What are you cooking for dinner this weekend?

[dgaddis]

Made my own pasta sauce for the first time. Super easy, just takes time, let it cook for about 5.5hrs or so. It's chunky, didn't break down the tomatoes too much, and lots of onion, celery, carrot, bell pepper, and mushrooms in it. Will do again!

Going into the oven.



5.5ish hours later.

[rwsaunders]

Chicken Cacciatore...awesome dinner to wrap up the weekend and to celebrate my dear Mother in Law's 93rd birthday.

[Coppercook62]

87EA1EA5-E64A-444F-B3BE-47F97694AE9F.jpg
I retired but im learning cad/cam cnc. Foie egg from mold i made. 🤷🏼‍♂️

[dgaddis]

Had a get together at my grandmas with a bunch of family today. It was a grand time, got to see some folks I love but just don't see that often, many of them met our little one (the newest member of the family) for the first time. All us 'kids' handled the food so our parents and grandparents could just hang out and enjoy the day. I hauled my kettle up there and cooked the meat, rotisseried a pork loin and cooked a tri-tip. The pork was a little dry, certainly not bad, but could have been a bit better. The beef was on point.

It was one of those days where everyone says "we really need to do this more often." Hopefully we will!

[htwoopup]

Wife's Canadian family began to gather for the Thanksgiving holiday.

Injected a loin from a boar with an apple cider and maple syrup marinade and coated it with Tony's Cajun yesterday and fried it up today.

Had to split it before I put it in the frying pot as it was so thick (it weighed 6 1/2 pounds). But it came out great...crispy outside and moist inside.

IMG_0265 by Jon Mandel, on Flickr

Tried my hand at applesauce for the first time to go with it. It was more like apple almost sauce but tasted better than it looked.

IMG_0266 by Jon Mandel, on Flickr

And for color there were mashed sweet potatoes and two kinds of cauliflower and broccoli simply steamed (a pre shot)...

IMG_0263 by Jon Mandel, on Flickr

Tomorrow we are frying a turkey for the main event.

And Pebbles will still be waiting for someone to drop something...

IMG_0261 by Jon Mandel, on Flickr

[rwsaunders]

This morning's post-ride breakfast and not dinner so I cheated a bit...Belgian waffles with bacon and glazed pears dusted with cinnamon. Ever since I read that Meghan Markle keeps trim by eating cinnamon on watermelon for dessert, I use it on everything.

[dgaddis]

Wings last night. Half w/a mustard based BBQ sauce, half with a sweet BBQ sauce. The mustard based was waaaaaay better, and I'm generally not a big fan of mustard based sauces.



Mixed this sourdough loaf up on Friday, it's been retarding in the fridge all weekend, and baked it this morning. Dang good. FB reminded me that 1yr ago today was the first loaf of bread I ever baked.

[mg2ride]

Lynnhaven Blues!

The late season Blue Crab have been great in the Lynnhaven. A steady 1/2 dozen every few days out of a single pot. Large and meaty!!





With any luck fresh Speckle Trout are to follow.

[dgaddis]

Cooked a pork tenderloin on the grill, indirect heat at about 350ish w/a chunk of apple wood for smoke. A little bit of a BBQ rub on it, then finished with a ginger apricot glaze. Roasted potatoes and broccoli rounded out dinner.

The glaze is super easy to make - ~tablespoon of minced ginger, put it in a sauce pan for about a minute with just enough oil to keep it from sticking, then add ~1/4 cup rice vinegar and about a cup of apricot preserves (mash/break it up as much as you can once added to the pot). Reduce down for a while, and once it starts to kinda-sorta thicken up a bit take it off the heat. As it cools a bit it'll really thicken up. We had plenty of it left over, so I froze it, hopefully it'll re-heat nicely.

[Too Tall]

Turkey is done.
Six hrs. on the Big Green Egg at 250F plus 30 mins. at 325F Cooked over hickory.
Also, I made cranberry/ginger/jalapeno sauce that nobody will eat and they are missing out it's really good. Oh...two pecan pies and garlic mashed potatoes.
I like to cook the turkey day before this allows me to carve it cold than plate it on our holiday platter with a cup of turkey broth and warm in the oven. I've tried it every which way and this is the best.
Thanks to Todd Holland for the cornbread stuffing recipe.
tday1.jpg

[Tom]

In-laws get seriously messed up by tryptophan... like coma messed up. So, slow roasted pork shoulder slathered with olive oil to hold on the garlic, rosemary, cinnamon, cracked pepper and salt. It's sitting in the cellar fridge all slathered and coated. Potato rutabaga gratin, pureed buttercup squash, brussel sprout and carrot ragout and of course two pecan pies. A choice of fine ales: Innus and Gunn Kindred Spirits, Founder's KBS, Belhaven Scottish Ale, Trout Town Brown... something for everyone.

[Octave]

In-laws get seriously messed up by tryptophan... like coma messed up. So, slow roasted pork shoulder slathered with olive oil to hold on the garlic, rosemary, cinnamon, cracked pepper and salt. It's sitting in the cellar fridge all slathered and coated. Potato rutabaga gratin, pureed buttercup squash, brussel sprout and carrot ragout and of course two pecan pies. A choice of fine ales: Innus and Gunn Kindred Spirits, Founder's KBS, Belhaven Scottish Ale, Trout Town Brown... something for everyone.

Fun fact: 3oz of turkey contains 123% RDA of tryptophan (for breast, less in the drumsticks). 3oz of pork contains 124% RDA of tryptophan..

[Tom]

That's really interesting. I wonder what else is in the bird that does it.

It sort of reminds me of something I read about how certain shamans in the Brazilian rain forest would induce their visions and trances. They had to eat four particular plants and then smoke a fifth. If they didn't combine them that way, nothing. Combine them and they were in for a wild ride. How they remembered what they did is a marvel to me unless someone kept notes.

[Octave]

Really there is nothing special about turkey that causes this. My two cents: psychosomatic, combined with overeating and higher than normal fat content. Fat requires huge amounts of caloric input for digestion which means the body redirect blood, glucose and other resources to the gut in order to process the fat. Turkey, especially the skin, is very high in fat and therefore has a high energy cost for digestion. Add to that some buttered rolls, lots of quick carbs (causing insulin spikes and refractory CNS depression) and some booze and you have a recipe for sleepiness. Combine that with overstimulation (FAMILY FAMILY maybe a 5k THEN SOME MORE FAMILY) and the psychosomatic expectation that turkey will make you tired and voila, nap time.

For what it's worth, gram per gram pumpkin seeds, soy beans, most cheeses, lamb, beef and pork all have more tryptophan than turkey. Tryptophan also doesn't absorb and convert to 5-HTP very well when other foods are around (if using tryptophan for sleep the dosage is about 5x what one would eat in turkey and taken on an empty stomach).

The brain is really cool.

[Too Tall]

OK Octave stop with the facts and don't forget two servings of pie ;)

[rwsaunders]

Let the Thanksgiving Day weekend games begin...

[Too Tall]

Gosh you guys are amazing bakers among other things. I'm a troubled by readily available supply of cookies in jars.

[rwsaunders]

There is only one way that I can eat Brussels Sprouts...simmered in stock and topped off with a little bacon

[guido]

Having lost L's mom recently, we weren't in the mode for a group gathering. So we stayed in and I made gumbo.

[rwsaunders]

Thanksgiving dinner is a wrap...only thing missing in the pic is the pumpkin pie and I can assure you that it was awesome. Now I’ve got to ride the calories away.