Thanksgiving test cooks

I have been playing around with some recipes and doing some advance prep for Thankgiving this week/weekend...........

did a test turkey this morning that will become stock tomorrow - spatchcocked it last night, simple prep - poultry seasoning, thyme, salt , pepper (I was testing spatchcocking and timing)

not that exciting looking but .....


yesterday I did some meatballs to add to some sauce, it's amazing the flavor that the smoked meatballs give the sauce when they have been simmered together


did a test batch of a new cranberry sauce recipe - this one is cranberry-pear (my favorite, well maybe equally favorite with my cran-blueberry)

cranberries, pears, maple sugar, cinnamon, water and........


my new secret cranberry sauce ingredient




then, the new stuff that needs the most work but I will have it dialed in by Thanksgiving (also the most exciting part of my weekend cooking) ............
to be continued ............

continued....

a couple weeks ago I went to VT with a friend and we took a class at the King Arthur Baking Education Center - it was 8 hours of Artisan Pastry and breads (recipes from this book Amazon.com: Baking Artisan Pastries and Breads: Sweet and Savory Baking for Breakfast, Brunch, and Beyond (9781592535644): Ciril Hitz: Books) It was an very intense, very cool day.

The instructor said several times that the first recipe we did from the book should not be croissants........ um, ok, I took that as a challenge Here's my first stab at croissants -- they are far from perfect but were pretty tasty.

Chocolate filled, chocolate croissants

the first challenge was finding european butter..... done....... here is a butter block (butter rolled out into parchment, it goes into the fridge to harden up)

Here's the chocolate dough

Here they start becoming one

here they are after the folds (this is NOT what the dough is supposed to look like)

even though it wasn't right i decided to keep going

after baking

cross section (tighter than it should be, i thought maybe an extra fold would help with my butter issue, it didn't)



I will conquer these by thanksgiving..... a whole wheat version will be on my table for dinner......... I have a couple ideas of things that I need to change in my prep

it all looks good to me. what no cheesecake? where's your milk deb?

that was still coffee time

there will probably be a cheesecake but I don't need to do a test one of those

I haven't finalized the dessert menu yet....... last year I made four, I"m not sure i need four for 8 people , maybe I do....... everybody tells me I don't need that many but I don't EVER hear anybody complaining with the choices. I'm more apt to hear, I'm going to have a little of each

Too bad I don't live closer, I'd love to be a Guinea Pig for you! Looks great.

I want to have Thanksgiving at your house. LOL. Looks great.

Looks awesome Deb!!!

What time is diner??
Looks great Deb! What a feast!


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