Celebrating a Western Canadian Thanksgiving

[Mooshmouse]

Thanksgiving dinner is in the oven as we speak; as holiday head chef, I'm entitled to take a breather now (cocktail in hand, of course) while the other 'line cooks' in my family take care of prepping the vegetables.

For 6 years in a row, I cooked both Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners for my family (translate: Ian and me, my Mom and my Aunt and Uncle). My only two reprieves were the Christmas I was in my first trimester of pregnancy (and incredibly green with morning/noon/night sickness) and the first Thanksgiving after I had Noah. Even then, I supervised the spicing of the bird and the overall cooking process.

Thereafter, I came to an agreement with my family members. Thanksgiving is now annually hosted by my Aunt and Uncle, and Christmas is hosted by us. Whoever hosts supplies the potatoes and the meat -- either turkey or ham -- and my Uncle and I traditionally put together these main components of the meal. I usually do the cranberry jelly. Everyone else pitches in and brings whatever else is missing: vegetables, dessert, vino. And everyone's responsible for cooking what they bring. Best of all, since I do most of the cooking, I don't have to wash dishes afterwards.

This year, we're missing one friend who was supposed to join us but was stricken with the horrendous cold that seems to be making the rounds. Nonetheless, she anted up with cornbread stuffing... can't wait to get a forkful of that. In return, we'll be bringing her a fairly hefty care package. Then there's turkey this year instead of the ham that we've had for 2 holidays running, organic baby carrots, the requisite brussels sprouts (even though these are an anathema to me, Thanksgiving just isn't the same without them), asparagus (yes, yes, out of season, but I love it), sweet Chilliwack corn and roasted garlic mashed potatoes. Since my home oven isn't yet hooked up, Ian ducked into Fratelli's today and picked up a couple of pumpkin pies that we'll serve with vanilla/nutmeg whipped cream. I brought over a bottle of Township 7 2004 Sauvignon Blanc that we'll crack at the beginning of the meal, and we'll switch to whatever red my Uncle has in the decanter.

Time to check on the spuds. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

[Zucchini Mama]

Thanksgiving Grape Pie-Diary of a Madwoman

Oct 9

Last year I tasted a grape pie at my son's preschool potluck and became intrigued. So this year I decided to do some research and make one as a surprise for thanksgiving. I bought a box of BC concords at the local East West grocery store, and we've been snacking on them for a week. They are quite small, dark with a good bloom and lots of little seeds. Reading a few recipes online, I discovered that the method involved squeezing the pulp out of the skins, cooking it up, them strain out the seeds. I was a bit suspicious, but once I tried cutting the little grapes in half and trying to flick out the seeds, I knew I'd go crazy doing the whole bunch this way, and the skins were coming off anyway. Finally, I got a rhythm going, pick a grape off the stem, squeeze out the pulp, plop pulp in one bowl, plop skin in another. I was only on dessert duty this year, so didn't mind a bit of finicky labor, besides these are the activities that fix into you body memory and remind you of special occasions like this.

I made a pumpkin cheesecake from scratch as well, so I had bought a beautiful little sugar pumpkin at UBC farm. The big complication is our oven isn't working, so I had to cook everything at our neighbor's house two doors down. I started by cooking the pumpkin last night, cutting it into quarters and roasting it while reading Dean Koontz's "Frankenstein" in an empty house. Very spooky! I loved it.

This morning I made the cheesecake, and while it was baking, I worked on the grape pie. I used the crust recipe out of Sid Goldstein's book (The Wine Lover's Cookbook) which is nice for this time of year because it's got a bit of cinnamon in it. I use a bit less cinnamon than he does, to make it a bit more subtle. I flubbed up the crust a bit, trying to combine a rustic tart idea of flipping over extra dough instead of crimping it, then I put some streusel topping on it.

It didn't look beautiful, but it looked tasty. Smells a bit like cough syrup, but that's not the grape's fault, it's the fault of people who think medicines taste better if they taste like fake grapes. Poor grapes, if only they could rise up in protest. Thank god fluoride treatments don't taste like pumpkin cheesecake!

Anyway, to top the cheesecake I usually make a maple syrup pumpkinseed brittle, but didn't have hulled seeds around, so I ground up some local hazelnuts and roasted them. I poured some maple syrup on the top of the cheesecake, added the buts, then put a bit more maple syrup on top of that.

Oct. 10

So the grape pie was a big success. It was a real conversation piece, and people were really curious about the alchemy of how the pie ends up with a gorgeous purple filling using the process described above. The cheesecake was also a huge hit. I think the hazelnuts are a keeper. It wasn't overly sweet, especially since I forgot to put sugar in the graham cracker crust, so it tastes really good with extra lashings of maple syrup, which is what I had for breakfast! There was lots of leftover dessert because Aunt C made two apple pies as well. Leftovers are the best part of Thanksgiving! We had a big ole bottle of Sauterne with the desserts-butter, lemon, honey. They had a hard time prying that bottle out of my hands!

Zuke

Edited October 10, 2005 by Zucchini Mama (log)

[maxm]

Hi, new member here. I discovered this forum while researching recipes for a Thanksgiving dinner, so thought I'd share the results, if not how excited I got about all the great autumn ingredients: walnuts, pears, cranberries, blue cheese, winter squash, etc. In fact, I sampled the pears and cheese so thoroughly the night before that I had to go back and buy more

To start, a light appetiser with stilton, walnuts, and dried cranberries scooped into endive leaves. I brined the turkey, then stuffed it with chestnuts, pears, dried apricot, sourdough bread, pork mince, and served with sprouts, backed winter squash, potatoes, cranberry sauce, gravy, off-dry BC gewurztraminer. It turned out delicious, but almost too rich. Next time, I'll try to go for more "pure" flavours and balance, maybe skip the brine or the stuffing, or tone down the sides. After that, pears in red wine w. cinnamon, ginger, citrus peel, a few black peppercorns, and vanilla ice cream with the reduced wine sauce poured over. Then a short conversation break, and then some more cheese (and a BC "port").

Now I'm on my second day of leftover turkey, and looks like it will last a few days more... (I'm a bit jealous of those who have leftover pie)

Edited October 11, 2005 by maxm (log)

[ktbear]

All the usual stuff for thanksgiving and always finish it off with the liver and the heart of the turkey that no one in my family (thankfully) appreciates.

[canucklehead]

So - we had our little Chinese Hot Pot Thanksgiving.

Our general set up includes to pots of soup on some sort of heating source. One pot was for red meat - the other for fish and veggies. Each setting has a bowl for dipping sauces, a basket to cook your food, and another bowl for eating.

You get a variety of fish, mushrooms, tofu, meats, vegetables, etc... that you cook in the simmering broth.

Boil boil blip blip.... One of sauce bases we use is to chop small Thai chillis and macerate them in soy and a little toasted sesame oil. Spicy good.

These meals are actually very easy to put together. Asian stores like TNT and Hannam (great for Korean thin cut meat) - pretty well have everything ready for your to take home - clean a little and then put out for people to cook for themselves.

I hope that everyone had a great thanksgiving - not matter what you ate.

[fud]

^ nice!! I love hotpot. We had one on friday! I'd love to have one on the roof of my building since it's nice and cold and I love hot hotpot when it's cold out.

We had a really nice thanksgiving consisting of Turkey and braised lamb as well as yummy Goat cheese and pistachio salad mmm (sound familiar to you NWCAV people?)

[Ling]

^ nice!!  I love hotpot.  We had one on friday!  I'd love to have one on the roof of my building since it's nice and cold and I love hot hotpot when it's cold out. 

←

Is this an invitation? heh heh....

(I'll bring dessert!)

[makanmakan]

So - we had our little Chinese Hot Pot Thanksgiving.

Our general set up includes to pots of soup on some sort of heating source.  One pot was for red meat - the other for fish and veggies.  Each setting has a bowl for dipping sauces, a basket to cook your food, and another bowl for eating.

You get a variety of fish, mushrooms, tofu, meats, vegetables, etc... that you cook in the simmering broth.

Boil boil blip blip....  One of sauce bases we use is to chop small Thai chillis and macerate them in soy and a little toasted sesame oil.  Spicy good.

These meals are actually very easy to put together.  Asian stores like TNT and Hannam (great for Korean thin cut meat) - pretty well have everything ready for your to take home - clean a little and then put out for people to cook for themselves.

I hope that everyone had a great thanksgiving - not matter what you ate.

←

swoon...beautiful! we called it steamboat in malaysia and it has been way too long for me!! thanks for the great photos!

we did ham (a la coca cola, thanks to an intriguing nigella recipe), potato gratin, baked mashed yams with pecans and brown sugar, asparagus tossed in brown butter and lots of cracked black pepper, crunchy salt and shaved parmesan. dessert was a cheesecake and strawberry rubharb pie from savary island pie co.

[*Deborah*]

Ha! Canucklehead made that Nigella ham and I got to try it, it's good, isn't it?!

I was the sick girl who got a fabulous plate of leftovers today, my cornbread/bacon/sage stuffing came out well (if a little sweeter than optimal; I'll know for next year), the gravy was just luscious, fabulous potatoes that I didn't have to mash, and lovely herby turkey breast. I left a chunk of turkey on the counter for later, though, and *Ilya Kovalchuk* and *Ziggy Palffy* (my cats) snacked on that a bit Well, they had something to be grateful for, too, I guess.

Best Thanksgiving gift of the day: the Canucks beat the Red Wings in Hockeytown

Edited for good and well correction; it was good though.

Edited October 11, 2005 by *Deborah* (log)

[jamiemaw]

Here's a link to a petite report on our weekend.

J.

Edited October 11, 2005 by jamiemaw (log)

[Junior]

Our Thanksgiving dinner was held at my wife's grandparents farm about 3 hours northeast of Saskatoon. We did not have all the usaul accompaniments because it was the grandparents 50th wedding anniversery. My wife's family planned a big evening of dinner, song, videos, and general entertainment for the grandparents and a 100 close friends. The majority of our meal came from surrounding commuties and there repective gardens and one cow.

We prepared Roast Beef (50# worth), a fall vegetable medley (celery root, rutabaga, yukon gold potato, russet potato, red yams, carrots, and butternut squash), cabbage rolls, peroigies, 3 different salads, homemade buns and horseradish, gravy, and several desserts inculding a wedding cake that my wife made that was the same as the one they had when they were married. We also found the original man and wife plastic figure.

Last night we some leftover beef with mashed potato, more gravy, veggies (what we could find in the garden), stuffing, cranberry's, some grilled lamb shank and shoulder(that had been marinated for about 4 days in a mix with garlic, onions, and some other stuff that Baba wouldn't divulge to me.) This dish was called Shislakeah, I think I spelled that wrong but it is a Polish tradition from this time of the year. More cake and more cake. Lots of wine and beer, of course over the weekend.

Just before we left central Saskatchewan had a few days of low temp's and rain but when we came home today, the weather had turned nice enough to see that the farmers were back to harvesting. Nearly every field we passed had combines running or they were swathing the field getting them ready to combine. The news is reporting we as a province are to have a record year for the harvest. Which for once is good news for the guys in the fields.

[Country Cook]

I didn't do any cooking this thanksgiving.

I went down to visit friends in the Bella Coola valley in the heart of the Great Bear Rainforest. The drive itself is awe inspiring (driving one lane down a mountain with around seven switchbacks).

On saturday we went on a 20 min heli ride up acouple of the drainages looking for goats and flying over very dangerous looking glaciers. Supper was fork tender ribeyes and my own roasted beets and potatoes.

On Sunday after talking the dogs for a walk on an old growth interpretive trail up by Bella Coola Seafood we had a traditional turkey dinner at one of their new friends places, quite delicious, especially the pumpkin pie tart.

On monday I was thankful I made it back up the hill.

[makanmakan]

Ha! Canucklehead made that Nigella ham and I got to try it, it's good, isn't it?!

I was the sick girl who got a fabulous plate of leftovers today, my cornbread/bacon/sage stuffing came out well (if a little sweeter than optimal; I'll know for next year), the gravy was just luscious, fabulous potatoes that I didn't have to mash, and lovely herby turkey breast. I left a chunk of turkey on the counter for later, though, and *Ilya Kovalchuk* and *Ziggy Palffy* (my cats) snacked on that a bit Well, they had something to be grateful for, too, I guess.

Best Thanksgiving gift of the day: the Canucks beat the Red Wings in Hockeytown

Edited for good and well correction; it was good though.

←

it is surprisingly good! and so easy! will be enjoying leftovers for lunch today!

hope you feel better....leftovers always make me feel much better!

[Paul B]

Paul B: Do you really taste a difference in the brined turkey? I used Alice Water's brining recipe (well, the Chez Panisse recipe) a few years ago, and I couldn't tell the difference. My family couldn't either.

←

L:

It's not so much the taste as the tenderness and juiciness. I've been converted to brining by reading Cook's Illustrated (religiously) and they've run all sorts of tests that prove that birds that are brined lose less weight during cooking and stay nice and moist, important for turkey since the breast meat tends to dry out. Now I regularly brine chickens and turkies before I roast them. I do not, however, use quite as much salt as they call for since it can make the resultant gravy a bit salty, by my standards anyway. The Cook's Illustrated book, Best New Recipes, has a whole section on the science of brining.

Check it out.

[fud]

^ nice!!  I love hotpot.  We had one on friday!  I'd love to have one on the roof of my building since it's nice and cold and I love hot hotpot when it's cold out. 

←

Is this an invitation? heh heh....

(I'll bring dessert!)

←

Maybe

I do live really close to where some of us are taking that cooking class (hint hint)

[Feedbag]

Another, hassle-free way to ensure a moist, juicy

turkey without going to the trouble of brining is to buy

fresh free-range. Once you've tried it you'll never go

back to frozen.

[Vancouver Lee]

Another, hassle-free way to ensure a moist, juicy

turkey without going to the trouble of brining is to buy

fresh free-range. Once you've tried it you'll never go

back to frozen.

←

Yep, I'm a big fan of free range poultry. I'm completely ignorant of the science behind brining, but getting meat to soak up water seems like it would have a detrimental effect on the flavour. Gotta read up on brining a little.

Our 2005 Thanksgiving dinner was marvellous. We had the pleasure of dining with six e-Gulls Sunday night. I, as usual, was stressed-out to the max about the food and only saw the mistakes I made in the preparation, but judging by the taste of the leftovers today, I think most of my blunders went un-noticed. If anyone wants some of my goat cheese/sour cream/buttermilk/reggiano parmesan/butter mashed potatoes, just say the word - I have a huge bowl left over!

Our guests were extremely generous with the wine they brought, including a Mission Hill Oculus that rocked. Many thanks to those who attended, you made our celebration a truly memorable one.

[Ling]

Another, hassle-free way to ensure a moist, juicy

turkey without going to the trouble of brining is to buy

fresh free-range. Once you've tried it you'll never go

back to frozen.

←

I've had a fresh free-range turkey before, and I thought it was much better than my brined turkey. But this year, we got a regular frozen one.

[Daddy-A]

Yep, I'm a big fan of free range poultry.  I'm completely ignorant of the science behind brining, but getting meat to soak up water seems like it would have a detrimental effect on the flavour.  Gotta read up on brining a little.

Lee, remind me and I'll bring you my Cooks Illustrated that has an excellent explanation of brining. Brining rules!

Our 2005 Thanksgiving dinner was marvellous.  We had the pleasure of dining with six e-Gulls Sunday night.  I, as usual, was stressed-out to the max about the food and only saw the mistakes I made in the preparation, but judging by the taste of the leftovers today, I think most of my blunders went un-noticed.

Blunders? Get real dude! That food was awesome. Easily the best turkey I've ever enjoyed. My sons were still raving over the dinner yesterday. I have pictures which I will upload soon ... hopefully tonight.

Thanks to you and yours for a wonderful evening!

A.

[peppyre]

I have to agree with what Arne said, there are no blunders! Those potatoes were beyond words. As was the stuffing, gravy...etc. It twas a wonderful evening and far cry from Thanksgivings past.

[Vancouver Lee]

Blunders?  Get real dude!  That food was awesome. 

←

Thanks, Arne, I appreciate it. One blunder was the blueberry muffins. My ancient family recipe that dates back to the Great Depression calls for making them with melted shortening or vegetable oil, presumably because oil or shortneing is cheaper than butter. I didn't think to substitute butter instead, and I thought the muffins suffered for it. I made another batch last night with butter and they were WAY better. Live and learn, I suppose.

[jayhay]

  I, as usual, was stressed-out to the max about the food and only saw the mistakes I made in the preparation,   

Why do we do this to ourselves? I'm the same way, & I'm sure our guests don't even notice the little things we refer to as "mistakes" or "blunders."

We had a Mennonite free range turkey from Stong's, which I cooked breast-side down for 2/3 of the time, & breast up final 1/3. Beautifully moist even without brining...which I have done on several occassions, & find makes for very salty gravy.

[Xando Head]

I had a heated frozen burrito with a hunk of aged gouda and a London porter ... at my desk as I worked.

Sigh. No rest for the weary.

[nwyles]

I had a heated frozen burrito with a hunk of aged gouda and a London porter ... at my desk as I worked.

Sigh.  No rest for the weary.

←

Ok, International jet-setting television media marketing mogul, what 5 star hotel business suite was this consumed in and which famous people were in the next room picking out all of their free "swag". Is "London" the hint !

[maxm]

Why do we do this to ourselves?  I'm the same way, & I'm sure our guests don't even notice the little things we refer to as "mistakes" or "blunders."

We had a Mennonite free range turkey from Stong's, which I cooked breast-side down for 2/3 of the time, & breast up final 1/3.  Beautifully moist even without brining...which I have done on several occassions, & find makes for very salty gravy.

←

Had the same problem with brining, so I poured off most of the liquid from the pan after two hours in the oven and boiled potatoes in this to absorb some of the salt - helped a bit, and the potatoes were delicious (ate them all secretly in the kitchen as the guests arrived ).