Thanksgiving 2020

This was a quiet Thanksgiving dinner, thinking of our loved ones, and grateful for our family, our friends, our health, and so many other things.

I went out looking for something a bit more unusual in the way of flowers.  They had me at the pink.  So I brought out a few copper accessories to bring out the color a bit more.

Placemats from Pottery Barn.  Napkins from Crate and Barrel.  Napkin Rings from Williams-Sonoma.  Copper tray from Target.

French Countryside, by Mikasa dishes.

Woodland, by Spode flatware.  I love bringing it out in the Fall!

No traditional Thanksgiving dinner this year.  By special request from favorite husband, Baked Ham, Roman, Potatoes and a Vegetable Medley.

For myself, I experimented with a new recipe:  Ina Garten's Maple Pumpkin Flan.  It was delicious but it seemed a bit more work than my basic flan recipe, and I think my taste buds were confused:  Is it a flan?  Is it a pumpkin pie?  The jury is still out on this one.

Most of the mishaps were my fault.  The recipe called for an 8-inch cake pan, but I only had a 7-inch mold (shown above), and a 9-inch cake pan.  I decided to use the 7-inch mold, which is actually designed for the Instant Pot.  I baked it in a Bain Marie, in the oven.  Unfortunately, I had to adjust the baking times.  It took considerably longer to bake this way.

The caramel called for maple syrup, sugar and water.  It took forever to caramelize, and in the end, I wasn't even sure how it would turn out because the color looked wrong, and the sugar never completely dissolved.  I think those valleys in the top of the flan may have been caused by the caramel.

For some inconceivable reason, I decided to mix all the ingredients with my hand mixer, instead of dropping everything in the blender.  With the added mascarpone, I could not get a smooth consistency, and ended up having to strain the whole thing before putting it into the mold.

Who would have imagined that pink would look so lovely when added to Fall colors?  It provided the perfect touch to our quiet day of Thanksgiving.

Carmela's Salad Redux . . .

The original Carmela's Salad is still my favorite, but here's proof that a good thing can be modified in many ways, and continue to work beautifully . . . or, in this case, deliciously . . .

This time, the pièce de resistance is salmon, baked simply in the oven with a little lemon juice . . .  Steam some asparagus spears and red potatoes . . . boil some eggs . . .

Make a lemon vinaigrette, or stick to olive oil and vinegar . . .

Keep it simple.  As Ina Garten would say, simple food has the most style . . .

Tea Bread Tuesday: Irish Soda Bread Redux

Tea Bread Tuesday is changing at my house.  I will no longer bake a new tea bread every Tuesday.  When even my husband, with his insatiable sweet tooth, stopped nibbling on the breads, I knew it was time to reassess the project.  Oh, I'll still try out new recipes now and again.  I just don't want to continue the search for a new recipe every week.  When I started the project, I really thought I'd have enough recipes to fill an entire year.  Well, it turns out that, although the recipes are certainly out there, I'm not interested in a great many of them.  If anything, all this baking has made me very pernickety about what I choose to bake.  So, I will continue to post a new quick bread recipe once in a while, but I'll intersperse my baking with the tried and true recipes that my family already loves.

This week I baked one of our favorites, Irish Soda Bread, which I posted here last year for St. Patrick's Day.  This year I tried a small variation:  I added the grated zest of one orange, borrowing a suggestion from Ina Garten, the Barefoot Contessa - it was delicious!  The orange zest compliments the currants beautifully, and adds a little more depth to the overall flavor.

Thanks to all my friends in blogland, who stuck it out all these months, and indulged me while I went through this tea bread phase.  I'm not completely done with it; I'm sure there're one or two recipes that I just have to try out . . . I'll be in touch . . .

Tea Bread Tuesday: Corn Muffins

I thought I'd kill two birds with one stone this week: Bake some muffins for Tea Bread Tuesday and find a new recipe for corn bread or muffins, since this constitutes one of the essential components of our Thanksgiving dinner, and . . . er . . . that's coming up soon! Yikes! The recipe came from Ina Garten, The Barefoot Contessa, and they were pretty good, but they were not the super moist wonders that I was expecting and my kids are corn muffin snobs. The search must go on . . .

Here's the link for the recipe: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/corn-muffins-recipe/index.html