Thanksgiving Recipe Recap, Part 2

Soooooooo. Thanksgiving. That holiday that I was so excited about that I consulted five different holiday food magazines in order to find the right recipes? That was a week ago.

A week ago.

And I’m just now picking up where I left off in terms of recipe reviews.

I am a bad bad bad blogger.

What can I say….after devouring a delicious Thanksgiving meal I spent most of the rest of the holiday weekend devouring The Hunger Games and its two sequels Catching Fire and Mockingjay (Note to my fellow book clubbers—if anyone wants to borrow either of the other two books, let me know!) Needless to say I was a big fan.  Before I knew it my vacation was over and I was back to work and headed to Kansas City.  And my poor blog was left all by its lonesome.

Well I’m back and I want to make sure I share the recipe that was the biggest hit at our Thanksgiving table: pumpkin crème brulee.  Pumpkin carmelized greatness. In Jason’s words anyway. And I’d say it was pretty accurate. Light, creamy, and tastes like fall….the perfect end to a hearty holiday meal. Plus it has the added bonus of being set on fire.

Although crème brulee may sound intimidating, it really isn’t. Sure it takes a few steps but none are extraordinarily difficult. And the end result is well worth it.

Pumpkin Crème Brulee
Adapted slightly from Emeril Lagasse

Ingredients:
2 cups heavy cream
¼ cup brown sugar
¼ cup granulated sugar plus 4 teaspoons
8 large egg yolks
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon grated nutmeg
1 cup pumpkin

1.Preheat oven to 325 degrees.  Arrange 8 small (approximately ½ cup in size) ramekins in a large metal baking pan.
2.In a medium saucepan, combine cream, brown sugar, and ¼ cup granulated sugar.  Bring to a bare simmer over medium-high heat, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Remove from heat.
3.In a medium bowl, whisk the egg yolks until frothy. Slowly whisk in ¾ cup of the hot cream mixture, whisking constantly. Add the egg mixture to the hot cream and whisk.  Add pumpkin and whisk until smooth. Strain into a large bowl through a fine mesh strainer. Stir in vanilla, cinnamon and nutmeg. Divide among the ramekins.
4.Add enough hot water to come halfway up the sides of the cups. Bake until custards are set in the center but not completely stiff, about 40-45 minutes. Remove from the oven and chill for at least 3 hours or overnight.
5.When you are ready to serve, sprinkle each custard with ½ teaspoon of sugar. If you have one, use a kitchen torch to caramelize the sugar. If you don’t, place under a hot broiler until sugar caramelizes (1-2 minutes). Serve!

Thanksgiving Recipe Recap, Part 1

Thanksgiving….my favorite holiday of the year….has come and gone. All in all it was a good one. I woke up on the earlyish side (thanks to the fact that I forgot to turn my weekday work alarm off…oops) and spent the morning finishing my contributions to the Thanksgiving feast, watching the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade (the official start of the holiday season!), and prepping our annual pre-Thanksgiving lunch of quiche and ham rolls.

If you remember, I had promised to make three items for Thanksgiving at Jason’s house: cranberry chutney, spinach gratin, and pumpkin crème brulee. I had taken care of the cranberry chutney and pumpkin crème brulee on Wednesday night (more to come on those) but waited until Thursday morning to do the spinach gratin—primarily because I didn’t have a whole lot of fridge space left at that point and also because I wasn’t 100% sure how it would hold up pre-cooked overnight (in retrospect, it probably would have been fine). I chose spinach gratin as a side dish for a couple of reasons—1) I thought that we probably needed another green vegetable to go with all the starches I knew my mother-in-law would be making (stuffing, mashed potatoes and bread) which was good since she also ended up making sweet potato casserole (one of my family’s favorites) as well and 2) Jason has a vast love of creamed spinach and as soon as I told him that one of the recipes I was considering for Thanksgiving was essentially creamed spinach topped with cheese and baked in casserole form, he was sold.

The spinach gratin recipe I chose, from Ina Garten aka the Barefoot Contessa (who else?!), was ridiculously easy. Usually when I make creamed spinach I opt for fresh spinach, but fortunately this recipe called for frozen chopped spinach (otherwise I would have spent half the morning wilting pounds and pounds of spinach to get the amount needed to feed 8 people).  Actually, the hardest thing about this recipe was getting all the extra liquid out of the five packages of thawed spinach that was called for (my secret—squeezing each package through several layers of paper towels and then putting it all in a colander and squeezing anything else that remained with the back of a large spoon).  Once the spinach was fairly dry it was as simple as sautéing onions, making a roux, and cooking milk and cream until it thickened. Fold in the spinach and some cheese and all you need to do is stick it in the oven when the time comes.

If you like creamed spinach, you will love this recipe. I would go so far as to say it is as good any creamed spinach side you will find in the fanciest of steakhouses (which may be why I decided we needed go to Whole Foods and get a steak to cook for dinner tonight to eat with our leftovers!) It is a wonderful addition to any holiday table.

Spinach Gratin
Adapted slightly from Ina Garten

Ingredients:
4 TBL butter
2 large yellow onions, chopped
¼ cup flour
¼ teaspoon grated nutmeg
1 cup heavy cream
1-2 cups milk*
5 (10-ounce) packages of frozen chopped spinach, thawed
3/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
½ cup grated Gruyere cheese
Salt and pepper


*the original recipe called for 2 cups of milk but since I was using skim, I ended up using less—probably closer to 1 ½ cup—since I know from previous experience that skim milk can wreck havoc when you are trying to make white sauce using an Ina Garten recipe

 1.Preheat oven to 425 degrees (if you are planning to cook right away). Squeeze as much liquid from the spinach as possible and set aside.
2.Melt better in a large sauté pan over medium heat. Add onions and sauté until translucent, about 10 minutes. Add flour and nutmeg and cook, stirring almost constantly, for 2 minutes.
3.Add cream and milk and cook until thickened. Stir in spinach. Add ¼ cup of the Parmesan cheese and mix well. Remove from heat. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
4.Spoon mixture into a 9x13 baking dish. Sprinkle remaining Parmesan and Gruyere cheese on top. Bake for 20 minutes or until hot and bubbly (about 30 minutes if you are baking it straight from the refrigerator). Serve.

Happy Thanksgiving!

It's Thanksgiving Eve which means I've spent a good portion of my evening prepping for tomorrow's big event. Jason's mom is providing the majority of our Thanksgiving feast, but I'm contributing three items as well. After a month of research, here's what I've come up with to supplement the usual turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes and green bean casserole (Jason's family is into all the traditional dishes as you can tell):

• Cranberry chutney with ginger and orange
• Spinach gratin
• Pumpkin creme brulee

I wish I could tell you that all of these recipes came from the many holiday issues I amassed during the Great Thanksgiving Recipe Search 2010...but the truth is, not a single one did! Can you believe it?! FIVE magazines and I end up going with three internet/blog recipes instead. Sigh. I really do have a problem.

Stay tuned this weekend for recipes and reviews. In the meantime, I leave you with an awesome example of how the holidays can bring out the worst in those of us with Type A personalities: Awkward Family Photo's infamous Thanksgiving letter....hopefully I never get this bad!

Happy Thanksgiving :)

I Have a Problem

My name is Lindsay and I am holiday-themed-cooking-magazines-aholic. Every year around this time when all the major food/cooking magazines start putting out Thanksgiving/holiday themed issues I go a little nuts.

Case in point:

Cook's Illustrated (subscription), Cooking Light, Food and Wine (subscription), Martha Stewart Living, and Everyday Food (subscription)

Yes, so far this year I have purchased (either through subscription or on the newsstand) five…FIVE!.... Thanksgiving/holiday themed magazine issues.

I know…it’s gross.

But I can’t help it…Thanksgiving is an important cooking/food holiday and the one I have looked forward to the most for many years. You see, my mom doesn’t like to cook and one year when I was in college she suggested that we (gasp) go out to eat for Thanksgiving. That was too much for me so I said if she didn’t want to cook, I would do it. So I planned my menu and made about 80% of the meal (my mom did pitch in with a few key dishes and helped do some of the prep work despite her aversion to the kitchen). And it got to be a tradition that I looked forward to. I loved researching recipes, creating a menu, and executing it from start to finish.

Things are a little different now that Jason and I are married; last year we went to his parents house for Thanksgiving which meant I had to relinquish my role as executive chef (as is the plan for this year too). Fortunately his mother has allowed me to bring a couple of dishes so I still get to indulge in my penchant for the Thanksgiving glossies. But you can bet on the fact that I am counting the days until we have our own house so I can host everyone and put together that Thanksgiving menu of my dreams!