At Charlie's request (again) we had a repeat of Thanksgiving turkey dinner for Christmas. These are friends who are staying with us for a while. They are Kalven and Ariyana. Ari requested tamales for Christmas and we had some for breakfast this morning along with some Mexican style rice that I made. Through one of Charlies car club members we were able to find a place that has some good tamales. It was a small mom & pop store that also sold food, but they only sold tamales on Friday this week. We pre-ordered got two dozen. They were very good and we still have some for later.
I cooked the turkey yesterday. cut the breasts and dark meat off in whole pieces, vacuum packed them and reheated it in the sous vide. The back of the turkey was cooked in some homemade chicken stock I had frozen and that gave me enough stock for all the other dishes that used stock. It made some very good gravy. I made a paste with butter and flour and added enough to stock to make the gravy, then added salt and pepper and a little cream, rosemary, sage and chives. Charlie said it was the best gravy he'd ever had.
I had enough time to make some bread. It was the same bread I most often make but without any sourdough flavoring. It is just water, salt, sugar, yeast and enough flour to make a soft but not sticky dough.
Dressing was Pepperidge Farm country style with some turkey bits mixed in with the broth. There were some bits in the gravy too.
Not pictured (besides the tamales) is an apple crisp like I made for Thanksgiving and a store bought pecan pie.
Merry Christmas.
