The aftermath

When I woke up the day after Thanksgiving, I came to a realization.

It felt strangely like the day after our wedding.  All the planning and effort that had gone into one big event had paid off, the guests had departed and left behind were two exhausted people since the adrenaline had stopped.  After our wedding, we waited until a week later to depart for our honeymoon and enjoyed having time to reflect on the big day and all the wonderful memories.  Now, over a week after Thanksgiving, we are still enjoying rehashing the memories of what was a great day.

We were joined by my family, my husband's mother and my dear friend, Crissie and her husband and two children.  Crissie and I went to college together and then were roommates in DC after college.  During our time as roomies, our families often came out to visit over Thanksgiving and we (well, our parents really) would cook a huge Thanksgiving dinner.  Those were the days when we didn't even have a proper utensil to use to serve pumpkin pie.  And, definitely the days before children.  Almost 10 years later, we sat together with our children playing happily and a meal that we had cooked by ourselves.

Crissie reading with our boys on Thanksgiving.
Photo courtesy of Crissie Traugott Photography.

Like the recapping of our wedding on our honeymoon (reviewing the food, who kissed whom, who drank too much and who was a maniac on the dance floor), one week after Thanksgiving, I am ready to recap the food!

Here you go:

The First Course: Salad
I highly recommend the salad as well with a lemon shallot vinaigrette, pomegranate seeds, apples and mandarin oranges with candies pecans.  Divine.  And, a perfect way to start a meal when you know the main course and dessert are going to be absurdly heavy.

As I was putting fork to mouth on my second round of dessert, I decided the salad was the best idea versus a soup or other heavy first course.

See my last post on Thanksgiving for the salad recipe.


The Main Event: The Turkey
The turkey was amazing.

Our guests words, not mine.

And thank goodness  because I did not want to be "the one" who everyone talks about every year on Thanksgiving as the person who served the disgusting turkey.  I was breathing a major sigh of relief after dinner.

This was the first turkey I had ever cooked and after successfully finding the neck in the turkey while rinsing it off and then having to go through the turkey's other end to get out the little bag of fun (giblets/gizzard I think), I thought I might never eat turkey again.

If you can't tell, I was the kid who didn't do well dissecting even a worm in high school.  I roasted the 17 pound turkey on 325 degrees for approximately 4 1/2 hours.  I ran out of time to brine the turkey but took a stick of butter still in the wrapper and rubbed it over the turkey before putting it in the oven.  I also sprinkled it with garlic powder.  Finally, I put some chicken stock in the bottom of the roasting pan to create a good base for the gravy.

I continued to rub the stick of butter on the turkey about every 45 minutes until it started to turn golden brown.  I also basted the turkey up until the last hour of cooking with the juices that accumulated in the bottom of the roasting pan.

The result?  Golden brown goodness.

Me with the first turkey cooked on my own.
Photo courtesy of Crissie Traugott Photography

This was so easy, I might just do it again!

Mashed Potato Thoughts
Go with heavy whipping cream versus skim or whole milk for the mashed potatoes.

Woweeeee!

Holidays are not the time to hold back on calories and fat.  Go big or go home!

Overwhelming Goodness: Pumpkin Bread Pudding with Caramel Sauce
I was nervous to make the pumpkin bread pudding with caramel sauce as it was not a 'traditional' pie dessert for Thanksgiving.

Sweet baby Jesus.  It was unreal.

If you make one dessert before now and the spring when it is no longer acceptable to cook with pumpkin (like wearing white after labor day, some of us still do it), MAKE THIS DESSERT.  The recipe is available in my last post on Thanksgiving.

Do Not Pass Up Chocolate on Thanksgiving
Crissie's mocha pie was out of this world and frankly, it was nice to have a dessert that didn't revolve around nuts or feature the traditional Thanksgiving dessert spices like nutmeg, ginger and cinnamon.  I adore chocolate 365 days a year and why pass it up on Thanksgiving?  I am going to try to get the recipe from Crissie to post.

I must admit that reading about all this food is now making me hungry again and I just ate dinner.  I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and enjoyed it as much as we enjoyed the holiday on this end.