Christmas Dinner for 8. No,... 9. No,...10!

My Christmas dinner was in the planning stages at Thanksgiving.  It's always easier to think about the next holiday meal when I'm in the middle of a current one because my mind is full of food ideas, appetizers, desserts, side dishes, etc.  My husband has remarked, on more than one occasion, my family is the only family he knows who will talk about their next meal while eating the one in front of them.  I doubt it's true but it makes him happy to think so.
  
Not my Christmas table but...somebody's! (forgot to take photos ack!)

Christmas dinner was no exception.  My friend and her husband were in town for the holidays.  We wanted to share dinner with them and their eldest son who lives here.  She and I began planning a meal for the eight people we expected to serve:  my husband, two sons, my MIL, my GF, her husband and son.  I asked if her other son was joining us?

  "No" she said.  "He doesn't want to have to "make plans'".  She rolled her eyes.  

My table fits eight, I have a fine china service for eight, crystal  champagne goblets for eight and I ordered a standing rib roast with 3 ribs...perfect for eight.  I'd bought it on sale at Thanksgiving.  It was in the freezer.

A few days before Christmas, my younger son's girlfriend wanted to know what time we were eating so she could eat with us after her family's meal.  Huh?  This girl is barely 5' tall & very petite.  I told her five o'clock.  She didn't think she could make that.  Crisis averted.

Wednesday, my GF came to the office and said her mother was flying in from N.M. unexpectedly.  Was that all right?  Of course.  Now I had nine for sure, ten if my son's GF showed up.  I called the butcher.  

"You'll need a bigger roast" he said.  "That rib roast won't serve ten or even nine."   He cut me a new 7 lb, boneless roast.  I left the other in the freezer.  

The table was set for nine.  It was tight but manageable.  Yesterday, my son advised me his girl wouldn't make it and I relaxed.  The table looked awesome.  When our guests arrived, they brought food, wine, appetizers and two large boxes of Rocky Mountain Chocolate apples.  They own a franchise.  Their eldest had his young Golden Doodle along.  We expected that.  Next person through the door was their younger son.  Did not expect that!    He had either not been invited to dinner at his GFs' home or he'd changed his mind.  Either way, we were now ten.

I hadn't had a drink up to this point.

I scrambled to set another place at the table and let the menfolk figure out where the extra chairs, stools or bench could be found.  I served the food from my kitchen island and everyone squeezed in together.  One of the boys said "Grace" (literally) and the guys started eating before the women had finished serving.  Sound familiar?  The food was delicious, could have been hotter but it made it to the table and into their mouths without complaint.

I had several glasses of red wine.  I was grateful to sit down.  I was grateful we were able to fit around the table.  It was a motley crew of three generations; four, if you count the dogs.  It all worked out.

My advise to you is:  always make more food than you need on a holiday.  It will save you lots of grief.  Oh, and while eating our dinner Christmas night, I was already thinking about New Years.

Theme Thursday Lunch

 
When I was a kid, mom or dad made my lunch.  I took it to school in a lunch pail.  Did I have a special one?  Probably, but I do not remember.  What I do remember is having a thermos of milk, a sandwich, some cookies and an apple or orange slices.  My father always made sure we had fruit.  At some point I became too "big" to take a lunch pail and began carrying lunch in a lovely brown paper sack.

By high school, we were eating in the cafeteria.  Not much memory of anything there except chocolate pudding.  By 11th grade, my best friend I would sneak out of school at least one day a week to eat at a local coffee shop across the street.  She and I would split a plate of french fries for 35 cents and we'd each have a cherry or vanilla coke.  It was heaven.

I worked summers at my father's office on Hollywood & Vine.  Once in a while, he'd take me to lunch.  he loved going to nice places so we'd eat at the Brown Derby or drive to Chinatown or walk up the street to Dupar's.  Hollywood was full of characters, derelicts, drug addicts and wanna-bes.  We'd see famous people, crazies, and prostitutes and one old guy in a ten gallon white hat & bolo tie who drove an old Cadillac convertible with hand tooled leather seats and real steer horns on the hood.  It might have been the famous boot designer Nudie, but I'm not sure.

Once I started my career in advertising, lunch was the silver standard for wining and dining the media department:  me, my media director and the other buyer.  While a national media buyer for Fotomat Corp., I purchased spot radio, spot tv and newspaper in eighty markets across the U.S.  We spent many days and evenings meeting with radio management from all over the country.  These guys (90% of them were men) were usually on a long road trip and they always wanted to eat in the best places.  I grew very spoiled.

After I went into broadcast sales, lunch continued to be the event of the day.  Clients expected to be taken to lunch at lovely restaurants.  For many years, the stations had due bills or trade or barter with many fine restaurants so their sales people could entertain in style.  And we were stylin' for a long long time.

The new millenia, corporate mergers, takeovers and acquisitions have replaced the independent owners of the broadcast industry.  Cutbacks and changes to the tax code have removed the perks for all but the upper management types.  Lunch nowadays is just lunch and I find myself coming full circle, bringing my lunch most days in a brown paper bag; having the occasional special meal with my husband and, once or twice a month, entertaining a client.

Ah but it was fun while it lasted.

Theme Thursday Breakfast

photo from TakeOutFox.com

Of all things I remember about my dad, it's his love of breakfast.  Breakfast was my father's favorite meal.  He made it every single day until he died at the ripe old age of 98.  Bacon and eggs, oatmeal with raisins and toast, sausages, egg & toast, biscuits with sorghum molasses and, best of all, pancakes.  Pancakes were our weekend treat.  We always had them either Saturday or Sunday morning.  He made them himself, often adding whatever fruit was on hand:  banana, apple, blueberry.  When I was little he made buckwheat pancakes a few times, claiming they were good for us.  We figured out real quick I was allergic to buckwheat.  I kept breaking out in hives.

Dad and Mother  loved sweet, ripe strawberries and peaches.  They cooked & produced fresh strawberry jam each Spring and fresh peach jam in early Summer.  We enjoyed fresh fruity jam all year long.  It was a loving contribution to the family feed.  I can still taste them.  Mother could never decide which on she liked best.  I think it was whichever was in season at the time.  

I have two favorite breakfasts when eating in a restaurant.  I love Eggs Benedict with a perfectly poached egg,  Canadian bacon on a crisp English muffin & a light, lemony Hollandaise.  I also love Chicken Fried Steak, particularly in the South where they always make it goooood.  Both are excruciatingly fattening. 

photo from thebrandingirongrill.com

After having children, I made a point of making breakfast each day. First of all, they needed a healthy, hearty diet.  Second, I wanted to carry on that tradition, to have them remember those lovely, made-from-scratch breakfasts of eggs, bacon, sausage, pancakes, hot cereal, toast, jam, fresh butter.  I am all about butter too.  

But that's another story...

The Fruit of Fall

Fall approaches.  In the northeast, the leaves are just beginning to turn.  Pears are ripening and ready to eat.  Apples are coming to stores and stands in great bushel baskets.  Pies, tarts, jams, jellies, salsas and relishes are ready for preparation.  

 Yellow Pear by Carson Pritchard

Garden tomatoes will soon be on their way out, no thanks to a short summer with too much rain and too little sun.  We will cherish those we have and think of them each time we eat a store bought or canned tomato this Winter. 

  
Red Tomato by Carson Pritchard

Holiday Meal Planning

I prepared for Thanksgiving by planning everything in advance. I ordered my first farm raised turkey, about 20 lbs grain fed, and picked that up the day before. I baked my first set of real Parker House rolls. I was experimenting with a wonderful book called "Baking in America" with many original or traditional baking recipes. They took half a day to prepare but they were unbelievably good. In fact, I'm making a new batch right now for a dinner party we're attending tonight. I made the usual green bean casserole, sweet potato casserole w/ fresh orange juice, brown sugar & marshmallows (very Southern), garlic mashers and the best gravy I've ever attempted. Actually, I hate making gravy but I read three recipes on how to get it right and it was easy and it was lacking in grease. I used paper towels to blot out the grease from the pan...an old fashioned trick. It worked. I used the fresh giblets from the turkey which I'd boiled over 12 hours to make the broth for the stuffing and they were great. I normally don't make giblet gravy either. Anyway, I made pecan pie and a pumpkin chiffon pie in a gingersnap crust and it was light as a feather. Good thing I baked over a four day period. It was my best Thanksgiving dinner ever. I guess I got into it because my eldest son is home for 5 wks (broken foot--skateboarding--don't ask) and the youngest was home, the in-laws were here and it was all family.