[Sca-cooks] Report on Thanksgiving experiments...OP

[Denise Wolff]

My only contribution to dinner  was a red velvet cake iced in white 
chocolate and decorated with silver dragees, and sugared walnuts, and 
candied orange peel.

It was placed amidst the usual pumpkin cheesecake, pumpkin, blueberry, and 
apple pies. It was weird how everyone kept coming over to tell me "Wow, what 
bakery is this from... or "Cool, something different".

At least I didn't have to take any home.... It was gone in a flash.

Andrea




"The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend 
to be." ~ Socrates

"Behavior is a mirror in which every one displays his own image."  ~ Goethe


>From: <kingstaste at mindspring.com>
>Reply-To: Cooks within the SCA <sca-cooks at ansteorra.org>
>To: "Cooks within the SCA" <sca-cooks at ansteorra.org>
>Subject: RE: [Sca-cooks] Report on Thanksgiving experiments...OP
>Date: Fri, 25 Nov 2005 01:44:49 -0500
>
>I, too got tapped to make gravy, after the first batch that had been 
>brought
>in was deemed 'not quite right'.  Mine was a simple affair with a blonde
>roux made with the turkey fat and turkey pan drippings.  It was declared
>"wonderful".  It seems to be a mystery, but really isn't all that hard, 
>once
>you get the hang of it.  Probably just lots of people that don't ever make
>it except on Thanksgiving and one or two other special occasions, and they
>just don't develop or loose the knack of turning out something that should
>be relatively simple.
>
>My contributions to dinner were a salad of mesclun mix and romaine hearts,
>dressed with a vinaigrette of shallots, honey, red wine vinegar and olive
>oil, topped with crumbled bacon and goat cheese rounds dipped in herbs de
>provence and breadcrumbs then fried.   I also made some curried mashed 
>green
>bananas (been dating a Jamaican, what can I say), and an experiment at
>gluten-free baclava.  I took Spring Roll wrappers, hydrated them, then 
>fried
>them for the layers, then mixed chopped walnuts and a syrup of honey, agave
>nectar, orange flower water and powder douce.  Tastes very yummy, although
>the rice wrappers are chewier than phyllo, they aren't too far off the 
>right
>texture.
>We also had an Alton Brown turkey (he's really made a splash here, hasn't
>he?), and the usual suspects including dressings, pies, cranberry things,
>greens, mashed red potatoes, sweet potatoes with big, whole marshmallows
>toasted on top, and more.  All in all, a wonderful spread, spent with good
>friends.
>Hope this foodie holiday was very good to everyone here - and let me say it
>again - I'm very thankful for each and every one of you, especially to
>Gunthar who continues to let us hang out in his virtual living room!
>Christianna
>
>
>So, naturally, about six people came up to me and made a point of
>coming up to me and saying, "My... God... that... was the _best_
>gravy I have ever eaten in my life!"
>
>Which, naturally, opens up a variety of touchy questions... I didn't
>do anything bizarre to the gravy. It was just... gravy. Maybe my
>version of acceptable gravy (I wouldn't have served it had it not
>been acceptable) is unusual, but I thought the reaction was a little
>extreme. Unless everything else was bad and people were trying really
>hard to be nice? The only thing I can think of that was even remotely
>unusual was the fact that the pan drippings from the brined,
>unstuffed turkey were probably pretty powerful, and the stock I'd
>used was homemade "meat tea" made from actual soup chickens. Brown
>roux made with a mixture of butter and olive oil, and mirepoix (two
>parts onion to one part each carrot and celery) in the bottom of the
>roasting pan doubling as both aromatic and roasting rack.
>
>Have I lived all my life without realizing that gravy is some sort of
>big mystery, or is my family just nuts? I mean, yes, they're nuts,
>but I wasn't aware of this particular facet of the group nuttiness...
>
>Adamantius
>
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