Mashed Potatoes anyone?

 A Carb junkie's delight!

Now I could actually envision a Thanksgiving meal without mashed potatoes, in fact I've eaten many a Thanksgiving turkey without the mashed potatoes.  Apparently this is sacrilege. Amazing what you find out when you lift your head out of your own plate to see what the rest of the world is eating on Thanksgiving. Ha! SO I decided post a little sumptin sumptin about mashed potatoes. Now just because I don't usually make mashed potatoes for Thanksgiving doesn't mean that I don't make them. I'm just more inclined to make them for dinner. I'm weird that way!
I like simple mashed potatoes. Nothing too fancy, just the basics. I recently found a recipe online for incredible mashed potatoes from one of  my all time favorite websites thepioneerwoman.com. I cannot wait to try her recipe for mashed potatoes with cream cheese and butter. Yum! You can find her recipe on her website. (I have already bookmarked it!) It seems like such a simple endeavor, cut up potatoes , boil them and mash them with butter right? Yeah well, if only! I have personally made mashed potatoes that have come out like wallpaper paste and are inedible, even for toddlers! (Whom I generally consider  to be little disposals who will eat anything as long as it's covered in cheese! Oh wait...that's me!)  It just took me forever to get the hang of making mashed potatoes. I kept messing them up. It drove me crazy because I didn't know why and I like to know why stuff goes wrong when I screw up a recipe. I think deep down (.. like really, really deep down) I was meant to be a food scientist or something.  Anyway I went on a quest to find out what I was doing wrong. And through the magic of the internet I can share this information with you! It turns out that the culprit was starch. I was using regular Idaho russet potatoes. ( or whatever was on sale that week!) These have a higher starch content than say the more expensive Yukon gold or Red  potatoes. And what happens is that when you boil them and then use a mixer on them ( a big no no!) instead of a potato masher or ricer you break down the cells and they release their starch. The breakdown in the starch leads to gummy mashed potatoes. And let me tell you there is no redemption here, once potatoes get gummy they are just dead. There is no hope. They must go the way of the dinosaur! There, now you  have more information than you ever wanted to know on the subject. If you want to know more go to my other favorite site about.com

Potato Masher

Now you can find recipes for mashed potatoes everywhere but I want to show you how to actually make the potatoes. Let's cook.
You will need:
A bag of potatoes (this works for some families, I need more like two (or twelve) But whatever works for you.
Use Yukon Gold for the best flavor.
Gigantic pot of boiling water, heavily salted.
Pepper
Salt
Milk
And whatever else you want to add, cheese, butter, garlic, cream, chives, sour cream...you get the idea. Alright let's cook potaotes.
Put your big pot of water on the stove with like 3 tablespoons of salt. Taste it as you add your salt. The amount of salt is determined by how big your pot is. One saucepan does not a stockpot make. If your pot is indeed gigantic than add more salt. If it's smaller than a stock pot add less salt.  You  want to taste the salt, you don't want it to burn your lips.Once your water starts to really boil. You are ready to add your potatoes. You will have peeled cut your potatoes into uniform pieces already. Add them to the boiling water and leave them for about 15 -20 minutes. They are done when you can stick a fork into one and it's tender.
Put a colander into the sink and pour your hot water and potatoes into the colander. Shake the excess water off the potatoes and put them back in the pot on a low flame.
Now VEE MASH! ( Inga voice) Get into it, don't be nice! Taste your potatoes. They should be salted but not salty. Add about a stick of butter and mash it while it melts. More butter? Why not? Be mindful that more butter does not necessarily mean more flavor. Add your milk or cream and continue to mash. At this point I'm tasting as I mash, and trying not to lick the masher and get my tongue stuck in all those little openings... Ahem (Never you mind..)
Now this is your dish, you can add whatever you want. Sour cream is nice, or roasted garlic.
Tips:
Try putting your prepared potatoes in 350 degree oven for about 40 minutes or so and let them get a little crust on the top.
How to make friends and influence people...
Layer your prepared potatoes with cheddar cheese..top with more cheese and melted butter. Sprinkle on salt and pepper and more cheese. Bake in the oven for 45-60 minutes. "Oh my dear gracious..honey call the cardiologist and have him reserve me a room I'm going in!!" Hahahaha!

How to make bread...

Going where mortals fear to tread into the dark crevices of the unknown, (cue mournful sobs..) Bread..that dastardly villan of yeast and dough...BREAD!! .. okay..okay I'm done...hahaahaha! Ah..I missed my calling..

  Anyway..in case you haven't figured it out, I'm going to show you how to make bread. Oh yes you CAN make bread, anyone can make bread. And as usual, I like to take the mystery out of the mysterious. There are no special skills needed here. If you can find your way to the grocery store you can make bread. There. Now lets get started.
First of all lets tawk about the yeast. It's alive, (It is ALIVE!!) sorry..Ahem.. Yeast is a living organism, so without getting too detailed. We need to feed it. Sugar feeds the yeast and it grows. It releases gases that make the bread rise. The longer it takes to rise the better the flavor. For our purposes we are going to make a plain old fashioned white bread. ( for you vegans out there I will include a few sentences on how to make a regular white bread recipe vegan friendly).
You will need a good recipe:
No knead Crusty White Bread (www.kingartherflour.com)
3 cups lukewarm (not hot) water
6 1/2 to 7 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 tablespoon salt
1 1/2 tsp
(2 tablespoons sugar) my addition, this is not included in the original recipe. I like my bread a little sweet.
Now this is a no knead recipe which means you can't hurt it by kneading the dough. Which is what you are going to do. I will give you a couple of bread tips that I use but you must be able to do the basics first.

Well kneaded bread..

Kneading is manipulating the dough until the gluten strands form. Unlike biscuit dough you want to manipulate bread dough because that's how you develop a nice even crumb. Just take a piece of bread out of your cabinet and look at it.  See the nice even crumb? No giant holes. This bread has been kneaded well, no little old ladies kneading bread at the Wonder bread factory, no sir. So, the more you knead or manipulate the dough the better it is for the bread. With scrupulously clean hands lets begin. You will need a big bowl or pot, (I use a pot, it's less cleanup.) measuring cups and your ingredients. Measure your flour into the measuring cup by cupfuls. The best way to do this is to pour the flour into your measuring cup over a big bowl. That way the excess falls in the bowl and not on your counter. Measure your flour and scrape the excess off the top with a butter knife. I know it seems like a lot of work but it's worth it. If you are not careful and just dip your cup into the flour bag, you run the risk of having too much flour. It's not the end of the world if it's just 1/4 cup or so but the more flour you put in, the more liquid you are going to have to put in to compensate and then the more salt....you get the idea. You will change the balance of the recipe. Baking is like exercise, you have to develop good form so consider me your trainer. (Feel the burn!) Okay, where were we? Yes, measuring the flour. When in doubt go for less flour rather than more. So, this recipe says 6 1/2 to 7 1/2 cups of flour. Go with the lesser amount. You may or may not use that last cup of flour when you knead.
Anyway, take your measured flour and add your salt. About the yeast, I just buy plain old yeast in the big packages from BJ's. If you are a newbie, and we all were once. Just buy whatever kind of yeast you want from the grocery store in the flour isle. I would stay away from the yeast cubes because they are hard to measure. A yeast packet is generally about a tablespoon of yeast. That's important for those recipes that say, 1 packet of yeast.
I'm not an instant yeast user by choice, although some swear by it, I just use boring powdered yeast. The longer your bread rises the more flavorful it will be. So quick rise means less flavor, but maybe I'm just a purist. No matter. There are no rules, just guidelines remember? Whatever your heart desires. How do you know if bread is flavorful or not? Here's how, take a piece of that bread you buy for the kids sandwiches, you know the store brand or Wonder or whatever. Hey, I do the same thing, no need to give the kids the good stuff. These folks eat twinkies!
Now take a piece of the more expensive potato bread or whole grain anything. The kind you keep for the adults! Yes it's different, still not homemade but pretty good. That's bread with flavor, and what you make in your own kitchen will be 1000 times better than the best bread in the store. (Darn that soapbox, there it goes again!)

Yeast just starting to bubble..

Now, you've got your dry ingredients in a big bowl, (salt, flour, 2 tablespoons of sugar). And  2 1/2 cups of warm water in a cup and 1/2 cup of warm water in another cup. A word about the temperature of the water. If your water is "ouch" hot. It will kill the yeast. So the water needs to be warm, like baby bottle warm. Put your yeast in the 1/2 cup of water with about 1 tablespoon of sugar and within a few minutes it should start to bubble at the edges. Now get a cup of tea. Your yeast needs to bubble for a few minutes. Those bubbles are the first sign of healthy yeast. In other words yeast that hasn't been sitting on the shelf for a year and is still alive. If you skip this step and proceed and your yeast is dead, your dough will not rise and there is absolutely nothing you can do but toss the whole batch. So do this step every time you make bread, and if your yeast is dead you've wasted a 1/2 cup of water and some sugar and that's it.  Trust me on this.

Happy Yeast!

Now, if you look at the measuring cup on the right you'll notice all the foam, that's thriving yeast. If after 20 minutes your yeast still looks like one up there, it's dead.  No matter, just toss it and try with an entirely new packet. Yeast is so cheap and so vital to bread baking it pays to throw at least one packet in the shopping cart every time you go shopping.
At least that's how I look at it. :-)
Tea done, ahh.. that was wonderful. Now back to the bread.
Combine your yeast water with the 2 1/2 cups of warm water which should probably need a about that long in the microwave to reheat it. Test it before you combine it with the yeast or well you know...
Pour your combined liquids into the dry ingredients and stir. It'll be a sticky unbread looking thing but no matter. Keep stirring. If you do not have a stand mixer your arm will probably fall off before long but

hang in there. A stand mixer will make quick work of the mixing process. But if you don't have one you can still make bread. So you are stirring, stirring until it all gets incorporated into a big blob. At this point the recipe says to refrigerate and leave it for up to 7 days. What? No no, we want bread tonight. We are not going to put it in the fridge (a word about the cold, it retards the development of yeast. In other words your bread will still rise but slower) The fridge is great for "you wanted to make bread but life happened." Yeah, been there, done that!HAAHA!
Alright now, you can leave your big bowl on the counter with a top on it or put it in the fridge. It's a good time to clean up. You've got about 1-2 hours to hang out. Go watch a show, or check your email.

Ok it's about 2 hours later and your bread has risen quite a bit. Dump it onto a floured counter and it should look like a wet sticky blob of dough. Now vee shall KNEAD! (said in my Inga voice) If you stick your finger in the blob it will be covered in dough, Make note of the consistency. Ready. KNEAD!  Shake some flour on the blob and lean your palms down on the center of the dough. Still sticky. Flip one end over toward the middle shake flour, spread flour all over the top, push palms down, flip another side over, shake flour over it smooth flour, push palms down over top. This is not the time to be nice. Put your weight into this palms down thing. Work out your frustration. Stuck in traffic for 40 minutes!!! Grrr... Darned cleaners messed up my dress!! grrrr!! get the picture? Passed over again for that proMOtion!!grrrr!! let it out!. Hey it's cheaper than therapy. The idea is to work the gluten in dough. Now stick your finger in the dough. Not so easy this time right? The dough springs back, in fact the little impression that your finger left is almost gone. Happy dough! Now again the recipe says to put this in the fridge because they are trying to make this as simple as they can for a first time bread baker such as yourself. I however, feel like if we don't conquer the hard stuff now you'll be making no-knead bread forever! So you've successfully kneaded your dough, go ahead and do the dance, go on now you've earned it!
Alright, almost there. Now is when I usually roll my dough out as flat as I can, cut it down the middle and roll into two loaf shaped logs. If your dough will cooperate great. If not just shape it into a log(s) and put it in your loaf pan(s) OR go for that artisan thing and shape it into a ball. Whutevuh!
Alright now leave your bread to rise for another hour or so. This part is kind of important, if you leave your bread for too long it will loose the rise that it will get in the oven. No more than 1 hour. Now put your loaves in a hot oven. The recipe says 450 but I dunno, I would put it in at 375. I think my oven runs hot and I don't like burned bottoms so, yeah 450 is hot for me. Put it in at whichever temperature you feel comfortable with for about 20-25 minutes. Bread bakes super fast so hang around your kitchen.
Tips:
You can put a pan of hot water on the bottom of the oven just under your baking bread for that chewy French bread crust.
You can also brush your bread with a beaten egg for that shiny brown crust you see in the bakery before you put it in the oven.
I brush mine with butter as soon as it comes out. But this takes away from the crunchy crust...but then I don't really care..heehee!
when you get confident;
Go to thefreshloaf.com. that's like bread college!
I substitute milk for the water in my recipes, or i add a cup of mashed potatoes.
For vegans: Use white whole wheat, King Arthur if you can find it. and 1/2 cup gluten flour. You will find this in the health food isle of any well stocked grocery store. It makes for a wonderful light spongy whole wheat loaf. Regular wheat flour cuts the gluten strands that you are trying to build up when you knead the dough. That's why homemade wheat bread tends to be heavy. Not to mention that regular whole wheat does not have any gluten of it's own. White flour has gluten in it. You must use white whole wheat flour (whole wheat pastry flour is wonderful too!) and vital wheat gluten. You can get this on Amazon. Bobs Red Mill makes it for about 7 bucks.
Breads out! Tap it. It should sound hollow, doesn't it smell wonderful?  Now you can brush melted butter on it or leave it. Take it out of the loaf pans and let it cool on a rack. Cut it and enjoy!

A few words for the dearly departed... or how to make soup from scraps

the aftermath...

Wow...what time is it? That sure was a great meal. Really? Was I asleep that long.? Is it 4th quarter already! Gee 12 nothing huh? These are the musings from a  tryptophan stupor. What is tryptophan? Actually it is a naturally occurring amino acid that is found in turkey. And truth be told there really isn't enough of it in turkey to make you sleepy. The reason most of us sleep after eating on thanksgiving is the reason we fall asleep after eating on any day; we eat like we are storing fat for the winter! But that's another blog entirely.
Back to the bird. Now that everyone has eaten and you are left putting the food away and  cleaning the kitchen all alone( and muttering to yourself. Mutter..mutter.. I sound like Yosimite Sam when I mutter..rasm..rasm...lily livered..two bit..long horned...HAHA!( If you were born after 1980 you have no idea what I'm talking about!) So you're cleaning up and looking at the pieces you know no one is going to eat and wondering what on earth you are going to do with them? Well, you my dear are going to make soup! Yes you can do this. Forget all of those folks who try to add mystery where there is none. It's not hard and you don't need any special skill. They're just trying to scare you!  Now before you tackle making soup, try to get everything else put away. Wipe your counters down and then attack the bird. Now remember, once you can make this soup, you'll be able to make any soup out of almost any combination of ingredients, because they all start out the same.(Well almost) Pretty tall words I know, and I mean to back them up. Are you ready?
You will need:
Sparkling clean hands and..
-1 turkey, chicken, duck (poultry) carcass. In other words what you have left after dinner is over. It's called a carcass.
-Onion
-garlic
-Salt
-oil
-carrots, celery, potato, whatever veggies you feel like cutting up and throwing in the pot
-and your imagination!
Okay..round one
Start taking the meat off the bones. There is no science to this. Just grab a piece and  pull all the meat off of it.
Throw the pieces of turkey in the pot. Take the meat off the turkey back. ( in other words turn the bird over and pick the meat off.) Making this soup is not a glamorous job. You won't win any prizes for beauty. In fact, you'll pretty much look like a halloween version of June Cleaver with your apron and big knife! But who cares as long as the soup gets done right?
Keep taking the meat off the bones and don't forget the pieces in the pan. No skin, just meat. Now if you have a lot of tiny pieces don't bother with them. Just let them be part of the broth.
What you're going for is a fair amount of light meat and dark meat, you probably won't fill the pot, but no worries just keep going. No questionable pieces please. If you wouldn't eat it than toss it.(as in throw it away)
So now you are going to take all the bones (hereafter to be known as "the carcass") that are left and put them in a pot large enough to hold them. All of those scraps are going to be used. Put a colander in the sink in a large bowl, now dump all of whats left from the turkey pan in the colander. This can be a total mess if you are not careful. I have had the whole thing fall on the counter, or on the floor! (ugh!) Just make sure you have a good idea of where the pot is and where the sink is. In case you haven't figured this out, this soup making thing is a solitary endeavor. Don't start it unless you have time to finish it, or you will be overwhelmed. And don't have any chatty Kathy's hanging around in the kitchen while you are trying to do this. This does take some concentration and you just don't have the time to talk about how you got that turkey so tender so, If you're still entertaining guests, wait until they all leave..I'm stepping down off my soapbox now!
P.S. if you don't want to do all of this work than you can just put all the food in the fridge and go to bed. I like that idea too! Also, clean up is way easier if you use aluminum baking pans for EVERYTHING)
Now back to our regularly scheduled programing..
Your colander is now full of just... stuff, dump the whole thing in the garbage. Not the broth, just the stuff in the colander. Remember the pot with the carcass?  Put this on the stove and fill it halfway with water and two chicken cubes. (Don't waste your good broth on this, you really just want a hint of flavor) Cover and turn the flame to medium and let it come to a boil. Once it comes to a boil turn your flame down to low and let it simmer. You are going to add this to the broth you just poured out of the pan which is in the bottom of the sink. (But not yet...I know trust me, there's a method to my madness) Depending on how much liquid you put in the pan when you roasted your turkey, you may or may not have more broth. Whatever, more broth is a good thing, but we can work with less broth too. Cover this bowl and put it aside. This is the start of your soup.
Here's what we are going for: 
The secret to any good soup is good broth. You can add stuff to it but creating it takes flavor from a source. Like bones or meat or vegetables. We are building a broth.
So..
-The bones and carcass need to be on the stove in a medium pot with water to cover and 2 chicken broth cubes. You are not going for super strong flavor here because the bones are already cooked, you just want to use whats left with no waste. Boosting it with a few cubes helps.
-The broth  from turkey pan needs to be in a covered bowl until it is needed. This is like found gold! It is what gives the soup it's homemade flavor because well.. it is homemade.You are going to use this in the next step.
-The pan that the turkey was cooked in needs to be washed and put away and everything cleaned up.Or if you used a disposable aluminum pan just throw the pan away!! It's not very green I know. Okay now, go get a cup tea, and put your bunny slippers and sweats on. Your  turkey carcass needs to simmer for about 1 hr.
Round two.
So far we have used the colander a pot and a bowl. Grab another pot, last one I promise! Put about 1 tablespoon of oil and 1 tablespoon of butter in it and turn your flame on medium. You should be smelling  the carcass cooking by now.
Once the butter is melted, Use your imagination. You can put in red pepper, parsley, or whatever your heart desires. Flavor it anyway you like with whatever spices you want to add.  At this point I add celery, garlic,salt, onion powder, pepper, potatoes if I want. No rules just guidelines remember? So, take a big spoon and dip some of the carcass broth in the pot. This helps the veggies in the pot not to stick or burn on the bottom. Turn your flame down and get your bowl of broth, the one from the turkey pan, pour it in, taste,correct seasonings and simmer for about 1 hour. Long enough to let your potatoes cook.  Now you have soup! That's all it is.. good broth and veggies. If you need more flavor go ahead and add a bouillon cube.
What about the broth from the carcass?
Well...turn your carcass broth off, and let it cool. Give it a taste. watery, but not water right? Good. It's just meant to correct your pot. It's not the soup. When you want to correct the seasonings in your pot of soup you don't want water and you don't want full broth yet. Full broth will overwhelm the flavor and water will..well water it down. You just want something  to correct the pot and add balance. Now that you know why we have the carcass broth you can choose to skip this step entirely and still have a pretty mean pot of homemade soup. Go for it. No rules, just guidelines remember? :-) Once you are done correcting your seasoning you can toss the carcass broth. OR if you are like me you can use it to boil chicken wings (bony pieces make better broth) and veggies and make more broth! yeah. Hey the more broth you have the more soup you have for later. Make a lot and use it for everything except like...pudding!
Alright now, stir your soup and taste it. It probably needs more of everything. Trust your instincts here. I can't tell you what it should taste like. But you'll know. If you still have thanksgiving veggies leftover, you know like corn or peas you can add them at this point. You could put noodles in right now too. But if you decide to put noodles in be mindful that they have a tendency to soak up a lot of liquid and get mushy..there's no other way to describe it. SO...if you want to put noodles in there's an alternative way you can do it.  Cook your noodles separately, not in the soup. I know it's so tempting to cook them in the soup but you will lose all of that yummy broth you worked so hard for. (Well maybe not all but you get the general idea). You can make enough noodles to refill the pot if you need to. People tend to eat all the noodles and leave the broth when they get soup! So there you have it. You've just made soup! Yeah..do the happy dance! You are incredible!!
Extras..

The nuts and bolts of good soup...

Good soup starts out with a good chicken, turkey, beef or vegetable broth. So, once you've got the broth down you can do anything! The more time you take crafting the broth the better your soup will be. So when you make broth make a lot of it and freeze the rest.
You don't need to tie up the whole kitchen when you want to make soup. You can start a quick soup with broth from a can or cubes. (cubes yes cubes! heehee) The thing to remember is that the cubes have a lot of salt and you may have to doctor the broth up a little to give it that homemade flavor. I find that if I'm going to make a soup with canned broth or cubes I try to stick with a cream soup or bean soup. (split pea works too!) because then the broth isn't the main attraction. So I might make a potato soup which is....leftover mashed potatoes stirred into your wonderful broth with a little pepper, and milk. Beyond that you can add whatever you like. (Ham? Bacon? oh yeah this is getting good right?) CHEESE?? hmmm..
or you could make a vegetable barley soup which is your wonderful broth with about 1/2 cup of barley added to it. Adding turkey makes it a turkey barley soup. What's barley? It's a grain. High protein and yummy. You can find it in the dried bean section. Cook it just like rice. I would cook it separately in some salted water or remember the carcass broth? Use it to cook the barley in your rice cooker..ahem. Anyway twice as much liquid as barley. (1 cup pearl barley to 2 cups water or liquid)
Feel better about this soup thing?
What about beef broth or veggie broth? Beef broth is cooking a roast with a fair amount of liquid, some lipton beefy onion dry soup mix, seasonings, cut up carrot, celery, potato and whatever else you want to add AND an oven bag. You can use the same kind you used for the turkey. Cook it on 325 for like 2 hours. Or crock pot it. No bag needed, just put everything in a crockpot and go to work. 8 hours later you have a delectable roast. The liquid in the pot is your gold!. Take it and add it to a smaller pot in which you have cooked some onion,celery and garlic down in some butta and a little oil.Throw in the cut up beef and some peas and carrots. Now a word about veggies that live in broth. They tend to lose their flavor. Here's a tip if you have time. Roast them in a 400 degree oven for about 15-30 minutes. Peas, carrots, potatoes all do well if you roast them in a little garlic and oil.  Even the canned stuff. Stir them about halfway through the cooking process. Then add them to your pot.  It makes a world of difference. You don't have to do this, only if you want to give it a try. Veggie broth is cooking stock veggies, Onion, carrot, parsley, garlic.  And whatever else. If you look in the vegetable section of the grocery store you can find stock vegetables in a styrofoam package. I get these and just keep them in the fridge. They are really handy to put in my broth to give it some muscle. Sometimes they have parsnips ( fancy carrots!) and turnips in the package. Just rinse these and put them in a pot. Or better yet roast them first and put them in a pot with veggie broth from a carton. The reason is the vegetable broth from the carton has so much more flavor than you can get from just veggies and your limited amount of time. Simmer this on the stove for about 1 1/2hours and then pour it into a colander in a bowl. The liquid you get will be what you build your soup with.
How to thicken your soup.
Add about 2 tablespoons of flour to the pot where you frying your onions garlic and celery in butter. The trick is to have equal amounts of flour to oil. In other words two tablespoons of oil to tablespoons of flour. Let the veggies cook down a bit, then sprinkle in your flour and stir. Eventually the flour with mesh with the oil and it will look like a uniform paste. At this point slowly stir in about 1 1/2 cups of hot broth keep stirring until it's all together than add more hot broth. (No more milk) Until you get it to where you want it to be. Correct your seasonings add whatever else you want to the pot and there you go!
Split pea
Peas cooked in good chicken broth and blended till smooth. Add in some ham pieces and you have split pea soup.
So now that the mystery is gone, go make some soup!

Doing the turkey shuffle. Or how to cook the bird?

                 Alright. What? you actually thought you were going to get away with NOT making a turkey and all the trimmings for Thanksgiving didn't you? Muhahahahha! Nope, no way.You're cooking!  And no frozen lasagna this year. You are going to make it all. Turkey, stuffing, and macaroni and cheese. Hmm..does any of this sound familiar to you? It should if you've been reading this blog, you already know how to make these! (well except for the bird, but we'll get to that) Now, quit your whining and go wash your hands, we've go work to do. :o)

So as you look at this turkey,(Jive turkey!..sorry) ahem.. you'll see that it's really just a big chicken. However if thought of roasting a chicken sends you running for cover than this is worst than I thought. The way to make nice with a turkey is to use a turkey bag. Reynolds (as in the aluminum foil people.) makes oven safe bags for this very purpose. Forget the Norman Rockwell picture of mama basting the bird at the oven door, life is short and we are going to use the bag! Now,where was I? Oh yes..the turkey (hereafter to be known as the bird or...jive turkey!) HAHA! Anyway, you'll need to clean the bird. There is no such thing as a clean bird. I don't care how good it looks. They all have feathers and stuff and they need to be looked over before you cook them. If you don't clean the bird, expect a house call from your local poultry police..I'll send them to you and.they will lock you up in the chicken coop! Ok that was bad...i'm done..really. So how do you clean the bird, chicken, turkey, duck,.same thing. Take your bird and run your hands over it. Feathers are hard. The fluffy part has been pulled out mechanically and all that's left is the hard part that's left in the skin. That's what you want. Take a butter knife and pinch the feather between your thumb and knife and pull it out. Do this for your whole bird. Now rinse. There are also flaps of skin, generally on the front or back of the turkey that have a ton of feathers and it's just not worth it to pick each one out. Just get a sharp knife and cut them off. Toss in the garbage and your problem is solved. Stick you hand on the inside and remove giblet bag. I cannot TELL you how many times I have forgotten to remove the bag from the inside of the bird. It's harmless, just don't to make a habit of it. What exactly is in the giblet bag? The turkey neck, the heart, and liver and the gizzard. Good stuff for stock, but I digress. Back to the bird.
    Put the giblet bag aside and no you can't throw it away.  Remember, I have the poultry police on speed dial!
Now if your bird has no more feathers and you've rinsed it well put it on a clean platter and season it; inside and out. I use seasoned salt,(Lawry's, or McCormick's or Adobo or your own creation, whutevuh works for you) pepper, garlic and onion powder. I also stick a whole onion inside, you can also stick a carrot some celery, a parsley sprig. The idea is to season the bird. All of these things add flavor while the bird cooks. Now put your bird in the oven bag. Depending on how big your bird is you may need help! This is a good time to talk about what size bird to get. Generally I go by how much I like turkey. Now in my house, no one really likes turkey so I don't buy a 47 pound bird! Even though there's 7 people in the house. I get like a 10 or 12 pound bird. That works for soup, or sandwiches. And to top it off no one eats dark meat. ( not to mention, my favorite vegan who doesn't even eat meat!) Moment of silence for me... Yeah so the point is to know your people. If it's just you, than buy accordingly. Also don't think that you'll freeze the rest and eat it later. No one wants to open a mystery package of meat in April to eat last thanksgiving's turkey. Leftover frozen turkey tastes like cardboard, only cardboard has a whole lot more flavor. So based on that, buy what you think you'll need. Follow the directions on the oven bag packaging. Basically, it's put bird in bag with seasoning put your bag in a roasting pan, pyrex, oven safe ( meaning all metal) stock pot? whatever you have that will fit the bird, and add the stock. Tie the bag closed with the supplied tie, and poke holes in it with a fork or slit the top a knife to let the steam out. Not hard. Let's get our bird in the oven.

   Now, 300 degrees is considered a low oven, in other words your bird is not going to cook fast. If you have a 25 pound bird (why??) and you put it on 300 it should be ready on Christmas Eve. If you are cooking a large bird, put it on 350 or so and it should be done in about  4 to 5 hours. (or days!) This is just not my idea of fun. If you have a bird that large, consider cutting it into parts, clean and season each part. Pack the parts in groups in ziploc bags and freeze them. Put the giblets and boney parts in separate bags and  pack in a ziploc as well.  Don't forget to clean and season everything. Nothing is thrown away except fatty portions with lots of feathers. (yuk) Once you do this, you can pick and choose what parts you want to cook. And because it's raw and seasoned You can cook the breast and the legs for thanksgiving and the wings and thighs for another meal and so on. I have done this many times and it really works. The pieces have been living in all of that seasoning so when you cook them they are so wonderfully flavored all the way through. Make sure you clean your hands really well. I wash them with Dawn and then spray the antibacterial spray directly under my fingernails and all over my hands, clean under my nails, rinse in hot water and wash again.Then I just use a really good moisturizer like Udder Cream or something else that's non greasy. Or you can try using gloves, they've never worked for me.
Okay your bird is in the oven and now you can clean up. (more cleaning?..yas!) A word about cleaning up. Raw meat has germs and you'll need an antibacterial kitchen spray to kill those germs. Use paper towels to wipe up all the water that splashed during the feather hunt. That way you can just throw it away. (Not green I know) After you've wiped the water, spray all of your surfaces generously with the antibacterial spray. Don't forget the faucet, the other sink, if you have a double sink. Behind the appliances on the counter, the back splash behind the faucet. And dry with a paper towel. Spray the Dawn bottle and wipe it down. Make sure to let the spray go in all the nooks and crannies on the sink. Then wipe everything dry. Lastly, spray a paper towel until it's damp and wipe the refrigerator handle and the garbage can top. I know this may seem excessive but you want your sink and counters spotless and germ free so you can continue to cook with confidence.
While the bird is in the oven I can finish my laundry, fuss at some kids and maybe even run to the grocery store. Why..because I'm not in a rush. Cooking is supposed to be an enjoyable endeavor. If you look at Thanksgiving as dinner, rather than a large event you'll relieve yourself of all the stress. Be mindful of who you've invited to your table, if they're stress producers leave them home. Invite people that will encourage you and celebrate your accomplishments. Don't invite a lot of them, maybe like two. There, stress gone poof!
Lets pretend that it's about 3 hours or so later and the bird is done. That's a guesstimate for my 10-12 pound bird. You will have to use your judgment. Generally, no less than 2 hours on 300 degree oven. You pull it out of the oven, and open the bag and see that it's falling apart. The legs have pulled away from the body and the liquid on the bottom is bubbling. The final test is the breast meat. You take a slice off and taste it and it melts in your mouth! WOW! you are amazing!
p.s..do not under any circumstances present your bird at the table and attempt to carve it.  Do your damage in the kitchen and present your masterpiece on a platter. They won't care as long as it's cooked. My turkey's are rarely photogenic. The cooking bag makes the bird so moist that the meat literally falls off the bone, and  that sounds like good eating to me.

The land of the beyond..or stuffing for dummies

OK, so I have a few areas of uncharted territory in my cooking adventures. One of them is making a scratch cake (as in not from a box) and the other is making homemade stuffing. Why does it matter?  Especially since only the adults in my house even LIKE stuffing. The meat eaters hate it. But my favorite vegan likes his stuffing with fried Portabello mushrooms, onion, garlic, celery, seasoning, chicken broth and bread crumbs made from whole wheat rolls. (gee is that all?!) That's it, right on the bottom of this paragraph. Vegan stuffing. Yummy!
  Alrighty then, back to the uncharted territory. This was the first successful attempt at homemade stuffing that I'd ever made. All of my previous attempts were horrible. I kept trying to make my grandmother's stuffing with the pork sausage, or  my mother-in -law's with the hard boiled eggs. And it just was awful! I think the reason is that none of these were my own creation. Now once again, if you are looking for relevance to the plight of the homeless in this in depth study, than this is not the blog for you! (smile) It's just cooking nothing more, nothing less. But if you can feel confident in the kitchen, who knows what it might do for other areas of the house!(HAHAHA!) Oh my dear!
Back to the stuffing. So you now have the recipe for how to feed a vegan stuffing. Now for me I make mine totally different. Since I'm a meat eater who occasionally grazes on veggies I used leftover chicken soup in my stuffing. (well i never..well you're going to today!) You know me, no rules only guidelines. Ready?
You will need: 
Bread crumbs- no boxed bread crumbs, or bagged stuffing please. Use leftover french bread or rolls. Toast them in the oven, put them in a large plastic bag and crush them.
Now your stuffing will only be as good as your breadcrumbs. So if you use hamburger buns, or 3 for a dollar bread..well..do we really need to go into this?  I am a cooking dweeb so I make rolls and bread at my house to keep the carb junkies at bay. Which means I always have homemade bread around. So I take my trusty mini food processor and grind them up. (Have I mentioned the fact that you need a mini food processor? well..I'm mentioning it.. mention mention ahem.. ) OK, back to the stuffing.
Leftover chicken soup, (yes, it's homemade!!) but you can just use chicken broth, no cubes please.
2 eggs beaten
Celery
Onions
Garlic
(And whatever else you want to put in to make this yours. Make it Latin with Sofrito and spices, Make it Indian with Garam Marsala, tumeric and cumin ( get Garam Marsala online, check links to the right) or make it Asian with Oyster sauce and green onions and ginger. Man, talk about uncharted territory! Go for it. I'm just giving you the bones you flesh them out any way you like.)
Alright now where was I?
Oh yes, so you have bread crumbs, broth, eggs beaten and veggies,and seasoning. Season this well. Salt, pepper, onion powder, garlic powder are four of the basics I use. Now put it all together in a bowl. Here is where you add enough moisture to make it moist. The secret to moist stuffing is liquid. Too much and you have soup, too little and it's like oatmeal. This should not be soupy and it should not be dry,  Use your instincts. Remember, if you make this watery you will have to add more bread crumbs and adjust the seasoning.
 Once you have this all incorporated,  pour it into a buttered, not margerined...casserole (pyrex works well here) Cover it and bake it at 350 for about 40 minutes. The eggs will make it puff up nicely. After the 40 minutes take the top off and give it another 5-7 minutes to let it brown.
There, you've made homemade stuffing! You are so incredible, you rock!
Ideas: 
-Make your own instant stuffing mix ( which is nothing more than bread crumbs and seasoning) Take some of your homemade bread crumbs and toast them in the oven with a little buttah. In a plastic bag add a teaspoon of dried parsley,some onion powder, garlic powder, pepper and 2 crushed to smithereens chicken stock cubes and what ever else you want to put in)  Anyway mix it well. and after your crumbs have cooled toss them with the seasoning. I would keep this in the freezer because of the butter. Try it and let me know how it comes out.
-Mix your bread crumbs,with leftover beef stew. Whut?! Oh yes why not? Why does poultry get all the fancy treatment? Tell me if you put stuffing on a plate with mashed potatoes, buttered corn, baked meatloaf and gravy you wouldn't get some LOVE?  You would! True undying love and accolades!! Switch out your chicken broth for beef broth, go ahead and add the celery and onion etc.
Let me know how it comes out.
-Add a little sweet to your savory. I used whole wheat ,cinnamon raisin rolls for my vegan stuffing. Yes that means there were bits of raisin in my mushroom stuffing. It was wonderful! If you've ever had cranberry sauce on the same plate as your turkey you get the connection. You can use raisin bread, the good kind from the bakery section of the grocery store. Anything from the bread isle might be a little too sweet and processed. (but whatever works for you )  Try this and let me know how it comes out. :-)