A few basic principles to help out those who are new to hosting Thanksgiving and to provide me with a checklist so next year I can sleep in past 8 am on Friday without visions of food poisoning bumping through my dreams.
1. Put the turkey in to cook right side up. Okay, some recipes will specify that cooking the turkey upside down yields more juicy meat. So it’s fine to cook your turkey upside down as long as you are aware of what you’re doing and actually take the temperature in the topside and carve the turkey from the top.
So how do you know if the turkey is upside down? If the turkey appears to have the proportions of a runway model, or as if it’s slender middle would be worthy of a crop-top, then it’s likely upside down. A right side up turkey looks like a turkey a Jewish grandmother can be proud of.
2. If you make the error of taking the temperature of the turkey upside down and erroneously think the breast meat has reached 180 degrees, then when you turn the turkey over and start carving into undercooked meat, stop! Do not feed your in-laws undercooked meat. If in doubt, throw the meat away, continue cooking if possible (I’ll let you be the judge) or feed it to your neighbor’s nightly howling cat.
3. Remember to light the candles on the dining room table before calling the guests. Candles can serve as on the spot food warmers for side dishes that cooled waiting for the turkey to be re-cooked.
4. Purchase dependable, pre-made desserts that can be quickly served without scrambling back to the kitchen to whip up a soufflé. Fortunately my husband is beyond patient with my random suggestions to add special accents to our holidays, for instance, giving him a recipe for individual pumpkin soufflés requiring no fewer than 25 steps, 12 kitchen utensils and 3 distinct major appliances. Next year, pie, from the dependable pie place.
5. Turkey soup is not basic regardless of what your mom says. If you haven’t mastered cooking a turkey, skip saving the carcass for tempting turkey soup despite your fond memories of a savory soup for Friday lunches as a child. For starters it’s messy. Plus freezing the broth on your back stoop to let the fat rise overnight can lure in the neighborhood carnivores.
6. Don’t miss trash day! So there you are, half asleep Friday morning, dreaming contentedly that no one woke up with food poisoning in the middle of the night and wondering why a plane is buzzing your house. That’s not a plane, it’s the trash truck. Quickly run to the front door in your pjs and bare feet, flag the driver to wait a moment, and then send the pumpkin soufflé man scurrying for the trash barrel while you quickly tie the final kitchen trash bag and run barefoot across the frost-covered lawn much to the amusement of neighbors peeking through their windows.
1 comment :
Just to add on to the end; Meanwhile your younger daughter is also running across the FREEZING lawn in daddy's shoes, with MORE trash.
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