Category: Cooking/Food/Health

So much of Thanksgiving these days is associated with eating, but the most important part of Thanksgiving is taking a moment to simply say thanks.  2008 was definitely my hardest year and lots of people helped me get through it, which was amazing.  Like every year I’ll do a blog post to recap the year, so I won’t say too much, but 2009 has been fantastic.  It has had some stressful times, like any, but it has to be one of my favorite years so far.

In 2009, I’m thankful for my fantastic little man, Tyler.  I’m thankful for the patience he has taught me and is still teaching me.  I’m thankful for my parents, who I’ll be seeing again in less than a month.  I’m thankful for my sister, my brother-in-law, and my awesome nephew.  I’m thankful for my girlfriend of almost a year, who is crazy enough to love a single dad and all the difficulties that come along with it.  I’m thankful for my friends, my co-workers, family, extended family, and my reading audience!  I was going to send an email to everyone but figured anyone who really knows me knows to check my blog, so happy Thanksgiving to all and thanks!

OK, so now that we have that “lovey-dovey” stuff out of the way, let’s talk turkey!  My man Alton Brown was at Google this week to answer some Thanksgiving questions.  If you want to watch the full hour-long video, you can do so here in HD.  I liked the turkey frying section of the video (embedded above) because I’ve always wanted to try a fried turkey.  Maybe in a year or two I’ll try it, and you know I’ll blog about it.  I went to my local Safeway and bought a frozen turkey, and I have no idea why.  I’m a holiday guy and even though I may have that turkey in my freezer for two more years, I’ll be ready, and it was only 80 cents a pound!  Any way, here are my notes from Alton Brown’s Thanksgiving talk in case you don’t have time to watch the full video:

• Don’t baste the turkey!  People think it makes the skin crispy, but if you put milk on your corn flakes, does it make your cereal crispy?  Of course not, and neither does basting your turkey.
• If you brine your turkey, it will help keep the moisture in (no basting needed) and gives the turkey extra flavor.
• Frozen are generally better unless the turkey is really fresh meaning you didn’t buy it from a grocery store, which is rare.  Here in California, I think my Safeway frozen turkey will work just fine.
• White meat is from the fast twitch muscles and the dark meat is from slow twitch muscles.  I’m a white meat kind of guy myself.

I had marble soda for the first time last night and I loved it.  So the gimmick is there is a marble inside the soda…get it…marble soda?  The marble doesn’t actually come out of the bottle but as your drinking it you think you’ll swallow it.  You can see the blue marble about 3/4 of the way up the bottle in the photo above.  I have no idea what the bottle actually says (probably “Pepsi”) but if you know please leave a comment.  I give marble soda a thumbs up.  I got my new camera delivered today and I’m really happy with it so far.  I’ll blog more on that later but this picture was taken with it and as you can see it is going to do a great job for me.

Gary sent me this recipe because he knows I love my breakfast of champions food…Pop-Tarts!  OK I’ve been given a hard time for eating them so I have cut way back but man they are tasty.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup all purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon sugar
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
• 2 tablespoons cold water for mixing
• 1 cup homemade preserves/jam from organic fruit such as apple, apricot, cherry, wild blueberry, cherry, mango or your favorite fruit flavor
• Powdered sugar
• Note: Choose an organic store bought jam if you don’t have time to make your own.

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Place the flour in a bowl with the salt, sugar, and cut the butter into small pieces. Work the flour and butter together with your hands, until the mixture is well blended. Sprinkle the water over the mixture to smooth out the any small irregular clumps. Work the dough vigorously until it is relatively smooth. You may also use a food processor, if desired. Wrap in plastic and let the dough rest 30 minutes.
2. Roll out the tart dough on a cold lightly floured surface. The dough should be about 1/8″ inch thick. Cut rolled out dough into 3″ by 5″ shapes, using a postcard as a visual gauge. (For smaller tarts, simply use a smaller measurement.) Cut 8 rectangles, and use a pastry scraper to place 4 bottoms onto cookie sheet lined with parchment. Place 2 to 3 tablespoons of jam onto the center of each pastry of the 4 bottoms. Place the 4 pastry tops onto the jam centers, aligning the corners. Press the edges with a fork, until each tart is closed, working around the entire rectangle. (These may be prepared ahead of time and refrigerated or frozen.)
3. Bake for 25 minutes, or until the tarts are golden brown. Serve immediately with a sprinkling of powdered sugar.

When I was driving back from Portland almost a month ago I took this picture using my iPhone.  I stopped for a milkshake at Burger King (I love me some ice cream), but found the drink recipes fascinating so I took a picture of it.  If you try them let me know if they are any good.