Thanksgiving dinner

This year, I really wanted to do something other than turkey.

Don’t get me wrong – I think turkey is phenomenal and wish that I made it more frequently throughout the year – but after years of Thanksgivings and Christmases turkey-centric meals, I really wanted a change.  I also wanted something modern, because I tend to always rely on comfort food classics and the usual suspects.

The other change was that I didn’t spend weeks planning out the sides and thinking about it.

See, my birthday almost always falls on Canadian Thanksgiving weekend, so sometimes I’m not entirely sure what night we’re having it until the day before, or sometimes of, so I’ve learned over previous mishaps to go with the flow a little more.

I shopped for fresh vegetables on Monday morning in the neighbourhood and didn’t plan out anything until an hour before I started cooking.

Had I gone completely insane?

Perhaps.

Because the capon was small (2 lbs. boneless), I knew it wouldn’t take too long to cook, so I just kind of winged it and I can’t believe how well it all worked out.

It was the.best.Thanksgiving.dinner.I’ve.ever.made.

Ever.

Menu

Lemon-Sage Roasted Boneless Capon

Trio of Tomato Confit with Mushrooms, Basil & Balsamic

Crisp Organic Green Beans

Baked Potatoes with Green Onions

Stuffing

p.s. I made a Portuguese soup for Thanksgiving Day lunch – kale, kielbasa and black bean. Crazygood.

p.p.s. Usually I think something;’s going to turn out and it doesn’t. This meal completely surprised me. And I couldn’t duplicate it even if you paid me. That drives me crazy, but makes me appreciate the good meals all the more.

From the garden

Every Saturday, I get together with my Dad and we go to Phil’s Organic Market or the St. Lawrence Market or some food-related place where we get a few things to cook up during the week.

In the summer, he greets me with a little bag of goodies from his garden – tomatoes, purple basil, green onions, lettuce and various herbs that get all blended together on his way to meet me.

At the beginning of summer, my fab friend Diana took me to her allotment garden (pictured above) and shared her bounty. I took home this bulging bag of lettuce, chard, herbs and other wonders that I would have ordinarily cooked up, but instead made into a salad due to the intense heat and humidity.

Last week, I got to see Diana after way too long and she had just gone through her garden to tidy it up and had saved me some beautiful ingredients for supper.

I had a friend over for dinner that night, but it was still too muggy to cook much.  So I took Diana’s fresh, fragrant basil, crisp green and purple beans and various tomatoes and created:

Chicken pasta salad with fresh basil and tomatoes

10 Bean salad

Green Salad (with Diana’s tomatoes)

It was perfect.

I am grateful to these amateur farmers as well as the professional folks who work so hard to put good food on my plate.

Watch for Poetry of Food’s next issue launching next week for my story about one very special farmer.

I’m back!

Last night’s menu:

* Fresh, local corn on the cob

* Caribbean Pork Tenderloin (with Rum, Brown Sugar and other spices)

* Warm Red Potato Salad with Creamy Lemon Basil Dressing

* Arugula, mushrooms and yellow zucchini drizzled with olive oil and aged balsamic vinegar

Food, glorious food

I finally made it back to the stove.

After a long day of walking the city, I came back to my hood to do a big grocery shop.

Ahh, so nice to have fresh goodies in the house!  But before putting them away, I cleaned out the fridge – ooh, there’s that lovely chicken chili I made last week and the pesto pasta that I thought we finished…

Then I put everything away.  With one small cupboard and one small fridge, this always means that I have to take out the majority of the items before I can make room for everything.

Really, it’s a whole thing.

Two hours after I had come through the door, everything is finally put away and the kitchen looks pristine.

It’s now time to make dinner.  I pull everything out and start the assembly.

My menu for tonight is:

- Roast skinless, boneless chicken breasts stuffed with wild leeks, fresh basil and lemons.

- Boiled new potatoes with olive oil and fresh dill

- Organic kale with garlic and horseradish

- Chopped salad of romaine, yellow peppers, endive and radish

I was tempted to do a big soup as well, but all that chopping and cooking took another hour or so, and I had started on a dessert (yes, I’m trying to learn to bake) that is going to take a couple of days, because you have to let things cool in the fridge in various stages. So despite how tired I was from the whole process, I was very close to just cooking all night.

However, I remembered that there is still tomorrow and Monday is a holiday here, so I may take a couple of hours in the afternoon to do something slow-cooked.

It is so good to be home, cooking again.  I am like an actor who just found out she got the part.

Tonight’s audition: finish the 3-part dessert (it’s a surprise), homemade soup (I think something minestrone-esque) and something from the new Jamie’s America cookbook.