You WILL Please Everyone Perfect Get Stuffed Stuffing

Dear Reader,

Playing host at Thanksgiving is fraught with many challenges, not least of which is stuffing.  Everyone has their own particular idea of what ingredients should be involved in a successful stuffing, and Thanksgiving is really all about the stuffing.  God forbid you leave out the chestnuts, or throw in some diced apples, it will be your head on a platter covered with cranberry sauce.  Better make sure to cover your bases.

You WILL Please Everyone Perfect Get Stuffed Stuffing

You will need:

Bread
Two onions, chopped
Four ribs celery, chopped
1/2 lb crimini mushrooms, sliced
1 Tbs. dried sage
1 1/2 tsp. dried rosemary
1 tsp. dried savory
1/2 cups vegetable stock
1 stick butter
14 oz. jar chestnuts
2 soy sausages, such as Field Roast Apple Sage
1/2 cup chopped parsley
1 Granny Smith apple, peeled, cored and chopped

Cube the bread.  This is very important, as you absolutely must include some cornbread for Aunt Betsy who is from Iowa and will be mortally offended if there is not corn in every dish on the buffet.  Also use other breads, such as whole wheat, sourdough, french and a touch of pumpernickel for diversity.  Toast the bread in the oven until it is as dried out as Grandma.  You should have six cups of bread cubes.

Melt butter in a large skillet and add onions, celery, mushrooms and herbs.  Remember that your cousin Fred married that girl who mentioned her mother puts oysters in her stuffing, and decide you're okay with her not speaking to you.  Cook vegetables until they are soft and the house smells like Thanksgiving.  Chop the chestnuts into small enough pieces that your brother won't recognize them, but your mother-in-law will wax rhapsodic about her youth in the Lake District.

Mix the vegetables with the bread, and chop and fry your sausage.  It is important to use soy sausage as the stuffing will be pretty much the only thing your sister and her vegetarian family from Vermont will be able to eat.  Do not omit the sausage, as weird Uncle Tommy, who has finally emerged from the basement after all these years, will turn right around if there isn't some porky thing involved here.  Any vegans can suck it.  Saute the apple with the sausage, and then add it to the other things.  Pour on vegetable stock, parsley and mix it all together, trying not to eat it all yourself before your guests arrive.

Spread into a greased 13x9 baking dish, cover with foil and bake for 20 minutes, before dumping it on the buffet and screaming, "THERE YOU GO! ARE YOU HAPPY NOW? ARE YOU? OH GOOD.  I'M SO GLAD.  I'M SO THANKFUL THAT YOU'RE HAPPY."  Go to basement and help yourself to Uncle Tommy's secret moonshine stash.  Don't come out until Monday.

Edward Cullen's Pumpkin Pie

Dear Reader,

As I finish the preparations for Thanksgiving, I am of course wondering, what would Edward Cullen enjoy in the way of desserts?  Of course, Edward hasn't eaten anything since 1918, but we are all nostagic for the food of our youth, so I turned to The Century Cookbook, published the very year Edward was born, 1901, to bring you this tasty treat.

Edward Cullen's Pumpkin Pie

Ingredients

• 1 pumpkin
• 2 cupfuls of milk
• 1 teaspoonful of salt
• 1 teaspoonful of butter
• 1 teaspoonful of cinnamon
• 1 teaspoonful of ginger
• 1 tablespoonful of molasses
• 2 eggs
• sugar

Instructions

Cut a pumpkin into small pieces; remove the soft part and seeds. Cover and cook it slowly in its own steam until tender; then remove the cover and reduce it almost to dryness, using care that it does not burn. Press it through a colander. To two and one half cupfuls of pulp add the milk, salt, butter, cinnamon, ginger, molasses, eggs, and sugar to taste. Add the beaten eggs last and after the mixture is cold. Pour it into an open crust and bake slowly forty to fifty minutes. Squash pies are made in the same way, but are not the same in flavor, although they are often given the name of pumpkin pies.

You can serve this after Thanksgiving dinner, and nobody has to know that you are fantasizing about Edward Cullen eating your pie.

Caramel Apple Pie For When You've Got Something to Prove

Dear Reader,

A few weeks ago I had dinner at my friend Claire's house.  Claire is an amazing cook, so we were all looking forward to a delicious dinner, which we had.  But then for dessert, she brought out these little caramel cookies.  She had cut them really small so they were almost like petit fours, and I didn't feel at all guilty devouring about six or seven of those bad boys.  I tried to take a picture, but they were gone so quickly - kids hovering over the plate, grownups swatting  away tiny hands - this was all I could manage.

The recipe for those cookies is from Martha Stewart, and if you're going to someone's house for Thanksgiving, you might want to make some of these to bring along.  They are amazing.  Today I have the house to myself and thought I'd get a jump on Thanksgiving and make an apple pie.  Easy enough.  But how about if I incorporated some of Claire's amazing caramel into the pie?  Ooh la la, right?  Claire warned me that making caramel is a tricky business, and I'd never tried it, but I thought I could handle it.  So I put on the Breaking Dawn soundtrack, threw some sugar and butter into a pan, and this happened:

Totally not caramel.

I decided to look around for someone to teach me how to make caramel, and lo and behold, I found Gordon Ramsay!

Elsewhere on the internets, I learned that caramel is best made in a heavy bottomed pan, so I dug out my trusty cast iron skillet, and I sprinkled in some sugar.

One cup of sugar sitting in a pan.

 Starting to melt and turn caramelly.

I went and effed it up.  I could hear Gordon Ramsay's voice in my head, "No! What have you done, you donkey?" I put away my spoon.  Would I have the confidence to let it go really nice and dark?

Yes!

 Now I added some butter - 6 Tbs. Let that melt, then poured in half a cup of cream, which you can see in this photo, at the ready.

Here is my pie crust waiting to happen.  In my food processor I have 2 cups of flour, 10 tbs. butter, 1/3 cup sugar, and the zest of one lemon.  WHIZ! Then add 2 egg yolks and a little water.

Rolled out dough.

If the dough doesn't fit perfectly, nobody will know unless you take photos and put them on the Internets.

I love this little contraption.  Caroline Ingalls would be consumed with jealousy if she saw mine.

I mixed the apples with a little lemon, sugar and then drizzled on the caramel.  I didn't go too crazy with it, figuring that it would lend a nice goo to the pie, and I could serve extra caramel, warmed up over ice cream to go on the side.  That's how I roll.

Estranged Family Cranberry Sauce

Dear Reader,

In every family there exists one person that someone else isn't speaking to for one reason or another.  Perhaps that person stole their boyfriend, cut up their prom dress, or just never repaid that $5.47 they borrowed for a milk shake at the beach back in 1998.  Maybe you are the person who is harboring the grudge.  Maybe you stormed out of their house, never looked back, and can't remember why you were mad in the first place, but now so much time has passed that even though they are no longer really upset, you have manufactured in your mind an injustice done to you which justifies your anger, even though the longer you go on not speaking the more awkward it is for your entire family.  Whatever.  Everyone needs cranberry sauce.

Estranged Family Cranberry Sauce

You will need:

12 oz. cranberries
2 oranges
1 cinnamon stick
2/3 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup sugar
Apple Jack or other brandy

Remove zest from oranges using the handy zester that sits patiently in your drawer all year waiting for Thanksgiving.  If you don't have a zester, wish that you were speaking to your sister because she has one and would probably let you borrow it if only you were talking to her.  Squeeze oranges over a bowl to extract juice and release some of the tension that sits between your shoulders from carrying grudges.  Pour juice, zest and cranberries into a saucepan over medium heat.  Add one cinnamon stick to the pot - do not use the stick that's been up your ass.  That one should go in the garbage.  Add sugars, both brown and white, which can live side by side harmoniously in your cupboard in spite of their differences.  Add a swig of Apple Jack to the pot, and then have a swig yourself.  Stir until all cranberries have popped, and the sauce is glistening and gooey like families are supposed to be at the holidays.

Things For Which I Am Thankful

Dear Reader,

I am thankful for a lot of things.  A lot.  Like my children and my husband, and my family and my friends. But also I am thankful for cocktails.  If you are still trying to figure out what to serve with your turkey, here is a delicious concoction that will go perfectly with not only said fowl, but all those side dishes as well.  I heard about the Stone Fence on the Rachel Maddow show after she was served one at a White House cocktail party.  It turns out that this was the favorite drink of Thomas Jefferson, so what could be more perfect on this most American of days?  Cheers.

Stone Fence

Apple Jack, Brandy, or Bourbon
Apple Cider
Dash Bitters
Sprig of mint

Add each to a glass in proportions according to your taste for booze.  Plop in a couple of ice cubes.  Drink.


I must also give a shout out of thanks to the University of Kansas Hospital and the Richard and Annette Block Cancer Care Pavilion for taking such great care of my mother.  Much appreciation sent to Kansas.  Happy Thanksgiving.

Extremely Serious, No Joke Spiced Sweet Potato Casserole

Dear Reader,

November has been a hard month for my family.  First, the girl came down with a fever, which turned into a cough.  The doctor put her on antibiotics, and meanwhile, the husband came down with the same cough. The daughter's cough did not go away, which sent us back to the doctor, who diagnosed her with pneumonia.  Walking pneumonia, which is only slightly less dire that what these people have.  So more antibiotics, two inhalers, and the husband is still coughing because his doctor said he "just has a cough."  Just as the girl begins to improve, the boy starts coughing.  So for about a week everyone in the house is coughing, hard, loud, barking coughs pretty much 24 hours a day.  And the mom is both tired and frazzled, but not coughing, so that is good, because somebody has to take care of everyone, as we don't yet have a private nurse.

Then, two nights ago, I was at a reading of Wallace Shawn's work, and my neck started hurting.  I thought that it was perhaps due to the fact that I had been basically staring in one direction for two hours, but that doesn't make sense, does it?  By the time I got home, I was sick, sick, sick.  Apologies to the people sitting on either side of me at the reading.

Last night I put myself to bed just after the children, at eight o'clock, with not so much as a glass of wine, which is highly unusual for me.  Truthfully, I expected to have a nice cocktail of Nyquil, but someone threw it out thinking it was perhaps expired.  Unfortunately, eight o'clock was the precise time my downstairs neighbor decided would be perfect to bang out some Billy Joel on her piano.  It didn't last long, though and I slept ten hours straight, beset by dreams featuring mimes, John Cusak, Jaden Smith, Mick Jagger and Joe Biden.  Today I am still sick, but a bit better, and still making sweet potatoes.  Today I give you the recipe I will actually use for my family's Thanksgiving dinner, as having tried so very many, I know with certainty this one is the best.  It comes from a magazine, not sure which, as I tore out the page years ago, and it stays folded up inside my Martha Stewart Cookbook all year.  It might have been Cooking Light, or maybe Vegetarian Times, as it gives the full rundown of nutritional information.

Extremely Serious, No Joke Spiced Sweet Potato Casserole

You will need:

3 lbs sweet potatoes
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
2 Tbs. butter
2 Tbs. orange juice concentrate
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
2 large eggs
1/4 cup chopped pecans

Cook the sweet potatoes either in the microwave or oven depending on the time you want to invest in this project.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Scoop the potato into a large bowl, add sugar, butter, OJ concentrate, cinnamon, salt and nutmeg.  Beat with a mixer at low speed.  Add eggs and beat until smooth.  Spoon into a baking dish - I will use a deep dish pie pan, and sprinkle with pagans, no not pagans, pecans, sprinkle with pecans.  Bake 45 minutes.  Can be made a day in advance, obviously, as I am making this right now and it is only Wednesday.

Sweet Potatoes for Unwanted Vegans

Dear Reader,

Every family has at least one.  They're at every Thanksgiving.  Vegans.  You can't make mashed potatoes, in my opinion, without butter and cream.  Likewise a proper stuffing is comprised mostly of butter and a little bit of sausage.  So what is left over for the vegans?  Cranberry sauce?  But what to put it on?  Here are some sweet potatoes that will satisfy even the most sanctimonious, patchouli-laden guest at your table.

Sweet Potatoes for Unwanted Vegans

You will need:
Sweet Potatoes
Orange
Cardamom
Salt
Pepper

Mash the sweet potatoes into a bowl resisting urge to smoke peels.  Squeeze on a little orange juice and mix in a dash of ground cardamom.  Season with salt and pepper.  Wash feet before sitting at table as that cheesy smell might go well with nutritional yeast dusted kale chips, but really ruins a freshly killed and roasted turkey.

Sweet Potatoes for Junkies

Dear Reader,

Every member of my family likes their sweet potatoes a different way, and I am sure your family is the same.  To satisfy all these many palates, I plan on offering you recipes for everyone at your table.  Today's version comes from my sister, who is NOT a junkie of the narcotic sort, but most definitely one of sugar.  No fear if the junkies in your family are more hard core, they will probably like this, too.  Enjoy!

Sweet Potatoes for Junkies

You will need:

Chewy Sweet Tarts
2 cans yams
1/2 box brown sugar
1 stick butter
1 bag marshmallows

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Place Chewy Sweet Tarts in microwave for 10 seconds to "loosen them up." Eat.  Open cans of yams.  Plop into a bowl and mash with a fork.  Melt butter in microwave and pour into potatoes.  Dump in half box brown sugar and stir, being careful to leave large chunks of brown sugar as special prizes inside mash.  Pour into large baking dish and spread.  Top with marshmallows - not mini-marshmallows, but the kind you can only fit three in your mouth at once, so that the ratio of marshmallow to sweet potato is roughly 2:1.  Bake until golden brown on top.  Brush teeth and make dental appointment.  If uninsured, have needle nosed pliers and bottle of whiskey on hand.

Sophisticated Cranberry Sauce For When You Are Intimidated By Your Guests

Dear Reader,

Thanksgiving can be fraught will all manner of insecurities, particularly if you are entertaining guests who scare the shit out of you.  Maybe you married for money and your new wealthy relatives are coming over, or your new boyfriend has much cooler friends than you are accustomed to, or you somehow managed to find a boyfriend or girlfriend at all, after many years of Hungry Man Turkey Dinners for one.  Whatever the case, you can NOT serve a gloppy can of cranberry sauce to these people.  I can help.

Sophisticated Cranberry Sauce For When You Are Intimidated By Your Guests

You will need:

Balsamic vinegar

Garlic

Dried cherries

Dried cranberries

Ella Fitzgerald CD

Artisanal Small Batch Wine

With the turkey in the oven, pour a quantity of vinegar into a sauce pan.  Add two cloves of whole, peeled garlic.  Put on Ella Fizgerald CD, as though some people might not love Ella Fitzgerald, nobody can argue that she is not worth listening to, and the choice of this sort of music says that you are familiar with music outside of the Nickleback and Rascal Flatts which take up most of the space on your iPod, and that you can appreciate arty things.  Toss in a handful of dried cherries and dried cranberries to the vinegar, and simmer.  Pour glass of small batch wine.  Purchasing this sort of wine eliminates the odds that you will buy a wine that is considered gauche or declasse, and if your guests have never heard of it, chances are they won't know it cost only $9.99.  Reduce the vinegar being careful not to stick your face directly over the saucepan as the fumes from the simmering vinegar will cause your throat to close up and your eyes to water.  Remove garlic.  When serving guests, the sauce may be smeared artistically beneath the turkey, dotted around the edge of the plate, or drizzled over the turkey, the choice is yours.  Just make sure you have a can of cranberry sauce on hand, because everybody likes that.

Sweet Potatoes for Homespun Minimalists

Dear Reader,
The fine people at CSN Stores once again asked me to review some of the products they have on offer.  I don't know if you know this, but CSNStores.com sells just about everything.  So with all that to choose from, I picked something I have wanted - NEEDED - for a long time.  But that has not arrived yet, so you will have to wait to hear about it.

I had a little money left over and settled upon a potato ricer, it being close to Thanksgiving, and just about the only time of year I would have need for such an item.  I chose the ricer made by OXO, because I am a fan of their ergonometric designs - not great to look at, but easy and comfortable to use, which is what you want in a device that is meant to squash an entire potato.  

My children, being born of another planet, do not like mashed potatoes, so I picked up some sweet potatoes.  I stuck them in the microwave (who has time for baking potatoes?) till they were soft, removed the peel, and stuck them in the bowl of the ricer, which was not quite large enough for one of the giant sweet potatoes, but most likely the right size for a Yukon Gold.  One squeeze and I had a perfect, lovely, velvety bowl of mash.  Just right for today's recipe.

Sweet Potatoes for Homespun Minimalists

You will need:

Sweet Potatoes

Butter

Salt

Pepper

Maple Syrup

Nothing else.  Nothing.

Prick potatoes all over with a fork and bake in a 475 degree oven for an hour or until they are soft.  You could do this in a microwave, if you didn't think they took up too much space on your counter.  Mash potatoes, add butter, salt, pepper and a dash of maple syrup to remind you of Mom and knickknacks.  Enjoy.

So wrong, but so right!

Dear Reader,

Occasionally I come across something that makes me slap my forehead and shout, "Why didn't I think of that?"  The personal computer is one of these things, as are the internet and the Home Shopping Network.  Now I have a new item to add to the list.  I give you the Turkey Cake.

The folks at Chow.com have come up with this really disturbing, but probably totally delicious, Thanksgiving invention.  Two layers of ground turkey, layered with mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, stuffing and "iced" with more mashed potatoes, and then sweet potatoes topped with mini-marshmallows browned gently in the oven.  Absolute heaven.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Dear Reader,

For me the best part of Thanksgiving, aside from the stuffing, is that it is socially acceptable to drink early in the day.  No matter what sort of holiday you are planning for today, from my family to yours - Cheers.

Warm regards,

Heather

Don't Give A Damn Yams

Dear Reader,

I have received another letter, this time from a gentleman that is truly in need of my help.  Please read:

Dear Heather,

I want a divorce!  Don't hate me, but my wife is a total nag constantly flirting with my friends.  Problem is, I'm not a total jerk and I don't want to leave her right before the holidays, right?  But we're going to her sister's house for Thanksgiving and they asked me to make the sweet potatoes.  I really couldn't care less and don't even like the stupid things.  Can you help me figure out what to make?

Fed up in Flagstaff,

Ted

Ted, you sound like a good guy and I would be happy to help!  For you, a recipe with a negative degree of difficulty is in order.  Enjoy!

Don't Give A Damn Yams

You will need:

3 cans yams

1 bag mini-marshmallows

Bourbon

Splash orange juice

Open up the canned yams.  If you can't find them at your grocery store, check the dollar store, as they are not an in-demand item, yet perfect for your needs.  Dump contents into some sort of dish.  Mash them down with a fork and have a shot of bourbon.  Spit some of bourbon over yams in the dish.  Stir with your finger.  Pour a glass of orange juice and stick your hand in it.  Then flick orange juice all over yams.  Eat some marshmallows because they are soft and yummy.  Scatter some on top of yams.  If you are feeling crafty, spell out "You People Suck" in marshmallow, then stick in the oven at 350 degrees until marshmallows are gooey and brown and as done as your marriage.

Ultimate Family Fight Apple Sausage Stuffing

Dear Reader,

Get out your boxing gloves, put on your cloak of indignation and get ready to hurl some insults and air some grievances.  Thanksgiving is coming!  Here's a delicious stuffing to serve to your ungrateful and insensitive family.  Enjoy!

Ultimate Family Fight Apple Sausage Stuffing

You will need:

Pencil

Paper

2 Tbs. olive oil

1 lb. sausage

2 celery stalks, chopped

1 onion, diced

2 Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored and chopped

1 shallot, diced

1 Tbs. chopped parsley

2 tsp. fresh sage, minced

1 bay leaf

1 lb. loaf French bread

1 cup milk

1 cup chicken broth

3 Tbs. butter, melted

3 eggs, beaten

1 cup cooked chestnuts

Escape plan

The day before Thanksgiving, make a list of guests who will be dining with you.  Included should be the usual unpleasant cast of characters, but their spouses and children as well.  Leave plenty of room between each name to write down the myriad ways they have belittled, embarrassed and taken advantage of you over the past year.

Heat oil in a large skillet and brown sausage.  Transfer sausage to another plate and consider asking for a transfer at work so that next year you can have a nice holiday spent either alone or with friends rather than family.  Note how sausage smells exactly like your cousin Jared, and plan to sit at other end of table from him this year.  Add celery, onions, apples, shallots and herbs to pan and cook until vegetables soften like the jowls on your manic depressive sister who totally denied putting a huge dent in the side of your car even though she was the only one driving it because your other sister was, once again, too drunk and needed a safe ride home, and neither of them have a job and so can't afford a car of their own.  Add sausage to vegetables.

Remembering the fistfight that broke out between your father and your brother at your high school graduation, tear bread into cubes with your bare hands and your anger.  Throw it in with the sausage like your mom threw out all of your old yearbooks and everything else that ever mattered to you in the whole world when she selfishly moved into that condo.  Crumble in the chestnuts, recalling that in the sixth grade your brother used to refer to your burgeoning breasts as "chestnuts" in front of the whole school bus.

Heat milk, butter and broth in a pot and pour over stuffing.  Crack eggs like you would the skulls of your idiot cousins who prank call you at work every day and mix it into the stuffing.  Season with salt and pepper.

Smear butter all over a large baking dish, the way your drunken sister apparently did with your Marc Jacobs pants she borrowed when she said she was going on a job interview but really was just going out with the guy who sells cell phones at the kiosk in the mall.  The guy that you saw first.

Throw everything in the pan and cook at 350 degrees for about 50 minutes or until golden brown.  Remove from oven and realize that the best part of Thanksgiving is the stuffing. The ultimate revenge would be to not bring it to dinner and eat it all yourself.  Turn off phone, lights and oven.  Enjoy stuffing with peace and quiet.

Drunken Grandma Cranberry Sauce

Dear Reader,

It's that time of year again!  If your family is anything like mine, the holidays mean many things- coming together, family and that Grandma is hitting the sauce pretty hard.  This year, hit her back - not literally  - a broken hip is expensive!  But with a little sauce of the cranberry variety.

Drunken Grandma Cranberry Sauce

You will need:

1 bag fresh cranberries

3/4 cup sugar

1/4 cup brown sugar

Vodka

Cointreau

Orange peel

Robert Goulet records

First, figure out where she has hidden the vodka.  Check the garage, the bathroom and her socks.  If you can't find it, try to remove Cosmo from Grandma's hand.  Be careful because the arthritis has made her fist into a pretty tight claw, and those fingers are brittle!  If it is not possible to remove tumbler, lure her over to the stove by asking to hear her stories about how much fun they had during the war.  When she is not expecting it, knock into her so the Cosmo in her glass tips into a measuring cup.

Grandma's yelling is going to frighten the children, so tell them Grandma just heard that some of them have been naughty, and she's going to get them if they don't sit quietly and wait for dinner.

In a sauce pot, heat cranberries with a half cup of water and the sugar.  Bring to a boil like Grandma's temper.  Play some Robert Goulet records and offer to dance with her to calm her down.  To get her out of your hair, spin her around really quickly so that she needs to go lie on the couch.  Lower the heat and simmer for 15 minutes while she "closes her eyes."

Pour sauce into a mixing bowl to cool.  Conspire with other family members while Grandma is sleeping.  A fun game is to switch names!  And calling Grandma "Jack" is sure to lead to hours of confusing fun after dinner!

When sauce is cool, stir in Grandma's Cosmo and garnish with orange peel.  To keep children from eating this sauce, stick a Brussels Sprout on top.  Enjoy with turkey, stuffing or a beer chaser.