Thanksgiving

David and I celebrate our first Thanksgiving with both families together. We had a total of eleven people including ourselves. Oh my, was it a lot of work. My mom brought two pies and David's mother brother 4 dishes and I was still cooking all afternoon. I made a turkey, ham, and a few sides dishes plus two pies. Below is my pecan pie. I cheated and used Pillsbury roll out pie crust. No time to make my own. David's friends were suppose to bring pies but they didn't so I scrambled that afternoon. This pecan pie recipe is by far the best I've made and so simple too. Not that I am a pecan pie expert or anything but the last one I made from Dorie Greenspan's From My Home to Yours didn't go over so well. This recipe is from the back of the Karo Dark Corn Syrup bottle.

The turkey noodle soup is what I did with leftover turkey. Very easy, make stock with turkey bones, add some diced celery, carrots, onions, egg noodles, season with thyme, salt, and pepper, bring to a boil, reduce heat, add the cooked turkey and simmer.

The cranberry bars are a modification of a strawberry streusel bar recipe from BHG. I used leftover cranberry sauce in place of the strawberry jam. I omitted the icing. The bars were quite good. I thought 4 cups of flour was an awful lot but they turned out just fine. Next time I will use less crumb mixture for the base and use more for the topping. The 2 cups the recipe specifies is not enough. You end up with a thick base and little streusel on top. Still tasty though and are nice with coffee for breakfast.

Cupcakes

I've been on a cupcake craze as of late especially any cupcake that goes well with cream cheese frosting. I started with pumpkin cupcakes, recipe from King Arthur Flour's website then ventured into banana walnut cupcakes, red velvet (actually cake recipe but did well as a cupcake) again from King Arthur Flour's website then gingersnap cupcakes from Baking Bites. I forgot to take a pic of the gingersnap cupcakes but will definitely be making them again as they were wonderful. Will post a pic next time. The banana walnut cupcakes are from Greg Patent's Baking Across America cookbook. This was my first attempt and red velvet cupcakes and they were delicious. Recipe is very simple to follow and has a nice mild chocolaty taste. I only used half the amount of red food coloring as I only had a 2 oz bottle. 4 ozs is an awful lot of food coloring. The cupcakes came out just fine with 2 oz of food coloring.

Catching Up

David and I bought a house in late September and since then my baking has slowed down significantly. Home ownership is ALOT of work. I have baked some since we've moved but just not as much. I haven't had a lot of time to post either. My goal for the new year is to stay up to day on my blog. I was doing well for awhile and then fell by the way side when we moved. I am going to post pictures some of the goodies I've made the past couple of months. I am doing my Christmas baking this Sunday and will definitely post the recipes. Will be baking some favorites mint brownies, lemon bars, snickerdoodles, and chocolate fudge. New for this year are chewy chocolate cookies with red and green white chocolate morsels, oatmeal cookies with cranberries and walnuts, soft gingerbread cutout cookies, and peanut butter fudge. If I have more time, I may bake one or two other items. David and I are headed in different directions for Christmas so I am making a nice dinner for us. On the menu is rosemary leg of lamb (leg of lamb), mash potatoes and gravy, green beans, and dinner rolls.