Dammit I was going to use just that Messiaen on my house music mix.
Dammit Messiaen are you fucking kidding me it's not even Thanksgiving yet.
Anyhow I'm going to upload one of these mixes I have sitting around here, and then everybody can dance, dance, dance.
Speaking of Thanksgiving, I just found out today that I am hosting this year. Yay. The friend who was going to host has been in the hospital with a sick baby for the past few days, so it falls to me. I can't say I'm displeased.
That Princeton irony lady is going to love this one.
AWB is objectively pro-sick-baby!
There's not a track on this mix that I don't sincerely like, though I admit I'm not exactly head over heels about Current 93.
Nooo! I have been rather worked up about the sick baby, actually, but I do like hosting dinners at my house. I have a big table and all the people who are coming are awesome.
I don't have a mix handy, but this chiptune version of Let It Snow has been in my canon for almost a decade now.
Okay! Zeno of Elea Mix, have at it.
Tracklist: I totally don't remember. But it's named after the first song, so I remember that one. It's "Zeno of Elea" by Kelley Polar. It has a bunch of remixed hipster shit, lots of dancey stuff, some kinda bailé funk kinda stuff, one hilariously, randomly sexist dancefloor anthem, a couple of boneheaded DJ fuckups, some breakbeat. You'll love it.
Oh uh and yeah totally christmasy, sure.
I'm sorry, I shouldn't tease about sick babies!
This version of Jingle Rock Bell is a classic, and the remix, Ringle Bock Jell, is not to be missed.
Also Christmas Rhapsody.
13: It's OK; he seems to be better. Sudden bout of very bad pneumonia, and had to be taken to Actual City an hour away because the hospital here in Wolfcub Town has limitations.
Also John Fahey! What, no one is going to tell me and neb to get a room?
Your room is too small for us both, Smearcase; we'll have to go to a full-on house in Montauk instead.
I will put in a Finnish rug with two whales on it from a shop in Amagansett and then it will be adorably ironic or something that the room is so small.
but I do like hosting dinners at my house.
Yeah, me too. About to host my first American Thanksgiving dinner ever, and I have a question about cranberry sauce. Namely: does anyone actually eat this? Would its absence be noted and mourned or decried? or not even noticed at all? Is it worth making, in other words? Okay, that's more than one question, obviously, but they're all related.
Canned cranberry sauce is gross and people don't actually like it though maybe they're nostalgic for it? Cranberry sauce that you make is simple and tart and delicious but contains shocking heaps of sugar.
We would usually have both kinds. People would eat them.
23 is right. It's very very easy to make. (Sometimes I get nostalgic for the canned kind. Not so much the taste, but the blorp sound it makes when it plops out of the can, and how we would try to slice along the corrugations.)
I was never all that fond of either kind, but to be honest I've never been very fond of most traditional Thanksgiving foods.
I would be so annoyed if whole berry sauce were not present that I generally would have offered to bring some just to guarantee its presence. I feel very strongly about cranberry sauce.
Make the sauce, MC. Make the sauce.
It is just too easy to make to be worth not making. And it can be done the day before.
OTOH mashed potatoes are a hassle, and way more trouble than they're worth.
Cranberry sauce (not the canned kind, Pat Nixon) is awesome and is completely vital to the turkey/gravy/stuffing/hominy/sauerkraut flavor nexus.
Nah, don't bother with any marshmallow yam dish if you're cutting corners.
I'm very fond of a food-processor cranberry relish; it's not as sweet as most sauces. 12oz fresh berries, segments of one orange plus zest, 1/4c Cointreau, up to 1/2c sweetener of your choice (I usually use some white sugar and some maple syrup). Pulse until large chunks are gone.
I have happily avoided the dish with the marshmallows I think without exception. Blume finds it baffling that I have managed this.
35: that might have gotten a bit specific to my family there.
27: I feel the same way about brown-and-serve rolls.
I guess we're going to some kind of @ist alternative T-giving this year, as my main relative will be out of town. Burning some pilgrims in effigy and shit, I gather.
I would be so annoyed if whole berry sauce were not present
Holy crap! now you're scaring me ... So there are varieties and hierarchies of cranberry sauce? "Whole berry" = not minced? not jellied? not from a can? I'm in way over my head, obviously.
But is cranberry sauce in America like mincemeat pie in Canada, is I guess what I am asking? Something you feel you should serve, for the sake of tradition, even though nobody under the age of 60 (50? 70? 40?) will even notice, since they never eat that old-fashioned stuff?
Yeah I'm not clear on how one might never encounter the marshmallow thing. It's ubiquitous and never good.
34
That is the kind my mother makes, and it's delicious and fresh tasting. But yes, you need cranberry sauce, even if it's just from a can.
I second cutting out mashed potatoes, as they are gross. Plus, who needs two types of potato at one meal.
Hominy?
I wanted to host a thanksgiving this year but I didn't get my act together in time.
You can buy whole berry sauce in a can and I'd be mollified. Or the pulsed kind Nathan mentions is fine, although not usually purchased in a can. Just not the sliced jelly from a can shit.
But is cranberry sauce in America... [s]omething you feel you should serve, for the sake of tradition, even though nobody under the age of 60 (50? 70? 40?) will even notice, since they never eat that old-fashioned stuff?
No.
39.last: I definitely always eat it, with dinner and as an additional topping on sandwiches later.
Nathan's recipe is a good one.
There are two main kinds of cranberry sauce: the jellied kind that comes in a can, and the whole-berry kind that does not. Both are considered traditional for American Thanksgiving, though many families only do one or the other. People do eat them. Not having any cranberry sauce at all would definitely be noticed, and some of those who noticed would be displeased.
37 to 43. But hominy with turkey gravy is really highly recommended.
Cranberry sauce is delicious. What 45/46 said.
MC
People tend to eat cranberry sauce. IME there is a turkey/cranberry sauce vs. turkey/gravy split in what sort of flavor people like to give their turkey. I suppose some barbarians do a turkey/gravy/cranberry mixture, but then there's no accounting for some tastes.
Of course I was young, I didn't eat cranberry sauce or gravy, and just put butter my slice of turkey, so I might not be an expert here.
I would accept a cranberry pie or cranberry cobbler.
MC, you don't have to make it fancy if it seems like a hassle: buy a bag of berries, put in a pot with like a half cup of sugar and some orange juice. Cook until they pop, and then cook a little more. You can do this a day or two in advance.
But yes, you have to have it, and everyone (not just the old folks) will eat it.
I like to put a big pile of cranberry sauce in the center of my plate, and then add little bits of each dish around it, so that it's available for everything.
52: Yeah, whole-berry cranberry sauce is definitely one of those foods that benefits from a couple days in the refrigerator. It's not something you're generally bolting down in great globs -- it's nice to have a bit of it to tarten up the other foods though.
I carefully arrange my plate so that my cranberry sauce only touches the turkey, but the gravy touches the turkey, potatoes and stuffing. If the cranberry sauce and the gravy touch, it's the end of the world and the holidays are ruined.
I love how the Christmas music thread has become the Thanksgiving food thread. My mother would approve.
We could serve you in those kids plates with the sections, jms.
I don't think I've ever seen a cranberry sauce made with whole cranberries. When you cook 'em they tend to burst.
57. But do the sections have channels so the gravy can communicate?
Another fascinating difference between my family and heebies's.
By "made with whole cranberries" in 58 I obviously meant "containing, as a finished product, more whole cranberries than cranberries that aren't whole." Made with whole cranberries, sure.
Hmm. You'd maybe be better off with two smaller plates, I now think. What about using one of those stacked hors d'ourves display sets? Three plates of descending radius connected by a spine?
Mine very much loves secular Christmas. And secular Easter too.
63. Maybe this year I'll serve dinner in muffin pans. I'll need to come up with twelve different dishes.
My mom that is, not my whole cranberries, which are inanimate.
We generally have cranberry sauce, sometimes the can monster stuff as well, and usually some kind of cranberry salad. And nobody gets urinary tract infections for months.
The cranberry sauce can only touch the white turkey meat and only then on the side away from the gravy.
My mom that is, not my whole cranberries, which are inanimate.
I hear that Jammies knows how to animate your whole cranberries.
Jeez you guys, it's all going the same place in the end!
Mine very much loves secular Christmas. And secular Easter too.
Whereas mine loves Thanksgiving precisely because it's secular (and also because her birthday is in late November and I think she sort of associates the two). She actually does like the extremely secular way my dad's family celebrates Christmas and Easter, but I don't think she can ever really think of those as holidays that she celebrates personally, as opposed to sometimes joining her in-laws' celebration.
You mean that I like having sex with him? Its true.
73: I feel similarly to your mom.
74 not to 72, but to 71. Of course.
I also like the secularity of Thanksgiving! I also like the (admittedly not often rigorously observed) theme of reflective thankfulness!
I'm not so jazzed about the pudenda origo, but you can't escape that.
Yes. Embarrassed, disappointed.
I'm not even annoyed by the 30 days of gratitude folks in my FB feed! I think they're all overly stressed out moms who I usually feel bad for.
Dammit, jms, we were trying to keep the sordid affair between Jammies and neb's mom a secret. Now they'll both have to resign.
58, 62: By that definition I've never seen whole wheat flour.
I like the idea of Thanksgiving, but as noted upthread I don't actually most of the food very much. Which is unfortunate, since that's most of the content of the holiday. The giving thanks part is nice, though.
Oh yes. MC, do make sure your gravy is sufficiently who
Ped and frothed.
Whipped and frothed. MC, traditional thanksgiving gravy is like a merengue. You'll want to freeze it a few days ahead of time and seve it from an ice cube tray.
58, 62: By that definition I've never seen whole wheat flour.
Well if "sauce made from whole berries" is all that people meant, then sure. I didn't know! "whole-berry sauce" is not a phrase I'd ever seen before. Maybe it's, like, cranberries macerated in sugar.
Talkin' Walkin' Gravy Pedestrian Blues
Ped and Frothed, Twenty Years at BBC.
89: You can clearly see the remains of the globular berries throughout the sauce. They haven't been pureed or whatever happens to them other cranberries, in a factory downtown, before a man puts them there in the can.
The confusion over what "whole cranberry sauce" means reminds me of this story from Chowhound.
Remember, MC, each diner will expect a pressed duck.
Tradition holds that you cuff the hands and blindfold whoever gets the turkey slice injected with bb pellets.
93: I hear it's also real good with white phosphorous.
And to bring the two threads together, it took intermediate google-fu to relocate that story. The query that did it was:
site:chow.com "israeli couscous" exploded "like garbage"
Also slash the tires of your favorite guests, as the traditional way to say "you're welcome to stay all week long!"
Thanksgiving is basically the American version of this. Not every one gets it right the first time.
At some previous moment, you will have made the stuffing for the quenelles. (This is what makes the stuffing "double.") It consists of the milt of the fish and the sweetbreads of the lamb, both the neck and stomach varieties. (Don't forget to mention them to your butcher.) The milt is rapidly blanched. The sweetbreads are diced, salted, spiced with freshly ground hot pepper, and tossed for 6 minutes in clarified butter. Both are then chopped very fine (blender permitted) and kneaded into an unctuous mass with the help of 1 cup of lamb marrow and 3 tbsp of aged Madeira.
Traditionally, the host gives each of the guests syphilis before they leave.
Via the mashed yams with marshmallows.
101: Does it have to be after they arrive, or can this be done in advance?
If 102 was to 99, those don't sound very sharp.
104: I thought it was customarily served warm. Isn't there an old Klingon proverb to that effect?
No, no. You slash their tires by embedding glass shards along your driveway, and for good measure the walkway up to your front door.
107: How does that target the favorite guests?
You know what the secret of syphilis is?
You buy glass shards that match their shoes.
In America, if the host is not in a position to legally pardon the turkey, guests will look askance if he or she does not offer to take its place.
111: Thus reminding me of the porn magazine cover I found most disturbing.
109: scabs should be openly weeping?
Hey, speaking of Thanksgiving! hg, I'm gonna be in your neck of the woods this week. (And yes, I'm a dolt for not mentioning this earlier.) Will anyone be around?
Mine very much loves secular Christmas
Am curious, did the Christmas party in Driving Miss Daisy get remarked upon in your family?
Unless I'm wrong, both GSpot and Tits showed up in the crossword today.
GSpot was definitely in the Times Magazine crossword today. I don't think I got to "tits" yet.
118: Unless you meant to write "[...] both 'GSpot' and 'Tits' showed up [...]", you receive a very disturbing newspaper.
119 -- curiously, both the Sunday NYT AND the Juggs Magazine crossword.
The Juggs crossword consists entirely of synonyms.
The author of the post will be interested to know that Edmund Welles has a Christmas album in the works.
122: I thought your version of Paleo was no-milk.
Those are Halford's nicknames for Mel Ott and Parseghian.
126: "Sunday NYT" and "Juggs Magazine"?
Mel "GSpot" Ott and Ara "tits" Paraseghian. Because I'm pro-explicitness.
130: W00t! Brunch next weekend? Or does something else work better?
Teo might be interested to know that as of now (preliminary counts), Alaska (4.42%) and New Mexico (4.17%) are 1-2 in % of third-party candidate votes in the 2012 election.
132: Interesting. Do you have a breakdown of the share of that between Johnson and Stein?
For AK it looks like about 2.5:1:1 Johnson:Stein:Write-ins.
I couldn't find comparable data for the 2012 general election the NM SOS website. They may just not have posted it yet.
Just thing of what it would have been if Roseanne Barr and Virgil Goode had made the ballots.
Or if the Alaskan Independence Party had fielded a candidate.
1. The anti-mashed potato remarks are lunatic. I will allow that they are not strictly necessary if there are mashed sweet potatoes, but they are wonderful and not hard to make.
2. For the sweet potatoes, skip the marshmallows and brown sugar and add nothing but brown butter. Crazy good.
3. Thanksgiving isn't intended to be secular; you're supposed to be thanking god. It's easy enough to ignore that part but it's implicit for many people.
4. I once spent an absolutely gorgeous fall Thanksgiving day with friends in DFH college town. We went our for a walk and ran into an acquaintance who, without a trace of irony, wished us "Happy Native American Oppression Day."
Thanksgiving isn't intended to be secular; you're supposed to be thanking god. It's easy enough to ignore that part but it's implicit for many people.
Well, okay, but at least it doesn't explicitly involve talking about Jesus by name. That's a big deal for Jewish people.
The War Against Christmas isn't enough for You People?
PUT THE CHRIST BACK IN THANKSCHRISTGIVINGCHRIST!!1
You don't even want to know what we have in mind for Independchrist Day.
Or as we like to call it, the Fourth of Jewly.
136: From the NYTimes site for NM (they are behind the site I get votes from, but it doesn't break out the individual minor candidates). Highest % for Johnson as far as I can tell (not a surprise I guess):
Gary Johnson Lib. 27,337 3.5%
Jill Stein Green 2,641 0.3%
Rocky Anderson Other 1,151 0.1%
Virgil Goode Con. 973 0.1%
1. Someone brought cranberry sauce with grated ginger to our house and it was really good.
2. I made cranberry ice cream one year, which involved pureed cranberries, lime, orange juice, and triple sec. I'd make it every year, but no one else likes ice cream as much as I do.
3.The fiery sweet potatoes recipe from the NYT several years ago has become a Thanksgiving staple for us. You can omit the brown sugar from the recipe.
4. The first year I went to Tweety's family's Thanksgiving, I was dismayed to find that the much vaunted family recipe pumpkin pie was barely edible. Happily, I learned in years later that his mom had forgotten some key ingredients that year. No sugar and no butter, or something like that. It was basically pumpkin pie filling and bourbon.
Ok, I will make a cranberry sauce. But I'm not serving that dish with the marshmallows.
And mashed potatoes are essential, if not vital to the maintenance of life.
I second cutting out mashed potatoes, as they are gross.
As a rule, Americans do not have a fucking clue how to make mashed potatoes properly, and they end up soggy, whipped to death, and with undercooked lumps in. My mashed spuds, on the other hand, are a kind of starch-based transcendental experience.
146.4: I made a pumpkin pie like that once. Stood there, reading the directions and forgot to put in a couple of important ingredients.
The Penzey's pumpkin pie pre-blended spices are really, really good. Not that neb would ever stoop that low, but you know, for everybody else.
I really love mashed potatoes and I've never even seen Gonerill's potatoes.
146.4: Maybe the ratio was off because that sounds pretty good.
On the other hand, anything involving sweet potato is an abomination in the face of the Lord.
Mashed potatoes are the best, but Gonerill is correct that they really ought not be whipped (there lies wallpaper paste).
The Penzey's pumpkin pie pre-blended spices are really, really good.
I like all their spice blends I've tried. When I have their Turkish seasoning in the house, I have a hard time not sprinkling it into my hand and eating it. I was just now looking at their website to pick out some mixes as a Christmas gift for my dad, whose cooking mostly consists of frozen fish or frozen chicken breast cooked on the George Foreman grill and some frozen veggies microwaved with a pat of butter.
That sounds really healthy, but a bit dull.
I also love mashed potatoes. Not whipped. Especially with the skins in there, the way my mom makes them.
I like yams; I just don't like the hyper-sweetened dish that shows up at Thanksgiving.
People tend to eat cranberry sauce. IME there is a turkey/cranberry sauce vs. turkey/gravy split in what sort of flavor people like to give their turkey. I suppose some barbarians do a turkey/gravy/cranberry mixture, but then there's no accounting for some tastes.
I'm a turkey/gravy/cranbarry barbarian. Sometimes I even have both types of cranberry sauce. Never done the marshmallow yam thing, though. Just butter and salt. Then again, my family hasn't done Thanksgiving on the proper Thanksgiving day for as long as I can remember, so I'm not in any position to be making normative statements about Thanksgiving dinners.
Normally, Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. But, this year, we are all going in different directions. It will be quiet and a little less fun.
I hate these foodie fuckwads who are always all like "oh it's such a tragedy we have to eat Turkey on thanksgiving, it fails to capture the sweet taste of chicken or other juicier meats.". Shut the fuck up. Turkey is delicious and super tasty, so eat it up if you are an American on thanksgiving and stop being a dickhead.
I am not much of a cook. But, during Thanksgiving week, I love to try to mix different things together for unusual pies or unusual stuffings.
Also unduly sweetened sweet potatoes are horrible, but sweet potatoes are great. Also cranberry sauce mixes nicely with gravy so just eat that. Simple foods, plain words, can't lose.
sweet potatoes are great. Also cranberry sauce mixes nicely with gravy
It's like you want to kill yourself. So, so sad. *sniff*
For halford, cranberry sauce=raw cranberries and gravy=elk blood.
Top of the morning to you, Robert.
Sweet potatoes are totalmente paleo, although Ive kind of lost track of the science of why. Check out this stuffing recipe:
http://paleocomfortfoods.com/in-the-kitchen/paleo-comfort-foods-time-for-stuffing/
When I dated the conflicted hippie who had been raised super Baptist, it was important to his family to convey to me that Sunday dinner (the kind served at noon) was more important than Thanksgiving. So when I had Thanksgiving with them, we had to wait until 3 or 4 on Sunday afternoon to return back to Austin, which I found super annoying.
OTOH, Orthodox Jews have a similar hierarchy with almost anything compared to Shabbos, but there I was a wayward member of the in-group, which didn't chafe me as much as being considered a sketchy member of hell-bound fast-talkers.
And by "there" I mean a different boyfriend, in the same early 20s period of my life.
You can also make cranberry sauce with no added sugar. Just boil those little btches until they pop and add some fucking orange zest or nutmeg or something.
Have you actually tried eating it without sugar? That's some bitter, bitter, bitter sauce you'd be making.
Ive kind of lost track of the science of why
I'm sure it's all perfectly rational and well-supported.
166: Dinner in the middle of the day! I thought this only survived in rural Ireland and parts of northern England (& maybe Scotland?)
I think you can also add some motherfucking fruit juice (whole fruit) to cut down on the bitter. I've been personally banned from the family Thanksgiving kitchen, though, so it's more dream than reality.
That's quite the stuffing recipe, Robert. Does anyone actually cook that?! (it's basically stuffing a turkey with a mess of fried pork).
159: I imagine someone who cooks turkey into a tasteless white lump will do the same with chicken.
171: I'm sure it's all perfectly rational and well-supported.
Something like sweet potatoes are totes OK, but yams are the devil. Or maybe the other way around.
172: it is somewhat common here as a special occasion thing (but not as a weekly thing except among the families of heebie's weirdo boyfriends).
Only one of the weirdo boyfriends.
Dinner in the middle of the day!
I grew up with this. Dinner at noon, supper at six.
172, 178: Grew up with that, and my folks generally continue with early afternoon Sunday dinner.
What's that you were saying about the weirdo families of one's love interests, Sifu?
I think it's that sweet potatoes don't contain lectins, which are noted for fucking you up somehow. So they're fattening but paleo.
175 -- because my so-called "family" doesn't let me take over the cooking so that we can eat like humans and not like fucking grain slaves, I haven't eaten that yet. But you could take a step forward for team awesome and make it.
Be the stuffing you want to see in the world, Hal.
172: Growing up, most people in my town at breakfast, dinner, and supper. My family ate breakfast, lunch, and dinner because I don't know why.
181: no no, not the families. Just your boyfriends.
Like every single day? We occasionally had Sunday dinner at about 1 pm followed by a supper, and definitely did that for holidays like Christmas or Easter, but would never have called the ordinary midday meal "dinner" and not "lunch."
187: Yep. It tended to be families where everybody came home for lunch.
Like every single day?
Yes for my town. It was changing when I was a kid; we had lunch at school and I carried a lunchbox, but my grandparents and sometimes my parents still called it a dinner pail.
I cannot decide whether the secular character of Thanksgiving is supported or undermined by the many classically passive-aggressive Protestant grace-sayings I have heard at the Thanksgiving table, wherein text ("Thanks, Jesus!") has often been overwhelmed by subtext ("You people are selfish assholes; now shut up and listen to me. Christ, give me the strength not to murder my extended family before dessert.").
Take me home, to the flatlands
Good old welcome-back-lands
Where the wavin' fields of wheat say come back soon (Come back soon)
Take me home, to that little town where everyone's your neighbor
And the family ate dead chickens every Sunday afternoon.
192: We just say regular grace like always.
wavin' fields of wheat
Fuck. Oklahoma! earworm.
182.1: Dicots good! Monocots bad!
I'd make it every year, but no one else likes ice cream as much as I do.
HARD TO BELIEVE.
Also, my mashed potatoes are excellent.
What do nosflow's mashed potatoes bring to the yard?
How fiery could 1 T of curry paste make an entire 5 lb of sweet potatoes?
Huddled masses, yearning for gravy.
re: 201
Surely that depends on the curry paste?
re: 201
E.g. is it some sort of evil Thai paste, that's 95% very strong chillies? Or is it some sort of milquetoast Indian paste, that's not?
201: The dryish stuff you can buy in a jar at any regular grocery doesn't make it very hot, but a tablespoon of the moist stuff in the bigger tubs from the Asian grocery gives some heat. I definitely recommend adding the curry paste to taste in that recipe. (Maybe it's named according to the palate of your unadventurous great aunt who'll be there on Thanksgiving.)
I just recalled that while my mashed potatoes are of course excellent, a nice alternative is to make a rutabaga/celeriac puree by poaching rutabaga and celeriac in milk and then ... pureeing them.
Patrick O'Brian's naval novels are excellent at showing the creeping onward of the fashionable dinner hour, leaving those of a traditional disposition to pine until it was reached. I understand that dinner eventually became so late that a nuncheon was required to stave off hunger pangs. Nuncheon -> luncheon . But you all knew that.
Patrick O'Brian's naval novels are excellent
Agreed.
209 is interesting! In contrast to the crappy canned blazing sour Thai curries, Harissa is excellent. My most recent instant food discovery: Vietnamese packaged instant pho is pretty good.
Oh man, I should have been reading this thread all along.
1. The anti-mashed potato remarks are lunatic. I will allow that they are not strictly necessary if there are mashed sweet potatoes, but they are wonderful and not hard to make.
2. For the sweet potatoes, skip the marshmallows and brown sugar and add nothing but brown butter. Crazy good.
Advice on making mashed potatoes? I've signed up to bring them this year. Cooks Illustrated says steamed, butter first, then half-and-half.
Those sweet potatoes sound PERFECT, since my preference would be to just eat sweet potatoes roasted in their skin. I always skip a sweetened version.
I generally dislike a pumpkin pie and skip that, too. A pumpkin-mascarpone pie won Pie Contest one year. Everyone who liked pumpkin pie LOVED it, and those of us who don't like pumpkin pie thought it was the only edible one we'd ever had. I made it for Tgiving that year and people loved it. But honestly, I think the pumpkin pie diehards like the familiarity of the version they like better than anything they're actually tasting.
I have a question! About cakes. It is long enough that I will give it its own comment.
Bakers, please! I have questions.
We got a Bundt pan this year (diagonal stripes) so now we are super excited for cakes. I'm proposing to make two on two different nights, to serve 18 people. (We had to get a second Bundt pan. Now I'm sorta delighted by them and went looking for them online. Did you know you can get an octopus bundt pan? I need one.) My questions:
Do you have a flour/sugar ratio you like? Virtually all recipes are too sweet for me, and I always scant the sugar (which has backfired in some pies and jams). I sorta peg cake amounts to the eggs (half an egg per person will scale to the right amount of cake). But I'd like to have a rule of thumb for sugar. As I double or triple the recipes, I can't stand to double the sugar. Any thoughts on a good ratio?
Apple cake one night; I've made and liked the Smitten Kitchen apple cake. So that's resolved (yes, I scant the sugar, half a cup or so).
I'm looking at an orange cake for the other night. The two accents I'm thinking of are chocolate and cranberries. That sounds too busy for me, but we have two bundt pans. I can mix chocolate chunks into one and cranberries into the other. So my real question is how to prep the cranberries. Chopped, sugared and boiled? Sweetener besides sugar? Bundt cakes can withstand a swirl of stuff, right? So I could mix in some stewed cranberries?
Please advise.
Yr humble servant,
Megan
Tell me what to do better please, nosflow? The pedants at CI claimed that boiling led to a thin and watery mashed potato dish and that steaming them whole was superior in every way.
I love cranberry sauce. The jelly is hard to make from scratch, but the whole berry kind is delicious. Water sugar and orange juice are all it takes. Cranberry relish like the stuff that Nathan's talking about is delicious too, especially with old turkey leftovers.
Neither cake is for Thanksgiving night itself, which is properly celebrated only with pies.
I won't eat cranberry sauce unless I can see the marks from the rings on the can.
Boil the hell out of the potatoes and just make sure they're well drained. Butter, salt, perhaps a tablespoon of milk if needed.
I've made and liked the Smitten Kitchen apple cake.
This isn't exactly what you're asking for, but I've had very good luck with the Smitten Kitchen walnut cake without the jam or cream, and a little bourbon added. It's already a dense cake with the nuts and eggs and, to my taste, the bourbon makes it nicely decadent.
I don't see any reason you couldn't cook it in a bundt pan.
Also, a local cafe has had a pumpkin cake which was buttery, not too sweet, and very tasty. I don't have a recipe, but I just mention the idea.
As I double or triple the recipes, I can't stand to double the sugar.
You're a psycho. Look for a recipe that tastes less sweet, but don't go hotdogging by making significant changes to the structural ingredients of a cake unless you're planning to do a lot of trial and error to make sure it still functions as cake.
So I could mix in some stewed cranberries?
Here, otoh, if you don't want too sweet, is an opportunity. If it were me, I'd try making a batch of cranberry sauce with half the sugar in the recipe, which should leave it pretty tart. Then look for a recipe for Bundt cake filled with preserves (This popped up on a quick google.) for filling technique, and there you go.
just make sure they're well drained
For me, that means pour the water out of the pot, and then put the potatoes in the pot back on a lit burner and shake them around for a minute or so, until they're actually dry but not yet singeing.
Chefs use a shitload of butter making mashed potatoes. The percentages are insane. So, a sneaky way to make your mashed potatoes extra delicious is to go part of the way down that route. Butter, salt, lots of black pepper, some cream or milk.
Boil 'em. Works fine. Just drain properly and don't overboil.
Or on an electric burner that's off but cooling down, yeah.
My sister has amazing things to tell of the cream : potato ratio in the mashed potatoes when she worked at a catering company in NYC.
On occasion it approached or exceeded 1 : 2, I think.
Advice on making mashed potatoes?
Use equal parts butter and potatoes.
I see ttaM and nosflow are on the same page.
re: 226
Yeah. Something chefs use between 1/3 and 1/2 butter. Which is mad. I've never tried those kind of ratios, but definitely a good couple of tablespoons in a pan of mash.
Cranberry is mandatory.
People should eat venison too.
Megan, did you not see the recent scientific proof that pie is in every way superior to cake? I'd think that you, of all people, would be ready to acknowledge the simple facts here.
We're in a state of flux, as usual. My son is coming home from college, but whether or not a couple of dorm friends (from NH -- too far to go home) are coming too is not finally settled. They might, or might have (develop?) other plans. OK, kids, it's time for you to decide which it is. (If it was snowing rather than raining this week, I think the issue would be quickly resolved.)
(Okay, I missed 217. But any flirting with cake ought to be scrutinized.)
Shoot. You guys are giving me the answers I need, but I'm gonna have to be away from my computer after this.
Look for a recipe that tastes less sweet, but don't go hotdogging by making significant changes to the structural ingredients of a cake
But you don't know if it tastes too sweet until you've already made it, and then you have a too-sweet cake. Which I know is a sorta ridiculous thing to say, but you can always add sweetness with a glaze or ice cream.
How is sugar structural? (Really asking.) Eggs and flour and the leavener, definitely. And I know that the degree that sugar dissolves in butter determines the crispyness of a cookie. But what is the structural threat to a cake of scanting sugar? Shouldn't change lift. Shouldn't change moisture. You think it changes the crumb?
I think there needs to be some sort of over-arching term for whatever the food group is that contains sweet potatoes and the squash/pumpkin family. They don't form a literal food group, but there's some combination of sweet and foul-textured that they share when used in quantity.
I was once helping a friend who was hosting his first Thanksgiving. He didn't believe me that whipping the potatoes would make them gluey, and he kept just trying to mix them more, which kept making them even worse. In the attempt to counteract this, he dumped in ever more cream and creme fraiche. The texture was hilariously bad, but they tasted amazing.
I think there needs to be some sort of over-arching term for whatever the food group is that contains sweet potatoes and the squash/pumpkin family.
"Orange".
Well, here's the thing, CCarp. I'm coming around to Smitten Kitchen's notion of every day cakes. I don't generally frost them or anything. But they are pretty easy to throw together and make a nice treat.
D's relatives were over last weekend. I could draw the kids into making the cake. But the real revelation was eating the cake (not too sweet!) and drinking coffee before cooking breakfast. We all sat around and ate most of the rest of the cake (the dog stole the rest off the table) and it was really pleasant.
As comfortable as I am making pies these days, cakes are still easier.
That's how civilizations fall apart.
It should obviously be a federal crime to broadcast in any place of public accomodation or over any public airwaves any Christmas-themed music at any time prior to the day following Thanksgiving Day. (As a Catholic, I would prefer the Christmas music not begin until the start of Advent, but of course I'm a firm supporter of the separation of church and state, so the day after Thanksgiving it is.)
Whether posting Christmas-themed music on a public blog runs afoul of this legal ideal is something I hadn't previously considered. I think not, so I think nosflow is in the clear. Obviously the analysis would be different if any of the music autoplayed on loading the page.
Oh sorry I see the thread has moved on.
People should eat venison too.
This week my Facebook feed is basically pictures of the kids of people I went to high school with holding up a deer head (still attached) by the antlers.
Sugar makes batter wetter and more tender -- if you reduce the sugar too much, you get something dry and tough -- more bread than cake. You can probably vary it some, depending on the recipe, but sugar isn't a flavoring, it's structure and not to be messed with lightly.
Mashed yams with chipotles in adobo (like, minced or pureed, then stirred into the yams). That's pretty much all you need to know about that part of the meal.
To the OP, the girls are home from school all week, so today we're going to finish learning the harmony for "Lo, how a rose." If we get it down, maybe, I'll make them learn the original German verses.
Sounds as if someone has been reading her Rose Levy Berenbaum!
233: I propose the word "cucurbits". While in small talk with a coworker from India she asked if I liked to eat "cucurbits". She gave as examples pumpkins, and what I heard as "bitamila", realizing several hours later that she was actually saying "bitter melon". I was perplexed by this new grouping of foods, but now think it should be widely used.
Although technically it also includes cucumbers and melons and does not include sweet potatoes.
My mashed potatoes got a lot better when I stopped trying to figure out some balance between butter and half and half and just went straight for the heavy cream instead.
|| A gift for Halford. Isn't it cute when people think conservatives actually favor small government to the detriment of big business? |>
Also, Charley's right about venison. There's all that delicious meat out there just walking around, for crying out loud. I often see deer at the gf's place, including, last week, a six-point buck. I wish I'd had the presence of mind to go all Halford on its ass.
The day after I saw the buck, in the same spot there were no fewer than 15 wild turkeys. When I told my daughters about it, one of them said, "Why couldn't you just grab one for Thanksgiving?" Excellent question.
Has anyone here eaten a wild turkey? I haven't and am curious. I did shoot one once (my only hunting kill) but it was for a political fundraiser and they just threw it away or something.
248 is the least surprising move ever. Why wouldn't the people who have destroyed every other unionized manufacturing industry in the US turn their sights on the one that's still world dominant?
244.last: My very, very favorite Christmas carol.
But, if I may reassure Halford, there is definitely absolutely zero chance that copyright reform will ever in any way become the platform of the GOP.
OK. Rose Levy Beranbaum books requested from the library.
251: I haven't, but I've read that the legs and wings are tough and stringy, on account of actually being used a lot, but the breast meat is supposed to be quite nice and flavorful.
248, 251: Not to worry, they've already retracted the report and tried to stuff it down the memory hole.
venison
These animals slow my bicycle commute and regularly assault the decorative plants and tomatoes in front of my home. I would really like a wearable diagonal scabbard for my back so that I can bike with an easily-deployed machete, that way I could both clear the path and set myself up with venison for later.
257: You missed some vital information somewhere along the way. ls;sot (long story, some other time)
I will admit, if the potatoes are 1 part each of butter, sour cream, cream cheese, potato, and garlic/chives, they are pretty good, though by that point it's probably healthier to just eat garlic flavored cream cheese.
Go ahead and revoke my American citizenship, but I also strongly dislike pumpkin pie. I can choke it down if there's enough whipped cream though. I do like pumpkin and squash in savory contexts, so I think it's the combo of nutmeg and cloves, plus texture.
Do pumpkin pie haters hate custard generally? I love it myself, so I have trouble seeing the problem.
I love pumpkin pie with bourbon but am not generally terribly excited about pumpkin pie that lacks bourbon.
I mean, it's fine. But with bourbon it's transcendent.
the recent scientific proof that pie is in every way superior to cake
I very much like fxcuisine's corn-and-squash cake.
I've never even heard of bourbon pumpkin pie, but now I'm fairly sure I won't be able to sleep peacefully until I've had some. "Transcendent" certainly sounds like the right word.
264: How about bourbon without pumpkin?
Do pumpkin pie haters hate custard generally?
No, I like custard just fine. It's specifically the flavor I dislike, but then again I hate most all squashes.
268: also a fan of that, yes.
But I hold that my enjoyment of pumpkin pie made with bourbon and my enjoyment of bourbon are, if not entirely indepdent, at least mostly dissociable.
My mashed potatoes are designed to nourish my grandmother. She who won't eat hardly anything, and weighs probably like sixty pounds, but mashed potatoes are one of the like three things in the world that she likes. So I have to fill them with as many calories as I can, to sustain her for as long as possible. They end up being butter, heavy cream and potato, in like a 1:1:2 ratio.
Other members of my family have high cholesterol, though, so it's kind of a dilemma whose life and health I prioritize.
271.2, but that's what the holidays are all about.
Pumpkin pie:
Not intrinsically interesting, mostly just tastes like cinn/nutmeg/cloves.
Texture is often bland mush. (I'm not against that, I love porridge. But it isn't worthy of a pie.)
Texture is uniform. No exciting larger and smaller bits of fruit, no heterogeneity of bites.
I mean, I love sweet potato pie, but most pumpkin flavored stuff does nothing for me. Bourbon and mascarpone make it better, but when you've got those on hand, there are better pies you could make.
I mean, it's fine. But with bourbon it's transcendent.
I like the bourbon pie fine, but don't go into these raptures about it. And I like bourbon a lot. (Sorry, Tweetyfamily.)
I agree with Megan's (@273) points 1-3. The flavor isn't great, the texture is mushy and occasionally soggy, and it's kind of monotonous. Pumpkin pie is the sort of food where the first bite is ok, the second is less ok, and by the 3rd or 4th bite I'm almost gagging.
I like custards and puddings of all sorts, but I dislike sweet potato pie for a similar reasons to my hatred of pumpkin pie. I think maybe it's that custard is smooth, but pumpkin pie is just something that's been pulverized into mush? I'm also not a huge fan of pulverized soups.
This seems relevant and important.
I would so prefer an eel-stuffed turkey to one stuffed with death grain.
I have the octopus bundt pan. Total pain to grease and flour, but worth it.
I think cranberries are likely to either sink or float in a cake batter, and will need to be minced up small (or gone after with a densiometer or calibrated to a brixmeter first, but even Insanity Rose doesn't do that). Other than that, tasty idea.
43, nosflow, etc.: the Dwarf Lord and I will be in town, our usual international students are all otherwise occupied, want to come over for T'giving? We can seat six expansively or eight friendly.
Oh, now I want pumpkin pie SO BAD. All you haters are crazy. Good pumpkin pie is amazing, and why do you hate America.
Also: Octopus bundt pan??!
[Pumpkin Pie]'s kind of monotonous
I think whipped cream helps to add a different flavor & texture into the mix (I hadn't thought about this before, but many pies are just as good without whipped cream or ice cream, pumpkin definitely suffers from their absence.)
I don't really like pie. I am alone in the world.
Think instead that you have not yet tried a pie you like.
The flavor isn't great, the texture is mushy and occasionally soggy, and it's kind of monotonous.
This is starting to sound more like you don't like bad pumpkin pie. Which, sure.
Think instead that you have not yet tried a pie you like.
"A Thanksgiving Artist"
280: Not alone! I too dislike nearly all the pies I have encountered, with the sole exception of a limited subset of pumpkin pies. Or meat pies - those I love second only to sausages.
To lend some support to the pumpkin pie haters, I'll admit that a bad pumpkin pie has more potential to be gross than most other pies.
What about eel pie? (Though I prefer gluten-free eel stuffing).
280, 284: yeah, I'm with you guys. I like some pie, and of course I will happily eat literally anything in the world, but the kind with big chunks of fruit or nuts or whatever are deeply meh.
I love pie with vanilla ice cream. Pumpkin pie is not my favorite of all the pies. Big chunks of fruit pies are the best. With vanilla ice cream.
WTF? Cherry pie, apple pie, peach pie—you scorn them?!
Turdeelucken needs to make an appearance.
You mean three birds with turds in the center?
With EELS in the center, Heebie. Get with the real Thanksgiving program.
I wonder if the Poor Man post with my vegetarian friendly Turducken alternative is still live somewhere.
Pumpkin pie filling can exist at various points along the starchy/custardy axis. I like it very custardy, myself, and can understand people who don't like it if most of their examples (such as most commercial ones) are of the more starchy variety.
Oh, god, my inlaws make a 'crustless' pumpkin pie by stirring the Bisquick they would normally use to make the crust into the filling. It's foul.
Huh, apparently eels are even more endangered than most other fish. The European eel is almost extinct and the Atlantic eel may soon be about to go completely.
but the kind with big chunks of fruit or nuts or whatever are deeply meh.
I'm convinced there's a fundamental difference of tastes going on here, because in my opinion big chunks of baked fruit are one of the best things ever (though I don't know many good pie makers, so I tend to have it as cobbler or crumble rather than pie).
298: I think this is obviously and evidently the case but the pro-fruit pie forces tend to act completely (if not terribly seriously) oblivious to that so I act the same way in return.
I like them all: I'm making pumpkin, apple, and a very non-gooey pecan tart for Thanksgiving.
I quite like apple crisp, but generally do not like apple pie. especially because you're generally eating it around people pretending to have mouth orgasms.
I just feel like, if you're so damn excited about big pieces of fruit, why not go cut up an apple and leave me to my dessert.
you're generally eating it around people pretending to have mouth orgasms.
Yes, this. I am so fucking sick of foodieism.
a very non-gooey pecan tart for Thanksgiving
Do you have a recipe? Because I can't stand more than a teaspoon of that gooey mess.
Surprisingly, it's Rose Berenbaum's. I might have posted it in the archives someplace, but if not I'll post it when I get home. (Conf to Halford -- there's no copyright on recipes so long as you're not quoting the wording.)
Oh, god, my inlaws make a 'crustless' pumpkin pie by stirring the Bisquick they would normally use to make the crust into the filling. It's foul.
That's straight-up weird.
Would they make assless chaps by sewing the ass pieces onto the knees?
Huh, I just tried to post the recipe and something happened to it and it didn't post. Trying again (it wasn't in the archives, I'd emailed to a commenter):
Pecan Tart (Thanks to RLB)
Blind-bake a 9 1/2" tart shell of regular pie crust (if it's in a pie pan rather than a tart pan, or slightly the wrong size, don't worry) to slightly underdone. Arrange 1 1/2 cups of pecan halves over the bottom -- it should be one layer with the pecans sort of overlapping each other.
Filling
4 egg yolks
1/3 cup of dark corn syrup or golden syrup
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
4 Tbsp unsalted butter
1/4 cup cream
pinch salt
tsp vanilla extract.
Combine everything but the vanilla in a saucepan, whisk it together and cook over medium low heat until it starts thickening a bit (160F, if you've got a thermometer). Strain into a small bowl and stir in the vanilla, and pour slowly over the nuts, trying to get them all covered (which will be hard, there's not much filling.)
Bake at 350 for 20 minutes with foil around the edge to keep the crust from burning.
Topping.
1 oz good dark chocolate, 2Tbsp cream. Melt the chocolate and stir in the cream until smooth, let it cool a bit and put it in a baggie with the tip of a corner cut off, and make patterns all over the top of the tart. There's a fair amount of chocolate compared to the surface of the tart -- it'll be almost completely covered.
Fruit pies are delicious, though apple is not the best pie. My favorite pies are blackberry pie and rhubarb pie. I feel like people who love apple pie also like pumpkin pie, which I interpret to mean they just really love nutmeg. I will amend my hatred of pumpkin pie though to say that instead of categorically hating pumpkin pie, it is rather that I've never met a pumpkin pie I liked.
I might make an exception for blackberry pie (which I've never had) provided it wasn't too sweet. Blackberries are the best fruit ever.
I feel like people who love apple pie also like pumpkin pie, which I interpret to mean they just really love nutmeg.
Allow me to serve as a counterexample. (I do happen to love nutmeg, but it's not enough to redeem pumpkin pie.)
I don't put any nutmeg in my apple pies.
I am pleased to see a couple of other pumpkin/sweet-potato/that-general-boak-inducing-family haters.
Pies: rhubarb, apple. Almost all the others, meh.
I don't know if I've just never had a good example of rhubarb pie, or if it's supposed to be made of sour pink slime. I've never liked it.
Oh, and just by way of conceding that not all American sweetened-gunk-in-pastry foodstuffs are disgusting, pecan pie can be excellent.
it's supposed to be made of sour pink slime.
This isn't exactly wrong, but it's still really good. Embrace the slime.
I love fresh-picked rhubarb. Rhubarb pie I am not usually excited about.
This may present strong evidence for the "different tastes" hypothesis.
sour pink slime
Most rhubarb pies that I see have either way too much sugar or too much gelatin. My preference is for rhubarb sauce (chop rhubarb, cook with sugar to taste -- I usually target the approximate sweetness of applesauce), which you can then serve over ice cream or yogurt, or what have you. It's less desserty, but it emphasizes the rhubarb flavor.
So that's straight rhubarb pie and not strawberry-rhubarb? Because I am quite fond of the latter.
But keep in mind that I like jello and many different kinds of jello salads.
I too love rhubarb pie. And strawberry rhubarb pie. And the only time I've eaten either one is at the Heebie U cafeteria, so I believe that even better ones exist.
Actually I have no idea if it has been with or without strawberries. FASCINATING.
320: Gelatin? Gelatin? What kind of freaked out pie are we talking about here? A little flour, maybe some cornstarch instead, but no gelatin in a rhubarb pie.
I think strawberry rhubarb pie is a bit of a waste of the strawberries. The rhubarb dominates them and you don't really taste them.
re: 324
Word!
It's just a thick rhubarb gloop, not overcooked so the rhubarb isn't entirely slime. With distinct textural chunks.
Although, tbh, the canonical rhubarb form is the 'crumble'.
Come on, raw rhubarb, nobody? Who's with me?
This thread is really making me want to eat something other than the shitty sandwich supplies I keep on hand at Heebie U. And not the pizza at math club this evening, either.
328: Newt is. Rhubarb season comes around, he's nibbling the stalks like a giant blond chipmunk.
Not really on topic, but as long as we're engaged in unresolvable conflict over individual tastes in food, I'd like to share that I had a Five Guys burger for the first time. It was fine, but not as good as In n Out, and miles away from Pie n Burger. (Pie n Burger's pies on the other hand are not very good at all.)
I don't think the rhubarb pie I've eaten has had gelatin in it. Just slime, with little pieces of cooked sour celery.
Pumpkin pie is best as a breakfast food.
332: I didn't really like pie n burger that much. Not the burger, nor the pie. I did discover an abiding love for in 'n out during my time in Pasadena. Ate a lot of lunches over at the Arcadia one when I was starting up at startup.
Yes, rhubarb with no strawberries and not so sweet as to overwhelm the natural tartness. The rhubarb should be just breaking down but still retain most of its structural integrity. Also, 324 is right, gelatine should be kept far away from pie. While I'm making pronouncements, cream pies with pastry crusts don't make sense to me. Cream filling and pie-crust pastry just seem so different there is no way those taste and texture combos make sense.
Also, I just went on a mission to find the last remaining Twinkies in the southeast LA County area. The Twinkies and powdered sugar Donettes have all disappeared, but I did get a CupCakes.
I'll make you a rhubarb pie if you make me a carrot pie, jms.
320: Gelatin? Gelatin?
I think you're correct that I should have said "cornstarch."
Having no interest in cooking anything with that texture I didn't think too hard about what was responsible for it.
The best Southern California hamburger was at Hampton's, which doesn't exist anymore. I agree with 336 and marginally prefer In-N-Out to Pie 'N" Burger. I refuse to go to Five Guys on principle, because really.
A little flour, maybe some cornstarch instead, but no gelatin in a rhubarb pie.
YOU PEOPLE. Tapioca is the only acceptable thickener.
I made a lemony ricotta pie (bottom half), lemony rhubarb pie one time. I liked it more than the others did, and I was glad to do something different with rhubarb. (Different than plain or w/ strawberries.)
Oh, Apple Pan. Also better than Pie 'n"" Burger.
Is a carrot pie a sweet pie or a savory pie? I am very curious about this concept.
346. It's a sweet pie, roughly along the same lines as pumpkin or sweet potato, except the texture is slightly different, and it has more ginger in.
345: Oh man I miss the Apple Pan. Somehow I suspect it can never live up to my memories of it, though.
I was glad to do something different with rhubarb
I once had insanely good rhubarb creme brulee, but have no idea how to make it.
It was really, really good -- my favorite item from an excellent dinner.
For custard pies in short crust, slip the custard into a blind-baked crust at the last minute, to maximize the contrast of flaky pastry with smooth filling. (Whipped cream on top to patch the creases, cracks, fingermarks. It's a slippery operation.)
I make a syrup with minced-tiny rhubarb and freeze it as pink lemonade mix.
350. Wait, do you mean that you bake the custard, crustless and separate, in a pie-shaped pan, and then place it in the crust after it's firmed up?
Eh, Apple Pan's alright. The cup holders are fiddly. And the pie tastes like trash.
I like raw rhubarb. I like pumpkin pie too. I am not as keen on sweat potato pie.
Tapioca is the only acceptable thickener.
Really? I thickened cherry pie filling with tapioca once for Passover, and it was unpleasantly rubbery. Maybe I did it wrong.
not as good as In n Out, and miles away from Pie n Burger
Not a fair comparison. IOB is a drive thru, Pie n Burger a greasy spoon. I happened to be in El Segundo over the summer and went to a Five Guys. Not worth the hype, wouldn't go out of my way to go back.
354: that said, "Sweat Potato" has promise as a Spinal Tap song title.
Does Tommy's place? As an LA dude, I feel like I should have an opinion, but I don't eat meat. My ex-stepfather-in-law said that Tommy's was his favorite when he lived here and worked as a waiter at the Ambassador.
Tommy's is more wonderful/terrible than simply wonderful. But it is an experience worth having.
I feel like 100% of my burger knowledge is purely nostalgic. And I'm not really a fair judge since I've now foresworn the bun. Cassell's also used to be a contender for the best, but that time is long past.
I think the best recent fast-food burger I've had was the Pastrami Burger at Johnny's Pastrami. But that's now maybe 4 years ago.
355: The tapioca is just supposed to have the blood of the infant, not the flesh.
Half rhubarb half blueberry makes a nice crumble, and even nicer if you add chopped pistachios to the crumble part.
A friend of mine once caused a minor scandal in his family by referring to his grandmother's pecan pie as 'penis cake.' He was three or four at the time. Anyway, I think of it penis cake whenever it is mentioned so I thought I'd share.
Pumpkin pie is hypothetically good, but in reality almost always gross. Boring/unappealing texture, not enough scent, gloppy crust.
Strawberry-rhubarb pie is fabulous in spring, when made with fresh fruit. Otherwise....
The hands-down winners in my family for the last umpty-ump years have been icebox pies. Raspberry whipped cream filling in a crumbled chocolate cookie crust...pina colada in a graham cracker crust...uhmmmmmmm.
212: They will be fine as long as you do three things:
1) Cook the potatoes until they are TRULY SOFT. Do not rush. (This is why I hate making mashed potatoes. I have no patience.)
2) Use good (preferably) butter, and lots of it. (Though probably no need to go any farther than President or Kerrygold.) Do not be shy about the butter. Pretend that it is the great depression, except that potatoes are the expensive food item, and you are stretching them out by adulterating them with butter. Pretend that you are a smuggler and the potatoes are your butter mule. Basically fold as much butter as you can into the potatoes. You need more butter than you think, even taking into account the fact that you need more butter than you think. (This is why I hate making mashed potatoes. I flinch from adding a proper amount of butter.)
3) Add salt gradually, tasting the potatoes periodically, until they are discernibly - but just barely - salty (or to taste). Restaurants always oversalt, but many home cooks undersalt.
Some options:
If you want to make garlic mashed potatoes, microwave a head of garlic, cut it through the middle, and squeeze the garlic goo into the potatoes. Easy! (You can approximate this in the oven/toaster by oiling the garlic and wrapping it in foil.)
Keep the skins in or take them out depending on your preference. It's subjective.
Oh, and never use a blender or other bladed equipment to mash the potatoes. Use a masher, or other utensil.
Also, I just went on a mission to find the last remaining Twinkies in the southeast LA County area. The Twinkies and powdered sugar Donettes have all disappeared, but I did get a CupCakes.
No need to panic just yet.
351, to jms: Yes. There is a drawing of this in my middle-aged _Joy of Cooking_, so, not even obscure.
I just talked to the mom of the sick baby, and it turns out they had a really hard time getting her spouse to the hospital in the city because one of our colleagues, two weeks ago, borrowed their car, got blind drunk, and was found sleeping it off in the totaled wreck about half an hour from here. Apparently his response is something along the lines of "whoops" and "it's so uncharacteristic for me to drink at all!" This is especially hilarious because I don't think I've ever seen him at a party where he was able to hold a conversation about anything other than how drunk he intended to get, and how people who don't lend him their cars are just so elitist and uptight. What the fucking hell, man.
At least he didn't borrow the baby.
That's really impressively terrible behavior -- the guy should be shunned. "I destroyed your vitally necessary and terribly valuable possession while breaking the law and putting bystanders at risk of death?"
367.last: The judge is my work partner's brother. My work partner is so proud.
The hands-down winners in my family for the last umpty-ump years have been icebox pies.
I'm making a retro 50s-style icebox pie: a chocolate cream pie, with a chocolate cookie crumb base, a chocolate custard filling, tons of whipped cream for topping, and chocolate shavings. I've made it about five times now, it's always a big hit.
But I'm not making a pumpkin pie: not enough people here like it, and it's too much trouble for something that nobody really wants to eat.
I don't dare not make a cranberry sauce, now that Mr. Carp has declared it mandatory (and I wouldn't want to offend heebie).
I'm also doing mashed turnip, because that's what my mother would do (if she made an American Thanksgiving dinner, that is).
And I'm not going to require that we go around the table and have everyone state what he or she is thankful for. Am I wrong about this? am I being a killjoy? I just find that sort of exercise so unnatural and uncomfortable.
So no one likes the mix, huh? I thought it was pretty swell.
I'm also doing mashed turnip, because that's what my mother would do (if she made an American Thanksgiving dinner, that is).
When you say mashed turnip, you mean yellow turnips, like a decent person, not white turnips, right? Lots of butter and pepper? I actually haven't located yellow turnips in my local grocery, and may end up going without, but I'll miss them.
Root veggies! Turnips of all colors. Rutabagas! I'll even allow Swedes.
371: It seems he went to jail, but only for one day because he said one of those charming things alcoholics say. I'm sure there are other repercussions to come, but everyone is pissed as fuck.
When you say mashed turnip, you mean yellow turnips
I mean yellow, yes, which I think is actually (or more properly? or whatever...) called rutabaga? but we always called it turnip. Lots of butter and pepper, of course.
I liked mashed rutabegas. It was a staple along with mashed potatoes growing up, but for some reason I never cottoned on to the mashed potatoes.
371: It seems he went to jail, but only for one day because he said one of those charming things alcoholics say.
Or because DUI is a misdemeanor and while there can end up being a lot of fines and such the amount of time you spend in jail when arrested on a first offense usually isn't much. We often release first offenders on a citation and a court date if we can get ahold of someone to come pick them up.