Sunday, November 29, 2009

Thanksgiving 2009.. Flop?!?! :)

Hey bloggers! I've been enjoying everyone's Thanksgiving posts, and figured I better get my picture's edited and blogged about tonight. I must say some blogger's entire Thanksgiving spread looked beautiful, especially the "turkey." Thanksgiving this year was just my mom and I. We had plans to see a movie, go shopping at the Forum Shops, or go to our friends house for wine and dessert. I really wanted to go out and do something, but once I came home I didn't want to leave. It was definitely a lazy day for me. Constantly working the days leading up to Thanksgiving and knowing I had to work on black Friday, I just needed the lazy time.

It is tradition that my mom and I will go to a spin class Thanksgiving morning and then afterward to Starbucks. I always feel a good workout before a big event/meal is needed because then I don't feel guilty! Definitely was a much needed workout and we had fun looking at all the black Friday deals while having our Starbucks. If you notice in my title I said flop because well this year our turkey was not very good. We thought it looked sick when cleaning it. I did my usually stuffing aromatics into the cavity and stuffing fresh poultry herbs into the breasts and cavity. Rub down in olive oil, and season with salt and pepper. Well I saw somewhere to cover the breasts with tin foil and then the last hour of cooking to take the foil off and let the top brown. They said this keeps the breast moist and from drying out. Made sense right? FLOP! Turkey breast was DRY and my bird still wasn't finish cooking after almost hitting the 5 hour mark and was only a 12 pound turkey. We picked through the breast with the parts cooked but basically felt "weird" eating it and just chucked the bird out. Major flop :( But I'm still here to show you the other wonderful things we had and already have a fresh turkey to cook up tomorrow since my dad will be home. He can take control and hopefully turkey #2 will come out delicious! I love my turkey and cranberry sauce.

Before going into the oven, apples, pecans and butterscotch chips definitely NO mistake here. ;)
 
I'm going to start backwards. Tuesday I made our dessert, Butterscotch Apple Cake from the lovely Noble Pig. I've had this recipe bookmarked for several months and that when I knew this was a Thanksgiving dessert. I decided to cut the recipe in half since my family is small, 3 people. Worked perfectly. I used a pink lady apple and granny smith apple. The combo worked perfectly with the cake, and my mom loved it so much she wants me to make this for her bunko coming up on December 14th! Good because I already want another piece! At least dessert made up for the bad turkey!


The cake smell the whole house up and was 
very hard to not have a piece till Thanksgiving.
 
I loved the apple contrast from light pink and grassy green. 
Definitely made for a very festive cake!
 
Don't get me wrong I like a good glass of Pinot Noir, but give me a good glass of champagne and I can't stomach it! Just something about the taste that I don't care for. I think it is over-rated! Well my mom's good friend mentioned this great Prosecco she picks up from Trader Joe's for only $6.95 a bottle and said she goes through a bottle a night. Yeah she likes to drink a little ;) I knew about Prosecco because they use that in a Peach Bellini and I know those are delicious. We picked up a bottle along with some pomegranate juice to give a splash of color to our drink. Umm can I say I found my new favorite holiday cocktail? Prosecco with a splash of pomegranate juice was delicious! It was a very smooth sparkling wine, and the juice took away from the slight dryness from the Prosecco. Yeah I usually don't drink 2 glasses but that day I had 2 glasses!

Glass #1 of course. This was very refreshing!
 
If you see this brand pick it up because I think you'll like it! 
I'm not a champagne girl, I'm a Prosecco girl!

With my first drink I also had a mini appetizer. I was going to actually eat this with my meal but figured it be way too much all at the same time. I was already a bit snacky so I sat down with a bowl of my tomato cucumber salad and a pumpkin cornmeal muffin!

But my snack didn't stop there. My dad was heading into work soon and I promised he could have his dessert then. I figured it was time for my dessert too and then my mom said, "Well if everyone having dessert, I want mine too!" Okay let's have dessert!
I heated the cake for a few seconds in the microwave, 
so it be warm as if it was fresh out of the oven!
 

 Noble Pig used whipped cream, I thought vanilla ice cream would be even better!
 
It is Thanksgiving and I want the real stuff! This was DELICIOUS vanilla ice cream. 
It was light and rich. Easily scoop-able straight from the freezer.

Which brings me to the "main event." The turkey that was a flop! I'm so glad everything else turned out delicious or else we would of been scrambling up some eggs for dinner.


I love the fall colors. I added a gala apple, sweet onion, carrots, lemon, and celery. 
This was stuffed into the turkey cavity. Perhaps it was over stuffed?
 
After all our snacking, we realized it was almost 5 hours and the turkey was still cooking! We couldn't wait no longer. I guess a few drinks down, anything looked good at this point to eat. haha.

Looking at this turkey now, it is still PINK! We need a meat thermometer. 
I'm glad no one got sick off the turkey.
 
The turkey breast were so dry.. we almost used up this whole bottle to hide the 
dryness. Verdict? I missed the jelly cranberry sauce, it has a more 
pungent flavor and I don't need to use as much.
 
We were so hungry, that I forgot to take a picture of my plate before digging in! 

Basically licked clean! So something must of been good ;)
 
This was one of our sides, roasted brussel sprouts and carrots. 

We also had baked sweet potatoes with butter and cinnamon! I totally forgot to take a picture of this, but I think you get the idea! ;) It was nice spending the time with my mom! We finished watching up all the Biggest Loser shows from that week and just relaxed. I was so tired but I ended up staying up to watch the Beyonce concert on TV. That girl can sing! I was literally out by 10pm and up early to get ready for the Black Friday shoppers! I've been working in retail for 6 years now and I KNOW what to expect. It was a very successful day and this holiday season will be very busy. I'm just happy to see people out shopping and spending money! I hope this makes for a better year economy wise in 2010!

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday because tomorrow is Monday. That means we all go back to work! Be well,
Fallon

6 comments:

Katrina said...

Great recap of your holiday. We don't think parts of our turkey was cooked all the way either, but the breast was actually perfect.

And that dessert---looks awesome! My camera is broke and I was so annoyed that I didn't really try to take pictures of anything with our little rinky dink camera. I've tried taking some and the pictures are not good. Oh well.

Ashley said...

Ummm, that dessert looks amazing. I am hungry and that is not helping!! ;) Sorry your turkey was a bust...that's never any fun! Sounds like you made the most of it though. I really like your spin class + coffee tradition with your mom...totally adorable and I agree about working out before a huge meal!

I LOVE roasted brussel sprouts!! mmmm

Can't wait to hear that your b/f has made it back safe + sound!!

Shannon - www.thedailybalance.com said...

oh my goodness that dessert looks AMAZING thanks for sharing!!

I'm new to your blog, but wanted to say hi ;)

http://www.thedailybalance.com

Joan said...

Hi Fallon,
I like your blog. And thanks for the apple dessert recipe. It sounds great!

Fallon said...

Thanks Joan! I'm glad to have another new reader browsing my blog. :)

You should try that apple dessert, I already have to make it again for my mom next week! Good thing it is really easy to make.

Robin said...

Whoa that cake looks so good! Yup I am with you, vanilla ice cream rocks. Too bad about the turkey. I served a ham and turkey this year just in case the turkey was gross.