Fixin' Supper

I know y’all think I haven’t done anything lately except think about Metro’s proposed Standard School Attire policy. With the exception of working, sleeping and feeding the kids, you’re about right. Early this morning, I realized I hadn’t planned Easter dinner. Easter baskets, yep. Dinner, ummm….

So I’m whipping out a couple of old standards for tomorrow. We’re going to have roast beef [cooked today in the crockpot] and golden baked potatoes, and cream-style corn, and asparagus. If I go nuts, I’m going to make a cherry cobbler.

Happy Easter!

  Shrove Tuesday at EEUMC

I have been awfully puny this past week…I even had to leave work at lunch on my first day back thanks to that "hit by a Mack truck" feeling. But I did manage to drag myself to church tonight since if I did so, other people would feed my children dinner.

An added bonus was the whole Shrove Tuesday thing. Pancake supper! And bacon! And sausage! Topped with whipped cream! Or, at least, the squirty version thereof that comes in a can. I didn’t have any king cake — is that cheating? — but I’m therefore also not responsible for next year’s cake.

I really am going about all this the wrong way, aren’t I?

Sigh. I have tried and tried and tried to get into Lent but I’m just not there. I’m not even good at Mardi Gras. I went to Mardi Gras once, in college. It was HORRIBLE. Did you ever hear of a college student who didn’t like Mardi Gras?

We went junior year, planning to spend our whole spring break in the Quarter. We even had hotel reservations at the Marriott, right in the middle of things. Unfortunately, in that college-student-devil-may-care sort of way, we decided to go a day before our reservations started.

So, instead of parking at the Marriott, we had to leave my roommate’s brand new car with an attended garage. Let’s just say that Ferris Bueller played in her head all night, negating any sort of fun she had. I’m not sure what the two parking attendants might have done with her Nissan Sentra, but it was a point of stress nonetheless.

We then spent quite a while trying to connect with our friends who had arrived ahead of us, thinking we could just spend the night with them. I think we were not the only people with that idea, because I spent my only night of Mardi Gras in a retirement community with our friends from school, at someone’s grandmother’s condo, along with 20 other similarly hard-up college students. The highlight was when my friend’s great-uncle arrived with the sun to take photos of all of us. We were draped over, around and under every piece of furniture, sleeping in sleeping bags, with towels and blankets, or just sleeping….it was not a fun night.

Bless his grandmother’s heart, she seemed to find us all very amusing, and I suppose we were in a lack-of-planning, laissez-faire, no-manners-crash-your-house kind of way.

The one night — and yes, there was some drinking in there somewhere and a parade or two — was enough to convince my roommate and me that Mardi Gras was not for us. We took off that morning and drove all day and through the night, and we spent the week on the beach in south Florida, staying at her house with her parents.

It was a great spring break.

So I found a recipe for a yummy frozen dessert and decided to make it for Dec. 26. It called for ladyfingers; have you tried to find ladyfingers in a grocery store in December? Let me stop you before you waste your time. So I decided to substitute something I made, instead of just buying an angel food cake or shortcakes. Silly me.

I found a recipe for a sponge cake, in a cookbook I have always loved: How to Cook Everything. This is one of those great, comprehensive cookbooks that you can count on to teach you how to cook any obscure vegetable, or to give you any number of chicken recipes when you’ve run out of ideas.

So I found a sponge cake recipe in this great cookbook. And maybe this was all my fault, because I chose that instead of the angel food in the cookbook, solely on the basis of the sponge cake called for five eggs instead of eight. I have a lot of cooking to do between now and Tuesday, so I don’t want to run out before I can get back to a store. [I'm like Shanon; if there is a store open on Christmas Day, I certainly don't want to be shopping there.]

I followed the directions for the alternate version — again, it’s all my fault. I was really suspicious that it was going to work without separating the eggs. But I was just trying to save time. So silly.

I wish I’d taken a picture for you, but it was so depressed. The cake came out totally flat and dense. Ugh. Fortunately, for the dessert I was making, it worked out OK — I just needed chopped up bits of cake, and since this cake still tasted fine, I could use it. But thank goodness I didn’t want to serve it as a cake.

My point: much as I love them — my collection is quite large – cookbooks and recipes only get you so far in this world. Instinct is more important in the kitchen.

Well, I’m getting pretty close on these menus for the weekend and next week. And thank goodness: I really need to cram in some shopping tomorrow. Whatwith Christmas Eve falling on Sunday, you have to plan ahead this year — liquor stores won’t be open here on Christmas Eve [note: or New Year's Eve!!]. So I’ve got to figure out what we’re eating and drinking between now and next Tuesday and get to the grocery and the liquor store.

I think those menus are it for now, but we’ll have to do another round next week when NYC sister and NYC fiance arrive.

Yes, thank you, I am NOT done with my Christmas shopping yet. Maybe I can get that done too?? In my dreams, I know.

First, a shout to a couple of locals who are doing much better than I at getting their holiday on in the kitchen. Linda spent the whole of last week baking, from the sound of it, and Lance has been whipping up peppermint ice cream and awesome sugar cookies.

Me? I’m trying to get the laundry done and the kitchen cleaned so we can mess it up again. Oh, and the grocery shopping. And etc. etc. etc.

But I have already promised the 7yo that if it does not commence before, the Christmas baking frenzy will begin no later than Saturday morning. We have many old favorites on tap:

• Caramel
• Fudge
• Chocolate truffles
• Reeses’ squares
• Peanut brittle

But I think we’re going to start with Lance’s sugar cookie recipe.

One thing I am NOT doing this year, despite how much I love them:

• Chocolate covered cherries

I made some last year, and they were great, but good night! what a mess. As far as I can tell,  these are one of those items similar to childbirth: You must forget the horrid parts or there would be no second children, and no one would make chocolate-covered cherries twice. [Me, I still remember childbirth fairly distinctly, even 7 1/2 years later. So it may be awhile on those cherries.]

  It looks better in liquid form 

I usually make a batch of hot chocolate mix every winter because the temperature in my office is completely unpredictable….on the cold days, it helps. But I didn’t last year, and I hadn’t made spice tea mix in years. I used to be addicted to the stuff in high school, and with all the sugar, why not??

This hot chocolate mix is from my former mother-in-law, who always has lots of neat tips and shortcuts for cooking. It makes a ton — enough for a person with many, many friends to take care of all their holiday giving — but we just made half the recipe last night and had enough for eight Brownies to get a half-pint jar each and have this much left for us.

Hot Chocolate Mix
8 qt. size box of powdered milk
8 oz. coffee creamer
2 lb. box Nesquik
1 c. confectioner’s sugar

Mix all ingredients. To make hot chocolate, mix with hot water. I usually use 4-6 heaping spoonfuls per large mug, but it’s really up to you. I can tell you, it takes more of this per mug than the spice tea mix.

Spice Tea Mix
2 c. Tang
1 1/2 c. sweetened, lemon-flavored instant tea mix
2 t. cinnamon
2 t. cloves

Mix all ingredients. I use about 2-3 spoonfuls per large mug, mixed with hot water. This doesn’t make nearly as much as the hot chocolate mix — you can tell from the ingredient amounts. We made one mug to taste-test and the rest of this recipe filled a 3 1/8 c. container.

Very sweet but nice when you have a sore throat or it’s freezing outside.

I’ve started the Backpack page for Christmas dinner, so now we can officially call it Christmas.

On the menu at the moment*:

• Pork tenderloin
• Golden baked potatoes
• Carrot casserole
• Cauliflower
• Spinach
• Homemade rolls
• Chocolate chess pie
• Pound cake

* All items except golden baked potatoes and chocolate chess pie are subject to change.

Yesterday I needed a nice holiday punch….Now, like any proper Southern girl, I actually have several punch recipes. But, I didn’t happen to have a hot punch recipe. Since the event I needed one for was a mid-day drop-in, I didn’t need anything alcoholic, just warm and tasty.

I found a fantastic one that was a big hit all around, and incredibly simple to boot. Get the details here, and you, too, can wow your next gathering of friends and family.

OK I realize this follows along every year right after Thanksgiving. But every year, I have the same panic attack, usually about this time. Good night! It’s time to hang lights on the house! Get a tree! Make cookies! Have a party or two! Finish buying presents! Celebrate Christmas!

I am trying to breathe.

This week I’m trying to get through a major Junior League fundraiser [at least the opening of one], a big party, another party, paying bills, laundry, and have you seen the dishes in the sink, and I am tired now, and there’s a lot going on at work all of a sudden; how did that happen?

Next week all I have is a school fundraiser, office holiday party, friend’s party and opera tickets. That’s better because I’m only responsible for one thing really [school fundraiser]. The rest is show-up-and-have-fun.

So, we’re postponing holiday prep around here until next week. Don’t worry; there’s lots of cooking involved.

I will share that I, a person who never makes New Year’s Resolutions, have already made two for 2007:
* I will actually attend the book club at my church. They have faithfully continued to invite me every month and it sure sounds like I am missing a lot of fun. In 2007 I’m going to go.
* I’m going to strive to eliminate the phone-it-in dinner from our family’s menu. I don’t mean literally, like, phone up a pizza. We don’t do that all that often. I mean, where I’m phoning it in by fixing mac & cheese from a box, or chicken nuggets, or something to that effect — ie., something I know the kids will eat, something that takes 5-10 minutes, and in the end, is absolutely rotten for us and does nothing to expand their palates.

After 2 1/2 days with no voice at all, it started coming back yesterday evening. It is about halfway back now. I have some hope that tomorrow when I talk to my clients on the phone, they won’t think I’m a prank caller.

So, here’s the story about the smoker. My dad used to have a smoker. For some long and involved reason, his got messed up and he threw it out. When my sister and I agreed to do Thanksgiving, she insisted we had to smoke the turkey. Since we didn’t even have a smoker, this made no sense to me. Add to the fact, neither of us had ever done so before. And in the past, this had always involved my uncle staying up all night and minding the bird. That did not sound like fun to me.

Apparently I was the idiot here, because next thing I knew, smoker had been procured from my mom’s neighbors. In another of those unwritten rules, a smoked turkey is an essential element to Thanksgiving. Now you know.

[In case you ever need one, the best roasted turkey recipe I've ever used comes from Cook's Illustrated The Best Recipe cookbook. You soak the turkey overnight in a salt brine, then roast, then make a delicious gravy from the pan drippings. Alas, it was not to be this year for the Creekmore/Norment clan.]

At any rate, once we moved dinner to 5 p.m., we decided to start the smoking first thing on Thursday morning, which was at least civilized. My dad agreed to consult. He had already spent quite a bit of time on Wednesday cleaning the smoker, which was awesome. We got started and immediately discovered a problem: the water pan had holes in it.

Now, maybe you are like me and until now had no idea what the setup of a smoker was like. Here’s the story: a smoker is shaped like a barrel, with a lid on top. There’s a little door in the side where you can check the charcoal and add more if need be. There are two pans on the inside: The bottom pan is for charcoal. You fill it up and get it going just like a grill. Then, there’s a pan above it for water. So you see, if the water pan has holes in it, your fire goes out. So that’s no good.

The rack for your meat [or two racks, in the case of this large smoker we were using] is above the water pan.

We decided the smart thing to do was just to switch the water and charcoal pans [filling the old, holey water pan with charcoal, etc.]. The charcoal pan had no holes and so we could use it for water. New problem: the water pan [now to be filled with charcoal and placed at the bottom of the smoker] was smaller than the real charcoal pan, and so it fell through the brackets that were there to hold the larger charcoal pan.

Oh my word. By this time we’d spent half an hour or more getting set up, figuring things out and stewing over this and I had several times suggested "just roasting the damn thing."

  These bricks saved the day 

My father, not so easily deterred, was determined to find a solution. It didn’t take long. He found some bricks to sit the old water/new charcoal pan on, holding it at the proper height. Thankfully, the old charcoal/new water pan fit on the water pan brackets, and finally, finally we got started.

We basted and injected our 12 lb. turkey and 8 lb. breast with this mixture:
1 stick melted butter
1/2 c. white wine
1/2 c. honey

They took several hours to smoke and I’m sure glad we were minding them in the middle of the day in Florida, where it was 75 degrees or so, instead of overnight in Tennessee, where I remember many Thanksgivings of my childhood being in the 40s. Of course, with global warming I guess all that’s over, since the high tomorrow here is 70!