Hello friends. I’m researching Morocco this week and next, but until then here’s some Thanksgiving information and stories to keep you nourished and ready to get through “the long dark” as they say in Seattle.
Failure is an Option
So there’s a thing between me and my son where we go back and forth about opening a bakery. He’ll say “we should really start a bakery” and I’m like “cool but that sounds like a lot of work”. I think that hasn’t completely processed for him because overall baking is for us always a fun project. We look for a recipe in one of our books, shop for ingredients, make, bake, enjoy. But last night there was a lesson.
I busted out the Tartine Baking book and found a Pumpkin Tea Cake recipe. It’s pretty straightforward, but for whatever reason (is jamming to music while measuring ingredient out too good an excuse?) some thing got mis-measured. We drooled while looking through the oven door glass and then excitedly waited for the cake to cool a little bit. But then!….. it was too salty. Oh the sadness.
There wasn’t much else around for dessert aside from random bars of various chocolate so I heated up apple pie bars from TJ’s and completely covered the plates with whipped cream while we watched War Games.
Then when I woke up around 5:30am for some unknown reason. I pondered whether I should make the cake myself to get a good result, or if the boy should learn to re-measure and get things right and get the satisfaction of eating a good cake. So got him up early around 6:30, and he redid it. After it went into the oven he went back to sleep for another half hour. It wound up a delicious success.
So Outsource or Not
How much do you value getting recognition as a home cook?
I know, for many people the heart of a home is the kitchen.
But let me tell you about the first Thanksgiving where I had a full-time job and two little kids. Kids were 1 and 4, and we had a wonderful au pair from Poland to help us out. I realized that I didn’t have family around a to help me with cooking, my husband also worked full time, and something needed to work out quickly to have. a Thanksgiving at home. So I ordered the prepared Thanksgiving dinner that the food co-op I worked for offered. It was a new menu, and I figured that since I liked everything from the prepared foods section of the co-op—how bad could it be?
Well, it turned out to be pretty bad. Something was wrong with the sauce on the vegetables. Everything was just kind of ..gross. It was embarrassing. I thought I’d prove to my new au pair that Thanksgiving is an amazingly delicious tradition. I thought the kids would love the food and well that meal was just a bust overall.
But you know what? I learned from that.
I think it’s important to not get obsessed about the idea of the perfect meal. The ability to find a friend that’s willing to invite you to Thanksgiving at their house where they cook almost everything is akin to the mantra to not buy a boat but find a friend with a boat.
Potluck It
The great thing about a potluck is the shared responsibility for success. Or failure.
Potluck rules:
Don’t be shy about telling everyone that they need to bring something.
If they can’t bring something to eat, then something to be shared is also acceptable (music? books? a quiz? sure.)
mix things up so there’s no ownership of the cranberry sauce or the pumpkin pie
**caveat to about: if the cranberry sauce or pumpkin pie made by particular people are so excellent that they are demanded for every subsequent year after their debut let things work out on their own
What Are Your Mistakes?
I know you’re probably going to not have everything go perfectly this year because you know something weird or off happened in the past. What was it?