Thanksgiving Recipes

This year we had Thanksgiving at our teeny tiny apartment & we cooked way more food than was really needed for Cyrus, R, my parents, & I. But that means left overs for us! Right now, we actually have what's left over of the turkey boiling away on the stove to make a nice stock.

I figured I'd share two of the recipes that were at our table this holiday; one I found on in my big book of slow cooker recipes that I have been dying to try & the other is a staple that has been at our table for as long as I can remember.

Butternut Squash Braised with Thyme & Cider

from Slow Cooker: The Best Cookbook Ever by Diane Phillips

Servings: 6 to 8

Ingredients:

1/2 cup [1 stick] unsalted butter, melted

1/4 cup firmly packed light brown sugar

1 cup apple cider

2 teaspoons dried thyme

4 cups of 1-inch chunks peeled & seeded butternut squash

Directions:

Combine all the ingredients in the insert of a 5 to 7 quart slow cooker. Cover & cook on high for 3 1/2 to 4 hours, until the squash is tender.

Serve the squash from the cooker set on warm.

 

image was taken before it was cooked, because it was gobbled up before I could get to my camera!

Sweet Potato Crumble

from my Grandmother

Ingredients:

1/2 cup unsifted flour
1/2 cup light brown sugar
1/4 cup butter
1/2 tsp. ground allspice
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
2.5 - 3 pounds sweet potato, pared
1/3 cup pecan halves
maple syrup

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a medium bowl, combine flour, sugar, allspice, & nutmeg. mix well. With a pastry blender, cut in butter until mixture forms coarse crumbs. Grease a 2 quart shallow baking pan or casserole dish.

Cut sweet potatoes into 1/4 inch thick slices, on a bias (diagonal). Place 1/3rd of the potatoes in baking dish & sprinkle half a cup of crumb mixture on top. Layer with remaining potatoes, slightly overlapping. Sprinkle with remaining mixture. Top with pecan halves & drizzle with syrup. 

Lightly cover with foil & bake for 45 minutes. Remove foil & cook for 10 minutes longer, or until fork tender.

 

The resulting dish is so so very sweet & delicious!

Do you have any must-haves on your holiday table?

What's on the Menu | Zucchini Fritters

Often, while I'm sitting at our computer, I can be found perusing the internet for new recipes to test on the guinea pigs family. I start by jumping over to Pinterest & typing in a main ingredient that I have on hand. This past week, we had a few left over zucchini in the fridge that needed to be cooked & I found a recipe over at Smitten Kitchen for zucchini fritters that looked absolutely delicious, so I decided to give it a go.

Unfortunately, I'm not the best in the kitchen. I've got a lot to learn, & I'm sure the tiny area we call a kitchen isn't a conducive learning environment, but I give it my best. Looking back on the zucchini fritters now, I can tell where I may have slipped up, & where my kitchen appliances & supplies failed me. I encourage you all to give the recipe a try, though!

The first mistake I think I made was that I didn't shred up enough zucchini. The second was that I don't think I got enough water out of them! I thought I had, because I seriously had about a cup of zucchini juice in the bowl. I pushed them against my fine mesh strainer & I wrung them out using a couple paper towels (I highly suggest using cheese cloth instead, we just didn't have any). It was crazy the amount of water that came out!

The second thing that hindered the way these zucchini fritters came out was our stove. It is very, very old & desperately needs to be updated, but my grandfather (our landlord) tends to be...well...cheap (the washer & dryer for the building is literally from the 70s) & will not get a new one until this one completely croaks. The knobs on the stove don't have any "high-low" notches, but even if they did, they probably wouldn't be of any help. The flame comes out as either super-duper high, or barely on. There really isn't any in between (it's a total hassle to make rice). So, it was either burn them way to quickly & smoke up the entire apartment, or let them cook really slow. I opted for the latter, which took the fritter out of "zucchini fritter" & replaced it with pancake.

The recipe was really easy, quick, & tasty; I'll definitely be making these again. Especially since Cyrus gobbled up a few by himself!