Thanksgiving Break

My week off was just what I needed. The weekend prior to my vacation was filled with my niece’s soccer tournament games and my weekdays were spent catching up on TV shows and movies, cooking, working out, shopping, decorating – all things I really enjoy doing. The best part was that Dan also had some of the week off – so we actually got to spend a lot of time together, woohoo!

My Mom and Dad hosted Thanksgiving at their house and I decided that I was going to make homemade dinner rolls and a corn dish.

I was so excited to finally use my grandmother’s mixer to make my rolls. I followed a Rachael Ray recipe. “Dinner Rolls for a Crowd”

I even used a towel with hearts to show the dough some love during the first rise.

I broke out the scale and got mega precise with my measurements to make sure my rolls would be uniform in size… then everything went downhill. I covered my baking sheets of dough balls for the second dough rise and the puffed up like magic. Then I made the “very bad” decision to transport them to my parent’s house instead of just baking them at home. I didn’t take into account the cold car and I ended up with dough that looked like baked sugar cookies…. total bummer. Thankfully I got some back up rolls in the event of a disaster…  it all worked out in the end.

The Gulliver’s Creamed Corn dish on the other hand – was phenomenal! Thanks Melissa for posting the recipe on your blog. I did use more cheese (an extra 1/3 of a cup) and I used white and yellow frozen corn, but other than that – I kept things the same. Everyone loved it!

My Aunt Diane (who recently passed away) created a family tradition back when I was a little girl. She would bring candy from a Carmel, CA candy store to every Thanksgiving. Gigantic bags of gummy fruit and bears, chocolate turkeys, etc. I have so many fond memories of her holiday goodie bags and boxes that in her honor I wanted to make sure that everyone had candy treats this year. I went to See’s and picked up some chocolate and toffee bars and butterscotch, vanilla, chocolate and café latté gourmet lollypops. It was the perfect way to carry on the tradition and I’m now slightly obsessed with the butterscotch pops.

My Mom set a beautiful table… fall colored dishes and napkins…

and the cutest little pilgrim birds I’ve ever seen… not that I’ve seen a lot of pilgrim birds… ha!

Deede and Josh brought one of Deede’s masterpiece pies – Pear and Butterscotch – one of Josh’s favorites. The crust was super flaky – Deede is my pie baking hero. She loves the precise measuring, the math, etc. and it really shows in the finished product. Incredible!

My bro and Aim brought an amazing pumpkin soup as a starter.

Served with an apple/cranberry relish as a soup topper…

and fresh bread… I asked for the soup recipe and will share when I get it. The soup had the perfect blend of spices – loved the little kick at the end.

My Dad brined the turkey in an apple and sage brine. He then BBQ’d it… and Oh man, was it good! So juicy and tender, loved it!

Deede also whipped up the second veggie dish of the meal – green bean bacon bundles. The sauce was made with onion, bacon drippings, white wine vinegar, sugar and salt – delicious!

We had quite the table spread. We finished the evening watching the National Dog Show – the back and forth commentary was hilarious. We had a wonderful time with our family and friends. We packed Higgin’s into the car and headed home along the fog filled back roads.

In dieting news… Foodwise I felt great. I tasted everything, but didn’t overeat or go for seconds. I didn’t post about my 17 day diet – cycle 3 (round 2) results – but I was down another 1.5 lbs. I’ve maintained the entire week off and I’ve been eating treats here and there throughout. Not too shabby. So there will be no master detox… no plans to “get back on the wagon” – because my wagon never crashed… I went into the holiday and my week off with a plan and I stuck to it.

I’ve now got some Christmas decorating on the agenda…

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving.