Thanksgiving Results

Thanksgiving was an odd day this year. Being a new mom and newly engaged we decided to spend the holiday on our own as a family, just the three of us. This marked the first Thanksgiving that I was not with my parents and sisters. It also meant no football games or Thanksgiving Day Parade. It meant no obnoxious people or relatives. So, our day was quiet. We woke up and went for a run as a family in the ghost town of Ripon, Wisconsin. Then we got home and slowly worked on prepping our meal and began cooking our meal. In between cooking and listening to Christmas music (FINALLY!), Andy and I snuck in a game of Monopoly, which has always been one of my favorites. I got Andy hooked on it, too.


Overall, the food was delicious, and we ate well that night. The green beans were a little under-seasoned, but for a girl who isn't a green bean fan, I thought they were alright. Naturally, all that cooking means a lot of cleaning.

Our kitchen mid-day

But we kept up with it all and did multiple loads of dishes throughout the day. I'm a big believer in cleaning as you go (Andy seems to believe otherwise).


The cranberries were beyond tart! I knew that was the point, but I couldn't get past a few small bites. Andy, on the other hand, loved them. Alex, after making a few disgusted faces, enjoyed them, too. 

Cointreau Cranberry Relish

The stuffing was quite tasty but not how I expected it to taste. The Cooking Light recipe that we used had you make your own cornbread, but in an attempt to make things easier, we used a basic box mix. However, I think the box made more than what the recipe would have so the stuffing was heavy on the cornbread. Now extra cornbread is not exactly bad, but it overpowered the jalapeno and chorizo's spiciness just a little too much. I was hoping for a little bit more of a zip! So, my advice would be to stick with the recipe and nix the shortcut. I will say, Alex was a huge fan. He ate most of the leftovers, too.

My plate of deliciousness

            

The sweet potato gnocchi was great! Andy did a fantastic job with it. He put crushed red peppers on a plate and poured oil over it and let it soak for several hours so that the oil took on the taste of peppers. He sauteed the gnocchi in the hot pepper oil and then cooked them with pecans in maple syrup and bourbon. So we had two dishes that played with the balance between sweet and spicy. However, the gnocchi was the clear winner.    

Sweet Potato Gnocchi Pre-Baking

                                            

That day I also prepped homemade spiced cinnamon rolls for breakfast on Friday morning. The recipe came from Cooking Light. I have included the link here. They were pretty easy to make on a technicality scale, but they were a little involved. You have to let the dough rest several times. It actually worked well to make them on Thanksgiving because I could cook other dishes while waiting for the cinnamon roll dough to rise. Once I had them all rolled up, I parbaked the rolls and then kept them in the fridge until Friday morning. Then on Friday while I let them finish baking in the oven, I made the glaze to pour over them. Yum!

Par-Baked Spiced Cinnamon Rolls

All in all, a nice turn out of food and a sweet day spent with my family, and gave me the break I needed to remember why I am so lucky and to be truly thankful for all of my blessings.

Happy Holidays!

-Kate

Sign of the Times

Lately, my only interest in blogging has been to discuss either food or Christmas. It's silly of me but it made me wonder for a second why those were the two things at the forefront of my mind. Then after a second of idiotic wondering I realized that the food portion stems from the fact that Thanksgiving is a mere 2 (and kind of a half) days away. And we all know why Christmas is on my mind--because I am minorly (okay majorly) obsessed and in love with the Christmas season. I guess my preoccupations are just a sign of the times.

So, in the spirit of Christmas and food loving I will post some favorites from both categories because I just can't seem to get enough of either! (This issue may require medical attention!)

For the food lover in all of us: If you click here you will find yourself on a page for Cooking Light's Spicy Caramel Brownies which look positively sinful and totally delicious! I haven't actually made them yet, but they are on my "To-Bake" list over the course of December. By the way, have I mentioned how excited I am  for the end of the semester and therefore the upcoming winter break. We get over a month off from classes and the best part is that since we are in the transition between semesters they can't assign any homework. Therefore I will have virtually an entire month free from assigned readings, papers, and projects. Now I still have a child so that is where most of my free time will go, but the thought of no school for a month fills me with joy!

And now for the Christmas portion of my post! I spent a lot of my downtime about a week or so ago watching "The Holiday." I watched it fully through about 4 times and then watched parts of it here and there while doing homework or surfing the Internet. This week, however, I have shifted my viewing frenzy to a different movie. "Love Actually" is my new film of choice, and what a great one it is. In fact, I "Love Actually Bombed" a friends Facebook wall last night with various pictures and quotes from the movie. I will share a clip of my favorite part of the movie with you: Hugh Grant dancing to Pointer Sisters "Jump For My Love." Well, it's actually one of two favorite parts. I also love the scene at the end where Jamie (Colin Firth) proposes to Aurelia. 

And on that note, I hope you all have a great start to your week!

-Kate

Let's Not Forget About Thanksgiving

As excited as I am for the Christmas season and all the joy and merriment that comes with it, I can't just forget about Thanksgiving. I have mixed feelings about Thanksgiving as a whole. I like it because it denotes the proximity to Christmas. I hate it because I usually only end up eating corn and rolls (such is the life of a picky eater). I love it because it's close to my birthday (and sometimes on my birthday). I hate it because it usually means spending the day with people that I find somewhat annoying. This year though Andy and I put off the task of figuring out how to divvy up the holidays between our families by declaring that we were going to spend the actual day as our own little family of three in our apartment. This means that Andy and I are making our very first Thanksgiving meal, and we couldn't be more excited! Seriously, this is a cook/baker/foodie's dream holiday! And as we consider ourselves as a couple to be a combination of those things we are truly looking forward to Thanksgiving.

Given that we are poor college students/new parents we have a limited budget and a shared disgust for turkey so we are ditching the Thanksgiving standards and giving them a unique twist. Our menu is primarily vegetarian because it's cheaper and we are not real big meat lovers. I thought it might be fun to share our menu here with links to the recipes we are going to be making so as to hopefully inspire others in their holiday cooking!

The Amell-Fehrenbach Family Thanksgiving Meal:

Cointreau Cranberry Relish ala Ted Allen: Click here






Corn bread, Chorizo, and Jalapeno Dressing (our exception to the vegetarian standard) from Cooking Light: Click here. We are just buying a cornbread mix to simplify Thursday's cooking process, but it should be exceedingly yummy!

Green Beans with Garlic Butter. This one is going to be made from Andy's own head, but I think it'll be quite easy. He's just going to saute the green beans in some homemade garlic butter to give them a bit of flavor. Plus, who doesn't need a little more garlic in their life?


Salad. We'll be doing a nice salad with fresh greens. We've really been a fan of this artisan lettuce that comes in a plastic container at the grocery store. It turns out that buying that and a head of romaine and tossing in a big bowl is way cheaper than buying all the bagged salads at the store. Plus if you have an OXO salad spinner, like us, your job is made that much easier (I love our salad spinner!).

Sweet Potato Gnocchi brought to you by Sunset.com: Click here. We are going to forego the mushrooms and spinach and make our own sauce to put over it. Andy is envisioning something spicy to complement the sweetness of the potatoes. Perhaps something with chipotle and honey? We'll see how it turns out!






Apple Cinnamon Bundt Cake from Cooking Light: Click here. I am really excited about this dessert! Just reading the ingredient list makes me drool!











A Bishop, David Wondrich's version will be our after dinner drink of choice. Click here and scroll down past the instructions for a hot whiskey to get to the bishop recipe. As a side note, we're pairing some red and white wines with the meal itself!


I'll be sure to write back about how it all turned out! In the meantime, I hope everyone has a fantastic holiday and a delicious Thanksgiving!

Deliciously Yours,

-Kate

Yummy Things to Make!

Whether I've actually mentioned this or not I don't know, but I am a lover of baking and cooking and it is a goal of mine to share some delicious recipes with you all. A few weeks ago I posted the recipe for the scrumptious black bean burgers. Today I bring you the joy of a good cookie: Oatmeal Cookies with Pecans and Cranberries (and if you're me, Chocolate Chips!). These cookies are insanely addicting. I find myself eating more of them at one time than I care to admit, but I like to tell myself that since they are made with oatmeal, nuts, and fruit that they're mostly healthy.

Not only are they a great bake, they're also an easy one as well! Nothing better than easy, tasty cookies! It is really hard to mess up this recipe. Unless you're me and use all your baking powder on a previous recipe. I Google searched "substitutes for baking powder" and read that if I use 2 parts cream of tartar and 1 part baking soda that I should be fine. I was not fine. You may or may not know this but baking powder (and soda for that matter) are leavening agents, and without baking powder my cookies were flat as pancakes. Don't get me wrong, they were delicious, just flat. Moral of the story: Read the ingredient list carefully so as to avoid discoveries like mine when halfway through a recipe. Another moral: cream of tartar and baking soda are never a good enough substitute for baking powder. End of story.

Now, without further ado, the lovely and delightful recipe: Oatmeal Cookies with Cranberries and Pecans

Yummy Things to Make!

I have always loved to bake. It started out just being chocolate chip cookies made from the recipe on the back of the Nestle Tollhouse chocolate chip bag which makes me think of an episode of Friends. Watch the clip to see what I mean. But, I now like to cook as well. Tonight we are having some friends come over and we are going all vegetarian: black bean burgers and corn on the cob with jalapeno chimichurri! The burger recipe is from cookinglight.com and so I thought I'd share the link so that you may all enjoy the goodness that is these easy to make, hard to screw-up burgers! Click the link to find the recipe!  Black Bean Burgers with Mango Salsa