Thanksgiving!

I swear I totally owe Classical European backlogs but first, Thanksgiving!

Possibly one of the most stressful things I've ever gone through in the past year and a half of culinary school and it wasn't even school-related. I had 20-25 people to cook for and no time, but somehow I pulled through. It took three all-nighters of prep work and a pre-cooked (...) smoked turkey, but it made the actual Thanksgiving day a breeze.

I had no idea what I was cooking until about four days before the event but I did have some rules:
1) Simple dishes
2) Serve nothing that has to be served immediately after cooking
3) Food must hold well without a heat source

Frankly, a lot of people were surprised when I told them about my menu and how simple it was but I don't think a lot of people think about how realistic it would be to serve a menu to that many people with one person in the kitchen. (Especially if Thanksgiving was that one person's only day off in three weeks and they just want to spend it relaxing...)

So I served:
- Green bean casserole with homemade mushroom soup
- Eggplant and bell peppers in homemade tomato sauce
- Butternut squash soup
- Browned butter chocolate chip vanilla bean cookies
- Apricot-glazed fresh fruit tart
- Smoked turkey with chicken bacon gravy
- Fresh fruit and cheese platter with crackers and prosciutto

And my mom made:
- Lasagna
- Pancit
- Mashed potatoes
- Ham

And a few families brought dishes too.

 Our spread.

Oddly enough, my favorite dish was the green bean casserole. I'd only had it once before at a potluck with a couple of friends and remembered really enjoying it so I decided to try it with mushroom soup that I made from scratch rather than the canned kind. I couldn't stop eating it.

I really didn't want to have to worry about brining, seasoning, and cooking a turkey for five hours when I could use the oven space for other things, so per a coworker's suggestion, I bought a precooked 10lb turkey from Bubbaque's. My family's always cooked the raw turkey every year so I was worried this would taste dry and reheated, but it was actually really good! We barely had any left over but I had plenty to use for broth.

The downside to not having a raw turkey is having to find something to make the gravy with. Luckily, I found some chicken in the freezer and a little bit of bacon left so I rendered those, removed the meats, sauteed some onions in the grease to translucent, deglazed the pan with some white wine, reduced it by half, added some chicken stock and reduced it by half again, then added a tiny bit of milk and then reduced it to sauce consistency. I thought I'd made a whole lot, but it was the first thing to get finished in the entire table!

I really wished I could've put a lot more cheese and Italian cured meats on there, but I forgot how expensive it all was. The fruit alone cost over $40. I tried to get all my produce local from the fruit stand I usually frequent, but a lot of the stuff I wanted was out of season (which probably explains why it cost so much at the grocery store). It looked really good, though! And I couldn't stop eyeing the camembert the entire day.

I've probably made this pie about ten times in the past year but I think I'm most delighted about the presentation of this one. I have no idea where I even got this idea from. I just started slicing away and then ended up with a kiwi rose... I hadn't made pie crust in months and I completely forgot to weigh the crust down when I baked them off, so a small piece of one of the pies ended up caving in, but I don't think anyone noticed. It was really tasty!

All in all I was really happy with everything. There wasn't a single dish we made that I didn't enjoy, and that was a big relief.

I passed out right before everyone started leaving, but luckily, Tigger took care of the dishes.