Friday, November 23, 2007

The Menu

What did I cook?

altarboyk wants to know!

It was fairly standard Thanksgiving fare. Turkey, stuffing, my stepmother's baked pineapple. But there were two notable dishes.

First there was the succotash. Back in August, I froze some sweet corn that was off the stalk and into a pot of boiling water within an hour, so it's sweet as sugar. I used one of three bags, and combined it with carrots, celery, finely chopped onion, and peas. I sauteed it really slowly over medium-low heat until the vegetables were just tender. It was really sensational, and a great counterpoint to the turkey and stuffing.

But then there were my yams.

Yams cooked in butter with some honey. They were softening up nicely when I had an idea. I had these prunes I found in the cupboard and thought that would be a nice addition to the yams. So I chopped them up and dropped them in the pot.

No no no no no.

The prunes seemed to dissolve completely. But they did lend their color to the yams. So what I was left with was soupy, gloppy stuff of a certain shade of brown. I'm not even going to teell you What It Looked Just Like, but it doesn't take much imagination. And once that thought crossed my mind, I decided it would do better to grace the compost heap than my table. So this was the Thanksgiving Without Yams.

And that was about it.

Oh. Other than to mention that I took off the wings and put them in a stock pot simmering slowly, along with some carrots, celery, onions, thyme, and bay leaves. My stock was phenomenal. And I made some great gravy with it.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Sorry the yams didn't work out. But the idea was sound--they need to go into a backed or stewed recipe, after the sweet potatoes are tender and all--find a recipe for tzimmes (or related spelling), a frequent Hannukkah table occupant for recommendations =)