The main food binge is over, all that remains are the leftovers we will eat for days. This introvert could now go for days without seeing another human being, including my significant other. I am exhausted, and it was only us two and two of our friends. Oh, and Ruger, the dog. Ruger is the only extrovert in this household.
Don smoked a turkey breast after letting it sit in the refrigerator for three days soaking in his secret “dry rub”. (The only other person who had the recipe was our son although many have requested it. The truth is: I think Don mixes it up just a little every time he makes it so it is in that ethereal realm of recipes as his grandmother’s mincemeat – she had no idea how she made it but it was the best mince meat this side of Heaven, and I don’t like mincemeat for the most part.)
I spent Tuesday making up four little tarts for the Holiday: rolling out the pie dough, filling each one with either spiced apples from our garden or my own version of mincemeat* (which is meat-less. Maxine’s had elk meat in it). *Mine is really an apple-pear chutney with ginger that tastes strangely like store-bought mincemeat. So don’t get excited. I think I found it on All Recipes.com.
Wednesday, I went to the dentist and got my teeth cleaned. That’s neither here nor there (no cavities, Ma!) except whilst I was away the sourdough started decided to “explode” all over the countertop. My sourdough starter is another well-kept secret: it was handed down by Maxine to my mother-in-law who passed it down to me. I don’t know how old it is because my mother-in-law doesn’t know how old it is and Maxine took the secret to her grave. It’s easily 70 years old. And it sits in the refrigerator, unused, except for those rare times I bake bread or on holidays. Even the “explosion” was a minor accident to the starter. It just bubbles happily away.
Thursday was all about prep work before the turkey was done and guests arrived. Tablecloth, fine China, real silver: check, check, check. Not for anyone else but for me and my need to grasp onto Tradition. I found a Lego wrapped up in one of the tablecloths when I pulled them out of the chest. A Lego. It’s been there since last Thanksgiving when our daughter and her horde came down from Alaska and celebrated with us.
I had to pull the table out and set all the settings on one side as there is a cast iron claw-foot bathtub hiding under the table. Our bathroom is still in the throes of a remodel that is taking months to complete. The tub had to be removed to allow for the new flooring but now we have to adjust all the plumbing due to the new flooring and the new vanity is still sitting where the tub belongs, awaiting new faucets. (How’s that for a run-on sentence?) Anyway, there is a bathtub on a dolly hiding under our table, but the men who put it there were going to be the men eating turkey soon. And the tablecloth hid it well.
I pulled the tarts out of the refrigerator and set them on the counter under a towel to warm up to room temperature and await their turn in the oven. Everything else was mixing and kneading bread dough, selecting the ingredients for the stuffing and sautéing the veggies to add, and making the sauce to pour over the broccoli dish I would be serving. While doing some of that, I accidentally elbowed one tart and it went face down onto the floor. Ruger was excited about that, but I shooed him off and tossed the contents into the garbage (sorry, Ruger, you’re already chonky!). Now I am one tart short. UGH. Blood pressure is maintained, at least. I still have my sense of humor.
I decided to make another tart, but I am now out of flour and pie crust mix, and I do NOT want to go to the grocery store. We had graham cracker crumbs in the cupboard and blueberries in the freezer: blueberry tart! I also poured myself a glass of white wine, mostly because the sauce for the broccoli takes two tablespoons of the stuff. Wouldn’t want to waste it, you know. And it takes the edge off.
No, this is not a “then I had another glass of wine”, post, because I really did not. That was later in the day after the guests left and I needed to decompress.
I had to mix up a roux for the broccoli sauce, but Husband was in the kitchen (I do my best work without distraction) and he thought I was making the gravy. I don’t know why he thought I was making the gravy. That’s the last thing a person makes after the turkey is ready and the potatoes are mashed, and the table is ready for people to start sitting down. The guests hadn’t even arrived. He tried to help by getting the gravy packet from the turkey breast out of the refrigerator, which in turn distracted me because that was NOT what I was making, and I managed to both snap at him and spill the heavy cream all over the counter and onto the floor that I had just mopped. Again, sorry, Ruger, but you don’t get to lap that up. OUT OF MY KITCHEN, DOG. And I washed it up. Blood pressure is slightly elevated now.
Everything was ready to be popped into the oven, the bread and rolls were baked, and we had a break in the clouds. I wrapped myself in a coat and joined my husband outside around the Breeo smokeless fire pit to relax a little bit. Aaah. I was still sipping on that first glass of wine.
The guests arrived half an hour later just as the turkey reached the magic point in smoking: done. I started putting dishes into the oven while conversing with the female guest. The men sat around the fire pit. My guest asked what she could do and I said I thought I had it under control.
“You always have it under control,” she said.
Um… I’ve dumped one tart, spilled the cream, snapped at my husband (and the dog, but he deserved it), and dinner isn’t quite finished yet. Also, I am beginning to feel the ache of missing family members. And the dog is back in the kitchen, very excited because our guests are his favorite people in the whole world next to us and the dog next door that usually ignores him. Ruger gets pushed back outside to play around the fire with the men.
Dinner went well, actually. Everything timed out perfectly and nobody minded that the bathtub was hiding under the tablecloth. Ruger even settled down after being yelled at several times to “GO LAY DOWN”. (“But, but, but… there’s food. And Morgan! And food! And people! Aw, OK, I’ll lay down and TRY to be good…”)
Dishes were picked up and real silver separated from the stainless. (Yes, everyone let Ruger lick the juices off of their plates, but there weren’t any leftovers, only a taste. Poor, fat, doggo.) We relaxed for a drink and settled our tummies. Eventually, I heated the oven again and set about placing the tarts in to bake.
The rack in my oven has very wide gaps in it. Why is a mystery, but there you are. And one tart fell through, face down onto the oven door, apple juice pouring down into the broiler pan, and my husband (so helpful) saying, “You should put them on a baking sheet”. Now I need that second glass of wine. Or a third. And he can’t understand why I glowered at him.
We never ate dessert. We sent two tarts home with our guests. I washed and dried the silver. Everything else went into the dishwasher (I cook and clean as I go so pans were a minimum by evening’s end). I left the over cleaning for today, and it is still waiting for me. Baked on apple juice is not fun.
I will end with this: I think the bathtub had the BEST Thanksgiving, ever. I think it was happy to be included. It was better behaved than Ruger was.
And that turkey… Oh, my. Don’s Secret Dry Rub transforms everything.
Jaci Dawn 