barnwood “Untamed” Tempranillo, which is my current favorite red – nice and spicy, which I particularly like with heavy food.
So you’ll note I mentioned dressing…I know alot of people use the term stuffing instead. But in my view, dressing is baked in a pan, while stuffing is cooked inside the turkey. I also make a distinction on the basis of the grain involved (bread made with wheat is what you make stuffing with, while dressing can only properly be made with cornbread) but that is probably a quirk of my family’s recipe preferences. I have observed that people who did not grow up in the South use stuffing for both, and have no clue what you are talking about if you mention dressing. Apparently the term dressing came into favor during the Victorian era when the term stuffing seemed too coarse for polite company (oooh, baby, stuff that turkey…yeah, that’s hot).
Things I am thankful for:
- My Crazy Family
- My friends
- Frozen margaritas with chips and salsa
- iTunes
- Re-runs of Star Trek Enterprise on the Sci-Fi Channel (oh, Lord, the shame)
- All the people I know who work so hard to make the world a better place
- OK, sure, this too
Happy happy, y’all!
