Anniversary

Friday, December 3, 2010

Turkey Day

Soooo it's been a while since I've blogged. I'm not sure why, but I just haven't felt like putting anything down on "paper". I guess screen is a better word...but anyways, everything has been fine, most of you know about my new job, so instead of playing catch up, I'll just jump right to the topic at hand.

This year was my first year ever to miss Thanksgiving dinner with my dad's side of the family back home. Me and Ben both had to work the day before and the day after TG, so it just seemed pointless to spend 10 hours on the road on one day off. Luckily, both of our sets of parent's decided to drive down and spend turkey day with us. This meant, of course, that I decided to play Martha Stewart, and I began planning my menu well over a month in advance. My first time to host Thanksgiving! It had to be awesome. After much debate, (To fry or not to fry? Should I make the green jello salad even though my dad's the only one who eats it?), I settled on a menu of butter and herb roasted turkey, my mom's twice baked potatoes (the only dish I wasn't planning to make myself,) corn casserole, sweet potato casserole, stuffing, Aunt Jo's famous green bean bundles, rolls, pecan pie and glazed chocolate-pumpkin bundt cake. I studied the recipes until I formulated the perfect cooking schedule, starting with thawing the turkey on Sunday down to the minute dishes were to be switched in the oven on the big day. We're talking five minute increments here. I made all of the sides the day before and put them in the fridge overnight, so that after the turkey was done on Thursday, all I'd need to do was throw them in the oven. I also made dessert in advance.

The day started off great...I had the turkey in the oven five minutes early, at 7:55 AM. My mom went ahead and made her twice baked potatoes, and we were on track! That's when things started to get annoying. The electricity flickered multiple time, causing me to run over to our electric oven and quickly reset the temperature, so the turkey would stay at a constant cooking temperature. As aggravating as this was, it only got worse. At 10:30 the electricity went off, and it stayed off. I paced the floor and threatened my family members with death if they opened the oven or the fridge...if we left them closed, maybe everything would be okay until the electricity came back on? I wasn't quite in panic mode at this time, but I was definitely pissed. Everything had been going so smoothly! I was actually going to pull this meal off! I had spent hours planning and shopping, not to mention over $100 on all the food. (Did you know there was such a thing as Pumpkin Pie Spice?) Everyone was so worried that I was going to freak, and they kept telling me "everything will be fine", which just aggravated me more. (Sorry family, but it did!) My dad decided to drive around the block, where he found the electric workers, who said it would be hours before it came back on. Something about fire and sparks flying...whatever. I. Was. Not. Pleased. So we did what anyone would do; we threw the bird on the grill! Now it wasn't exactly "grilled turkey"; there was no way I was going to ruin my gourmet bird in such a manner. We left it in the roasting pan and closed to lid, trying to simulate an oven the best we could. After about an hour of me yelling at Ben to quit opening the lid, we finally decided that it must be done. Instead of using our nice plates like I had planned, I said SCREW IT and we used paper plates. For lunch we had turkey and potatoes, with two choices for dessert. The turkey actually turned out really good...and I think everyone liked it. Of course at this point, if it had tasted horrible, no one would have told me! So we ate in the dark, no football game in the background, no air conditioner, but it was a nice meal. We didn't miss the rest of the food too much. After we ate and cleaned up the kitchen, the moment I sat down on the couch to relax, (I kid you not,) the electricity came back on. Straight out of a sitcom.

So we got down to some football, napping,and hanging out. A few hours later, I baked the rest of the sides, and for dinner we had Thanksgiving, Part Deux. Less turkey emphasis, and more sides. It was nice. It was a good lesson for me...things don't have to be perfect in order for them to be good. Thanksgiving isn't about a perfectly planned meal; it was great because we had our family there, which is all too rare. I saw a quote the other day: "Being happy doesn't mean that everything is perfect, it means that you have looked beyond the imperfections." I like that. And you know what? There were no left overs.

Me and my turkey in the wee hours, when optimism was high.


The finished product, in the dark.