Do you see the froggy relaxing?
Most everyone was in attendance, poor Babs wasn’t able to come down to enjoy. Let’s give a large raspberry to Allstate for being such pigs. The day’s weather started a little gloomy, but cleared up soon enough for everyone to enjoy. Meathenge Labs goes traditional for Thanksgiving (Gravy Day). I figure we have all year to play with food, don’t mess with my roasted turkey and gravy, don’t mess. Today’s post is just a little sharing of what went on in and around the stove and table. Wanna see?

There are several reasons for going traditional with holiday meals. One of which, I love them best. Second, it is something I’ve done a million times and absolutely do not screw up. My dear sister even exclaimed how good the gravy was, see? Stick to what you know and do it well. The above picture is mama’s pumpkin pie in our cool little convection oven given to us by Big D. I can’t stress enough how helpful it is to have a second oven handy. When you’re doing holiday meals you’ve got many things cooking at once as well as things that need to be kept warm for an hour or so. They’re easily found on ebay or 80 bux or so, get one.

I’d placed my order for a natural turkey weeks ago, but when Fatted Calf’s menu for the holidays showed up, I just had to have a whole duck with cornbread stuffing. Mama informed me in no short order that I could not have both ovens for the day. Not only did she plan to do 2 pumpkin pies, but about 4 loaves of sourdough bread were up on the menu. I needed another oven, but what to do? Smoke the s.o.b. In the image above you’ll find the children’s maple play blocks burning nicely and getting the smoker ready. Since old wood like is more fuel than smoky flavor, I used Dr. Jones’ apple chips he gifted me a few weeks ago.

Here is the duck an hour in or so, looks really well and I spun it around a few times to get the cooking even.

As people arrived with their dishes to share, the stove got quite crowded. Grampa’s fancy cauliflower was set on top of the convection oven for warmth. The rest were stacked here on the old Wedgewood. Not only are these old ranges good for cooking & roasting, but with this one’s 3 pilot lights, they’re good for keeping food warm as well. The oven stays a constant 110 degrees day and night!

The first meat out was the duck, take a look at that baby. It didn’t take long, 3 hours or so. I didn’t measure exactly, I pull meat when it’s done, not when the time is up. It was juicy and smoky and rich and yummy. Even people who said they didn’t like duck, ate it and enjoyed it. Just goes to show you what properly cooked and prepared meat can do. This should be done on a monthly basis, it’s so easy and so good.

As I was preparing the meat, warming the food and testing the turkey, Auntie Cindy was making her sweet potatoes and marshmallows. We’ve got a pretty picky line of eaters and they all say hers is the way to go. I don’t know cause I don’t know nothin’ ’bout no sweet taters. I stick to the gravy. I’m sure it’s better than good.

And here is the grand beast of all time. An 18 pound natural turkey roasted slow and happy. I stuffed 4 pieces of smoky bacon under the skin, over the breast along with fresh sprigs of thyme from the garden. It was rubbed liberally with fresh extra virgin and allowed to sit out until the chill left. It sat in the oven for about 4 hours or so, just until it hit 160 in the dark areas. At this point I had about 13 people at the table along with all the sides. The foils were being removed so everyone could dive in, I served a platter of turkey quick to get them started. The duck was carved up next and the other half of the turkey followed.
We have a small home, really small. The table when extended takes up the entire dining nook and living room, just enough room to scoot around the edges. Didn’t seem to matter, the food was plentiful and amazing. Fatted Calf’s cornbread stuffing, sister Becky’s sausage stuffing and mashed taters made it all worth while. I did spend too much time in the kitchen, but it paid off big time. The table filled with hot food on time, the meat was absolutely done perfectly and the gravy was divine.
And there we have it, a traditional meal that was done so that everyone left full and on time.
Hugs