What A Feast!

[plumtreeblossom]

Thanksgiving at the Wabbit House was perfect! Our small-ish gathering of 7 didn't feel small at all, and we had a huge yet casual meal with epic laughter and free-flowing libations. Our guests brought pies, cranberry sauce, pan-roasted winter vegetables, excellent scotch and port and wine and I'm probably forgetting something(s). We roasted up a 20-pound turkey that could have fed 20 people, had stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, green bean casserole, cornbread, and more. This was the first year that I successfully made my own pan gravy. Previous years I have either failed and had to fall back on jarred gravy, or asked a guest to make it. This time, victory was mine!

I sound like a glutton listing off everything we stuffed in our mouths. The company was jovial and joyful, and beowabbit and I deeply grateful to our guests for making it such a success.

Neither Wabbit nor I know how to carve a poultry in neat slices the way you always see in food photography. We just sort of hack at it, and the chunks of meat still taste as good, but it's kind of a Cro-Magnon style of service. We'll have to work in the coming year to learn to carve civilized-like.

There's so much I'm also grateful for, but they deserve their own post, and Piggy-Girl has leftovers on her mind. (You can probably tell I'm hungry. :-)) I'm enjoying reading about everyone else's holiday, too!

Comments

[mindflankr.livejournal.com]

Congratulations on mastering pan-gravy! Sounds like you had a wonderful day.

BTW, NO ONE is able to carve a hot turkey and have it look like the photos in magazines. It is actually quite easy to perfectly slice a bird when it is cold.....it just doesn't taste nearly as good and hot, 'Cro-Magnon' style turkey!

[daisytells.livejournal.com]

Mindflanker is so right! Time was when I lacked a proper carving knife so made the initial cut with a small very sharp paring knife, then tore the meat from the bones in chunks. It was FINE! That's what I do with leftover turkey now, just tear it off the bones -- then I make soup from the bones and any bits of meat that cling to them. I freeze the leftover turkey in two-serving portions for later use in sandwiches or hot turkey plates or casseroles of various types, oh yeah and turkey salad, too.
Sounds like you guys had one heckuva party! Very nice.

[ka9sqb.livejournal.com]

Sounds like a great time; sorry we couldn't be there.
Re. leftovers, I look at a Thanksviging dinner as the
gift that keeps on giving.
Anon, Don