Day 170: You Must Try This!

Tonight's dinner was a celebration of autumn and the holiday season.  

If you read my Thanksgiving entry, you may recall that we grilled an herb rubbed turkey breast this year, rather that roasting the whole bird.  The herb mixture includes garlic, thyme, rosemary, and parsley - combined and made into a paste in a food processor.  Since Thanksgiving, I've used this herb mixture with halibut and tonight I used it with organic bone-in skin-on chicken breasts.  As with the turkey, I gently pulled the skin away from the chicken breasts and placed a thick layer of herb rub underneath.  Then, I browned the chicken in a skillet pre-heated with olive oil and then placed it in a glass baking dish to finish in the oven.  (375 degrees for about 30 minutes)

But the star of tonight's meal was the side dish.  I started with a recipe I found on Epicurious.com and tweaked it to make it a bit more dynamic and interesting.

Ingredients:

1 2-lb butternut squash, peeled, halved, seeded, and cut into 1 inch pieces

1 T light brown sugar

1/2 tsp fresh thyme leaves

2 T olive oil

1 cup fresh cranberries

3 T unsalted butter

1/2 tsp freshly grated nutmeg

1/3 cup pistachio nuts, coarsely chopped

Combine squash, sugar, thyme, and oil in a large bowl.  Season with S&P and toss to make sure squash is evenly coated.

Lay squash out in a single layer on a rimmed baking sheet (spray pan with non-stick spray beforehand) and roast at 375 degrees for 30 minutes.

After 30 minutes, sprinkle cranberries over the top of the squash and roast for another 15 minutes.

Melt butter at medium-low heat until browned (4-5 minutes).  

Once squash and cranberries are finished cooking, place them in a large bowl.  Pour the brown butter over the top, add the nutmeg and pistachios, and toss it all together.  Serve!

The ingredients in this dish balance each other out perfectly - sweet, sour, a little crunchy, a little salty.  It was pretty close to perfect and I look forward to making it many more times this winter.  Experimenting with recipes is fun - especially when it works out so well!

Day 146: Happy Thanksgiving!!

Holy hell.  I'm full!!  

My parents came to us for Thanksgiving this year and my husband and I took care of all of the cooking.  As you can see from our very full table, we went all out.  Our menu consisted of the following, starting from the upper right hand corner of the table.

Main Course #1:  Turkey!!

Rather than cooking a whole bird, we purchased two breasts at Whole Foods and grilled them.  That freed up the oven for the sides and gave my husband something to do (man + fire = happiness).  We prepared each breast differently the night before to give them a chance to suck up lots of good flavor.

One breast got an herb and garlic rub:  1/4 cup each of chopped fresh sage, thyme, and rosemary, a 1/2 cup of parsley, and 10 cloves of garlic.  All of that was ground up in the food processor and then I tucked a thick layer of it underneath the skin of the turkey.

The other breast was marinated in a mix of the juice of 5 oranges, zest from 2 of those oranges, juice and zest from 2 lemons, 1 large sliced shallot, 6 smashed cloves of garlic, a couple of tablespoons of sugar, about 1/4 cup of olive oil, and S&P.

The breasts took about 2.5 hours on the grill on indirect heat.

Side Dish #1:  Cauliflower with Mustard Lemon Butter

Side Dish #2:  Orange Rosemary Cranberry Sauce

Side Dish #3:  Butternut Squash & Creamed Spinach Gratin

Side Dish #4:  Corn Bread (for recipe, see side of Marie Callender package - this was the only thing I did not make from scratch)

Side Dish #5:  Wild Rice with Wild Mushrooms

Mushroom Gravy

Side Dish #6:  Thyme Roasted Sweet Potatoes

All of this was quite delicious and satisfying, but what's a Thanksgiving dinner without dessert?  After a short break, we were ready to dive in.

We had three desserts:

1.  Chocolate Pumpkin Tart

2.  Apple Crisp (made my our friend and dinner guest Julie)

3.  Coconut Macaroons (recipe available on the back of the blue Baker's Shredded Coconut bag)

Everything was enjoyed by all.  We are slipping into a food coma as I type this.  In fact, typing this is becoming increasing difficult.  Happy Thanksgiving!  Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz