Thanksgiving Fun!!!

I know my family is crazy!

Is your family crazy?

I thought we could share our most crazy Thanksgiving Day stories here in a thread just to have some Thanksgiving Fun!

What is your favorite Thanksgiving Day tradition?

Post your favorite Thanksgiving Day Recipe!

BUT ABOVE ALL DO NOT FORGET TO TELL US ABOUT YOUR CRAZIEST THANKSGIVING EVER!

I think this year for me is going to top the crazy t-day list so I will reserve my story until next Friday Thought you would like to be kept waiting...

Let the games BEGIN!

hey middlemamma,

Don't forget to include pictures of all of your craziness!

While at work today, I'm sure I will remember some of my Thanksgiving fun. I'll report it and my all-time favorite stuffing recipe.

I have two that rival each other. First, the year Mama learned to oil paint. We never did figure out how the turpentine got into the stuffing.

Second, us kids were always shuffled off to the kiddie table, but our poodle had a bib tied around her neck and ate turkey at the table from the china and silver. I was never fond of that hound.

This sounds like fun! I will have to break out my buttermilk pie recipe. My Thanksgiving is not complete without it.

Oh boy....too many stories. I think I'm passing our hereditary dysfunction down to my kids, too. It's as if too much from the same genetic pool in close proximity creates mass chaos.

I guess its the chaos and craziness that create the best memories...

My brother does the Alton Brown turkey derrick! Yes, it really works for frying turkeys!

Here is the link to the video...
http://www.foodnetwork.com/thanksgiving-turkey-tips-and-how-tos/video/index.html?videoId=29726

Here is the link to the directions...
http://altonbrown.com/pdfs/AB_turkey_derrick.pdf

mm - Can't wait to hear your stories!

We had a dog who visited one of the neighbors' and ate some of the leftover turkey. We didn't know this before we left on a two hour trip to visit family. He wasn't a car dog to begin with and with a full belly of turkey .... well, let's just say we had to stop multiple times to clean up (and air out) the car!

Our other dog (we only had two in 30 years) snuck into a different neighbor's garage and stole the turkey carcass right out of the trash can. They called us, but couldn't be mad because he looked so proud trotting up the driveway with that carcass in his mouth. We got it away from him before he could chew on the bones.

squaredeal wrote:We had a dog who visited one of the neighbors' and ate some of the leftover turkey. We didn't know this before we left on a two hour trip to visit family. He wasn't a car dog to begin with and with a full belly of turkey .... well, let's just say we had to stop multiple times to clean up (and air out) the car!

Our other dog (we only had two in 30 years) snuck into a different neighbor's garage and stole the turkey carcass right out of the trash can. They called us, but couldn't be mad because he looked so proud trotting up the driveway with that carcass in his mouth. We got it away from him before he could chew on the bones.

Reminds me of the movie Christmas Story LOL! The dog ate the Christmas beast.

I must confess I am somewhat concerned about the holidays. As of this morning I have lost 64 lbs doing Weight Watchers Haha, I weighed more in highschool, even though back then I was solid as a rock...funny how solids turn to jello when you get older
Luckily, I am at a point where I can eat what I want for a few days on special occasions and not gain or drop quickly what I do.
Thank goodness cause I have been drooling on myself thinking about making my pies and eating mounds of mashed taters and graaaaavvvvyyyy

I really can't think of any Thanksgiving stories to tell. I guess I was lucky enough to have a normal family

Well, the only one I can think of now took place Thanksgiving of 1992(OMG....19 years ago!).

I was making the stuffing. I had everything prepared(bread cut up into cubes, sauteed onions and celery, spices, etc) and when I add the liquid from cooking the giblets, the bread just turned to absolute mush. I was horrified. It was the first time that the recipe ever got messed up and it happened while I made it. My Mom suggested that I just gently fold more bread cubes into the slop. Well I did and it actually turned out better than I anticipated.

The only thing I could come up with is that it must've been the bread. Maybe it was too fresh. I definitely didn't add too much liquid.

I thought this would be appropriate for this thread.....


Cooking with the Three Stooges

if you don't want to watch the whole clip, you MUST skip ahead to the 2 minute mark. LMAO

Too funny. Never seen the 3 Stooges in color before. Nice.

Large bowl, beat eggs until they are light & lemon colored. Mix sugar & flour, add to beaten eggs 1/4 cup at a time, beating constantly. Stir in buttermilk, butter, vanilla & salt.
Pour into pie shell & bake in preheated oven at 450, on lowest shelf for about 10 minutes. Reduce heat to 325 & bake for 50 minutes or until a knife inserted in center comes out clean. Transfer to cooling rack.

You can increase or decrease the sugar to your desired taste. I typically use 1 1/2c.
If you have never had buttermilk pie before, its along the lines of a chess pie.

Turkey Stuffing

cooked giblets, finely chopped
1/2 cup butter or margarine
1 cup celery, finely chopped
2 medium onions, finely chopped
2 pounds bread(21 cups), measured after cutting into cubes
1 TBS salt
1 TBS poultry seasoning
1/2 tsp pepper
1 tsp sage
3 eggs, beaten
1 cup of liquid from cooking giblets
1/2 cup parsley, chopped

Cook giblets in just enough water to cover them and chop fine. Cube the bread and set aside. Melt butter or margarine and slowly simmer the celery and onions for a few minutes. Add the salt, poultry seasoning, sage, and pepper. Mix well and remove from heat, and let cool. Combine the celery and onion mixture with the bread. Add beaten eggs, giblet liquid, and parsley. Toss lightly until all ingredients are well blended.

You can chop the celery and onion as fine as you like. You can even put then in the food processor and chop them that way....that's the way I do it. When you clean the celery, you can always use the leaves or little stubby leftovers along with some onion and put that in with the giblets and cook. It'll make the broth more flavorful. If you get the usual giblets with the turkey(neck, heart, stomach, liver), they don't all go in the pot at the same time. Simmer the neck first for a little bit, then put in the stomach, simmer for a few minutes, then put in the heart and simmer for a few minutes more. The liver goes in last because that takes the shortest amount of time.
Depending on how much stuffing you are making, you might want to get yourself an extra tub of chicken livers. You don't have to use the neck in the stuffing, but cook it anyway and either pick the meat off and eat(like my brother and I used to do), or just throw it away. There's very little meat on it.

A single batch of this recipe makes enough stuffing for a 15-18 pound turkey. I ALWAYS made a minimum of a double batch of this because it's so good. And yes.....you can actually put this in the turkey. Just don't pack it in too tightly. Any extra stuffing can be baked in the oven. Just be sure you baste it a few times with turkey broth from the roasting pan.

almost forgot in that previous post....

The recipe calls for 1 cup of giblet cooking liquid but you might not need it all. Add it a little at a time.

Well, the first shoe just dropped on the holiday season. Mom just blew a gasket and sent all kids (including the one typing) to the basement to play where she can't hear them for awhile.

DoH! If momma aint happy...

hmmm Buttermilk pie! I had it for the first time about six weeks ago and it was heavenly!

How 'bout a recipe for Cranberry Sauce? Its been in our family since 1890 and its a jelly, not a relish or sauce, and it is quite sweet.

1 lb "box" of cranberries (1+ bags of cranberries)

1 cup boiling water

2 cups sugar

Wash, pick over berries, drain. Cook in one cup of boiling water until skins burst 10-15 minutes. Stir all the time. They should be tender and thick. Blend in a blender (or not), return to the pan, add the 2 cups of sugar and continue cooking 5-8 minutes more, stirring constantly. Pour into a 1 qrt mold and refridgerate.

Doesn't every crazy woman story begin with, "I was pregnant with so-and-so" ?

I was pregnant with Caleb, big pregnant, it was Thanksgiving and he was due January. Thanksgiving for 20+ was at our house that year and I was stressed out. The day before I was doing the cooking marathon. Pies, relish trays, cranberry sauce, veggie trays, dips, you name it, if it could be prepared the day before I was doing it. I boiled the eggs for deviled eggs. I was young, only 21 or 22, and no one had ever imparted the perfect boiled egg trick to me.

So I was hunched over the kitchen sink, as big as a friggin' house, feeling as big as a a duplex. My whole torso hurt, I had been on my feet for so long and after a while when you are that big pregnant gravity takes effect on that baby belly and you just hurt. It was like 11 PM and I still had a cheesecake to make. The shells wouldn't come off. I had peeled so many shells my finger tips were sore, every bit of shell was fighting for its life clinging to that egg white. The eggs looked like I had tried to peel them with the tip end of a veggie peeler.

I still had a dozen or so to go when I lost it. I screamed an animalistic guttural scream of frustration and I threw something that hit the wall with a bang, a coffee cup? I don't remember. Then I wilted into an enormous pile of fat human on the kitchen floor writhing with female hormonal sobs of anguish and frustration. When my husband at the time came from the bedroom around the kitchen corner and stood there like a deer in the headlights, that just made me cry more. I laid on the linoleum floor wailing in full on 3 year old tantrum mode. Had you been there you might have been able to discern my cries of hate toward the stupid eggs, or my sobs of how ruined the WHOLE holiday was, or my groans about how I hate the Holidays, or my whines about how everyone hated me even the eggs, or my distress about how fat and ugly I was.

Someone should teach a class to men on how to handle a woman this far fallen down the hormonal pit of despair, I have never met one to this day that handles it right. The proper response is to help her up off the kitchen floor, hug her, tell her dinner will be fine and the holiday is not ruined. Don't forget to add that she is beautiful. Dry her eyes, hug her again. Tell her you love her.

Whatever you do...don't get mad and start yelling about how ridiculous she is being....because THEN she goes from despair to pissed in about 2.6 seconds and might throw a freshly baked apple pie at you, or maybe a whole tray of freshly cut vegetables, or maybe a huge glass platter meant for Tom the Turkey. Or maybe all three and you spend Thanksgiving day not speaking. Either way it's better for all involved if you just follow the above advice. You might even get some Thanksgiving day lovin' if you play your cards right.


GOBBLE GOBBLE!

The forum is slow, so I figured why not stir up a little controversy with a rebuttal:
"mm's advice works, BUT, BEWARE YOU MEN OUT THERE..."

I've lost track of the number of post drafts that I've deleted. No matter how impeccable my logic and reasoning is that encourages and instructs men to avoid that situation altogether, I can't do it. As much as young men need to hear my advice, they're not getting here, today. I'm sorry, fellas, I can't do it.

You see, mm played the pregnancy card. Guys, when women get together, they like to out-brag and out-complain each other, about who got biggest, who hurt the most, who stayed skinniest, who got the worse stretch marks, who saw death's door during delivery, who got the biggest episiotomy or C section scar (or smallest), and who lost the most post-natal weight. They giggle that men don't know their secret word (perineum), and that men could never endure the pain of birthing, etc etc etc. However, as much as they like to compete with each other, when their hormone induced lunacy is challenged by a male, they will join together and circle the wagons faster than a pregnant woman looking for a bathroom. I would get shredded into worm food!

Sorry, gents, we're waaaaay outnumbered here. For now, let's keep mum about how to deal with wacked out hormones, and live to fight another day. I hope everybody has a great Thanksgiving Day!

I have a feeling this is about to turn ugly.

A topic such as this usually goes the way of a religion or politics thread.

As a former OB nurse who has delivered her share of the little darlings when the MD didn't make it to the hospital on time, I can assure you that some women really do have difficult pregnancies and labors.

HOWEVER, I've often wondered when overhearing them share their stories with each other whether they undergo selective amnesia at some point, since some of them came back for an encore or 2, or 3....and once for her 10th!!!

please pass the stuffing

Give me stuffing or give me death!

I actually had two beautiful births and wouldn't use any other word to describe them negatively.

I didn't mean to imply that my craziness was valid...I was trying to be funny.

I apologize for missing the mark and making anyone feel uncomfortable. That includes every wonderful male member on the forum.

I guess without posting too much lately I have lost my touch. LOL

Please commence with more Thanksgiving FUN!

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

Does size matter?

I'm talking turkeys of course!

The biggest turkey I ever bout was just a hair over 30 pounds.