![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tzikehThanksgiving with my family is all about the food. It is my favorite meal of the year, no matter what kind of fancy restaurants I frequent between Novembers. We generally have between 15-35 people - this year it was 27. A large percentage of the adults are in some way, shape, or form in the food business - be it as restaurant owner, meat and seafood purveyor, pastry chef - you get the idea.
Our Thanksgiving meal is served buffet-style - fill your plate and find a seat at one of the three tables set up in the dining room, den, or library.
Our menu included:
Drinks:
Red Zin, a Scotch I didn't catch the name of, homemade Apple Cider, Dom, various and sundry other libations
Appetizers:
Various Italian cheeses (Pirano cheese - my new favorite)
a spectacular assortment of crackers and freshly baked breads
chilled rock crab claws with several dipping sauces
mushroom / artichoke / olive salad in lemon-herb vinaigrette
spiced pear chutney with ginger-encrusted raisins on a cream-cheese base
Main Meal:
2 turkeys, moist on the inside, crispy skin on the outside, carved thin, separate platters for white and dark - and a third platter for turkey legs.
1 ham, marinated in cinnamon liqueur
2 stuffings - one with cranberries and breads, one with oysters and chives
numerous dishes of cranberry sauce - both the smooth and the berry-filled kinds
2 dishes of yams mashed with sherry and topped with toasted marshmallows
1 dish of turnips whipped with creme fraiche
1 dish of sliced vegetables sauteed in butter and almond paste
2 dishes of stewed fruits (peaches, plums, cherries, nectarines) topped with sugar and nutmeg
2 gravies - flour and flourless
Desserts (all homemade)
Hot apple pie with vanilla-cinnamon ice cream
Mince pie
pumpkin-caramel cheesecake
Coconut custard pie with sugared toasted coconut
chocolate mousse cake with layers of chocolate ganache topped with raspberry-chocolate wafers and rolled pastry crisps
And, you know, coffee.
And as a wah-wah punchline for the driver's license story - when I got home, I got online at the Illinois DMV to try to renew my license through the website - entered my DL number, and came up "your driver's license is current through 2005."
There's this thing in Illinois where, if you're a good driver with a clean record, you can auto-renew through the mails and they send you a sticker which goes on the back of the license with all the pertinent info - donor ID, birth date, etc. - and lo and behold, I flipped over my license and there it was. Current through 2005. Just like the website said.
Just think - if the gate agent had flipped over the license, I never would have had the Terrorist Panini story. And what a loss to modern folklore that would have been.
Our Thanksgiving meal is served buffet-style - fill your plate and find a seat at one of the three tables set up in the dining room, den, or library.
Our menu included:
Drinks:
Red Zin, a Scotch I didn't catch the name of, homemade Apple Cider, Dom, various and sundry other libations
Appetizers:
Various Italian cheeses (Pirano cheese - my new favorite)
a spectacular assortment of crackers and freshly baked breads
chilled rock crab claws with several dipping sauces
mushroom / artichoke / olive salad in lemon-herb vinaigrette
spiced pear chutney with ginger-encrusted raisins on a cream-cheese base
Main Meal:
2 turkeys, moist on the inside, crispy skin on the outside, carved thin, separate platters for white and dark - and a third platter for turkey legs.
1 ham, marinated in cinnamon liqueur
2 stuffings - one with cranberries and breads, one with oysters and chives
numerous dishes of cranberry sauce - both the smooth and the berry-filled kinds
2 dishes of yams mashed with sherry and topped with toasted marshmallows
1 dish of turnips whipped with creme fraiche
1 dish of sliced vegetables sauteed in butter and almond paste
2 dishes of stewed fruits (peaches, plums, cherries, nectarines) topped with sugar and nutmeg
2 gravies - flour and flourless
Desserts (all homemade)
Hot apple pie with vanilla-cinnamon ice cream
Mince pie
pumpkin-caramel cheesecake
Coconut custard pie with sugared toasted coconut
chocolate mousse cake with layers of chocolate ganache topped with raspberry-chocolate wafers and rolled pastry crisps
And, you know, coffee.
And as a wah-wah punchline for the driver's license story - when I got home, I got online at the Illinois DMV to try to renew my license through the website - entered my DL number, and came up "your driver's license is current through 2005."
There's this thing in Illinois where, if you're a good driver with a clean record, you can auto-renew through the mails and they send you a sticker which goes on the back of the license with all the pertinent info - donor ID, birth date, etc. - and lo and behold, I flipped over my license and there it was. Current through 2005. Just like the website said.
Just think - if the gate agent had flipped over the license, I never would have had the Terrorist Panini story. And what a loss to modern folklore that would have been.
