Thanksgiving 2012: Leftovers

On the last day of Thanksgiving, there were leftovers.

All weekend, Hubby had been polishing off most of the leftovers in their purest form: he just makes himself another plate of his favorites and microwaves them.

Me, I like to repurpose. The first couple of days were sandwiches and soup, but on Sunday I decided to extend the life of what we had left a little bit longer.

First up was a variation on this Thanksgiving Salad. I heated up the last of the Brussels sprouts and green beans, some sweet potatoes and a chopped up slice of turkey in a skillet...




then cooked some quick couscous, and mixed it all together.



That should be lunch for the next couple of days.


Next was a variation of one of my favorite sandwich spreads, Turkey Salad with Cranberries.



I chopped up the last of the turkey (all those little pieces on the platter came in handy!), the last of the celery, and some dried cranberries. Seasoned it with Mural of Flavor and added fatfree mayo.



Yum.




YUM. On toast with carrot chips. Yesssssss...

I have another idea to meld two recipe ideas into Sweet Potato-Spinach Ravioli. First was from this recipe, then I saw that My Bizzy Kitchen made a great one with spinach that I knew I wanted to incorporate.

Unfortunately, work is taking over my life and I am getting a little tired of leftovers. We shall see if I end making that or if the sweet potatoes make it into a pot of soup or just the trash.  I'll let you know by Friday! ;-D

Thanksgiving 2012: The Calorie Count

A couple of days before Thanksgiving, this fascinating article made the rounds on several of my news and food sites. The question asked was: how many calories will you eat on Thanksgiving Day?

The answer: 2,486 calories, excluding any alcohol or breakfast. They estimated including those could bloat it up to over 4500 calories.

This was their breakdown:
A six-ounce serving of turkey with the crispy skin on, including 4 ounces of dark meat and 2 ounces of white for a total of 299 calories.
• Sausage stuffing at 310 calories — go big or go home, right?
• Dinner roll with butter for 310 calories
• Two kinds of potatoes are always in order during the holidays: Big serving of mashed sweet-potato casserole made with butter, brown sugar and topped with marshmallows for 300 calories per serving, and a half-cup of mashed potatoes for  140 calories of starchy goodness.
• Green bean casserole at 110 calories for 2/3 cup, cranberry sauce at 15 calories and roasted brussels sprouts (veggies!) for 83 calories.
• Then there’s pie that has to get shoved in there — pumpkin pie at 316 calories per slice, pecan pie for 503 calories and lots of whipped cream on all of that at 100 calories.

+++++

I decided to do my own tracking on the LoseIt! app. I already showed you guys the calorie counts for all the recipes I did, so adding them together was a snap.

My total for the whole day was somewhat less, and it DID include alcohol, breakfast, and the Thanksgiving Sandwich for dinner.

Breakfast was two mini cinnamon rolls and a small plate of fruit: 243 calories.

Pre-lunch was cheese-stuffed dates wrapped in bacon and a cranberry pomegranate cocktail: 403 calories.

Lunch was turkey breast with no skin (178), cranberry sauce (37), mashed potato casserole (195), cornbread stuffing (188), Brussels sprouts (59), green beans (57), and a second cranberry cocktail (216): 930 calories.

Dessert was pumpkin cheesecake and a pumpkin-oatmeal cookie: 362 calories.

Dinner was my absolute favorite part about Thanksgiving, The Sandwich. 2 slices wheat toast, turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce and a slice of bacon: 343 calories.

That comes to 2,281 for the whole day. My dinner alone was 930 compared to 1567 in the Times article. Guess burning the rolls helped me more than I thought! ;-D




How did you do? Does the thought of counting up the calories for Thanksgiving horrify you?

P.S. The costume for the flamingo was a gift from my mother-in-law; she got us outfits for them for all the major holidays. It's been a running joke that we make fun of the geese on her stoop that she decorates for the holidays, so this was her "revenge". Ha! She found them in a catalog somewhere. I am afraid to ask where. :)

Thanksgiving 2012: Recipes, Part 2

When last we left our Thanksgiving table, we had appetizers, a soup for leftovers, and cookies. Hrm, I think we need to add a bit more to our feast!

First up was, of course, an Herb Roasted Turkey. I went with a bone-in turkey breast, which is super-easy and stays moist.



I used fresh herbs - sage and rosemary -- to mix with the dried thyme, dried toasted onion, dried garlic, salt and pepper, and olive oil to make an herb paste.



I tucked that all underneath the skin, as well as on top. Carrot, onion and celery acted as my aromatics, and some chicken broth on the bottom of the pan kept it all from drying out.



8 pound turkey, 20 minutes a pound = 2.5 hours to cook at 325 degrees. We took it out and tented it for 30 minutes while the veggies went into the oven to roast.



Hubby carved it up nicely -- that is only one breast! He did the other one after the turkey had cooled and we were cleaning everything up.



I had made my friend Sharyn's Mashed Potato Casserole the day before.



It's pretty easy. First you peel and boil the potatoes for 20-25 minutes. I only did a partial peel because I like that in my casserole.



While they boil, dice an onion and garlic and saute it in a small pan.

When the potatoes are done, drain them and return to the pan. Add in the onions, butter, 2 heaping tablespoons of horseradish, cup of sour cream, salt and pepper and mash it up. (I use a hand masher, but I like them still a little chunky.)




Stir in 1/2 cup of cheese until fully mixed. Pour the whole thing into a casserole dish, and add paprika or Northwoods seasoning (optional). You can either bake it at 350 for 20-30 minutes now, or refrigerate and bake off the next day.

I won't lie, the mashed potato casserole is a calorie monster. That's why I only make it once a year. (1 serving = 1 cup.)




The other big starch was of course, my favorite Cornbread Stuffing with Turkey Sausage. I got the recipe from Eating Well several years ago, but it is definitely a keeper! I had to bring a container of it to Shopping Friend on Friday! ;-D

Forgot to take a picture of the ingredients together, whoops! But the recipe is:



Ingredients
1 pound sweet Italian turkey sausage, (about 4 links), casings removed
2 cups finely chopped onion
1 1/2 cups finely chopped celery
2 pounds (approx 12 cups) prepared cornbread, cut into 3/4-inch cubes (You can make it yourself, like I tried and burned, or you can buy it, as I ended up doing)
1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
1 tablespoon chopped fresh sage
1 1/2-3 cups reduced-sodium chicken broth

Instructions

Preheat oven to 325°F. Coat a 9-by-13-inch baking pan with cooking spray.
Cook sausage in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat, stirring and breaking up with a wooden spoon, until browned, about 10 minutes.
Add onion and celery; cover, reduce heat and cook, stirring occasionally, until tender, about 10 minutes.




Transfer the mixture to a large bowl. Season with salt and pepper.
Add cornbread, parsley and sage.
Bring broth to a simmer in a small saucepan. Pour 1 cup over the stuffing mixture and toss gently (the cornbread will break into smaller pieces). Add as much of the remaining broth as needed, 1/2 cup at a time, until the stuffing feels moist but not wet.
Spoon the stuffing into the prepared pan and cover with foil.
Bake the stuffing until thoroughly heated, about 25 minutes. Serve warm. (This also can be baked off the next day; I had room in the oven so both the stuffing and potatoes went into the oven during the last half-hour of the turkey's time.)







I think a serving size is a half-cup, but that doesn't seem right. Anyway, it's a high-calorie item so I try to eat it reasonably.

But that wasn't all! There was fresh cranberry-pomegranate sauce...





...roasted Brussels sprouts seasoned with balsamic and thyme...



...and roasted green beans seasoned with Mural of Flavor.



Mmmmmm, delicious.




But wait!!!

There's one more!!!

I ALSO made slow-cooker sweet potatoes, an idea I got from Kalyn's Kitchen.



Peel and cube sweet potatoes, toss in olive oil with salt, pepper, and any seasonings you want (I used Northwoods and a dash of chipotle). Dump into slow cooker and cook for 3 hours on high.



Unfortunately I did not read the recipe correctly and put them on low for 3 hours, and they were not quite done. I kept cooking them through dinner anyway, and by late afternoon they were done.



Too late to be added into the feast, but I have a couple of ideas for them anyway. I think I am going to try these sweet potato raviolis, and this Thanksgiving Salad with Sweet Potatoes and Brussels sprouts.  Lastly, now that my other soup is packed away in the freezer, if there are any sweet potatoes left after the ravioli and salad, they will become their own soup.

Speaking of leftover recipes, I would make this Shepherd's Turkey Pie but I am pretty sure Hubby will have polished off the potatoes and possibly the turkey before I have a chance. Maybe I can steal some turkey away from him to make one batch of turkey salad with cranberries! 

Anyway, it was a great meal(s), and we have been eating very well ever since.

What are you guys doing with your leftovers? Anything fun or different?

Thanksgiving 2012: Recipes, Part 1

Gobble, gobble! (That's the sound flamingos make too, right? Haha.)

I hope everyone had a fantastic Thanksgiving (if you celebrate it of course)! We had a really nice day; a couple of mishaps in the kitchen, but the only thing that ended up burnt were the crescent rolls, and they were not even missed. (But next year, I am just buying finished rolls instead of baking them. I think I burnt them last year too!)

This year's feast was carefully photographed and documented, all for my readers at Low Fat Dressing. :) But there are a LOT of dishes, so I will probably break this out into a couple of posts.

We started the morning off with some fruit salad. It came in handy in trying to keep the calorie count down!



First up was an appetizer, goat-cheese-stuffed dates wrapped in bacon.



I had a package of unpitted dates from Whole Foods and there was already bacon for The Sandwich, plus I was inspired by the last few weeks of dinners with Shopping Friend. I had to do it!

It could not have been easier. I sliced through the date and removed the pit, then used a teaspoon to stuff the cavity with some goat cheese. I cut the bacon slices in half and wrapped them around the dates. Baked it in my toaster-oven at 375 for 20 minutes, and voila!



Next time I might make a maple-balsamic glaze to coat them in as well, but they were amazing even without it. They do well with a quick microwave reheat too! Shopping Friend, you can make them too, with smaller dates and no goat cheese. :)

One of the other things I did this holiday was track my food on the LoseIt! app on my iPhone; turns out adding in recipes is almost easier than using the Bar Scan option to log your food. For recipes, you simply enter the amount of each ingredient you are using (or scan them) and how many servings it will make, then each time you eat it you can select from your recipe list.

According to LoseIt!, each stuffed date was 64 calories. I had 3. :)



We had the dates with a delicious cranberry-pomegranate cocktail. No pictures, but you all know what red liquid in a wine glass looks like. :)



I probably should have measured the liquids better but I would rather overestimate calories than underestimate them.

The second appetizer item I made was a vegetable soup. I didn't make it with the intention to serve it with dinner; instead it has been a filling, tasty addition to my leftover sandwiches every night.

The recipe originally came from Multiply Delicious; I changed the seasonings so much I decided to re-write it here (also because my FB friends have been asking for it.)



Butternut Squash-Carrot-Sweet Potato Soup

Ingredients
1 medium onion, diced
1-2 cups butternut squash cooked (I had a container of frozen, but 1/2 baked squash would work too)
3-4 large carrots, peeled and cut into 1" cubes
1 large sweet potato, peeled and cut into 1" cubes
minced garlic
cinnamon
nutmeg
salt and pepper
chicken broth




Instructions

Cut butternut squash, carrots, and sweet potato into 1-inch even sized cubes.
Heat a large pot or dutch oven over medium heat.  When hot add olive oil and once oil is hot add onions and garlic, and saute until tender.
Add in squash, carrots, sweet potatoes, garlic, salt and pepper, and chicken stock and bring to a simmer, cooking until squash is tender (about 20-30 minutes).
Carefully add mixture to a blender or food processor and puree, or use immersion blender.
Add content back to pot and stir in cinnamon, nutmeg, and more salt and pepper as needed.

When reheating, add in more chicken stock to thin the soup again.





I have eaten it 3 times already and the rest just got bagged and frozen for coming weeks. 91 calories a cup!

I'm going to skip ahead to dessert; we had a small pumpkin cheesecake from Whole Foods which was amazing...



...but I also made pumpkin-oatmeal cookies, from a recipe from my friend Amanda.



Pumpkin-Oatmeal Cookies

Wet ingredients:

1 stick of butter, softened
1/2 cup light brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup pumpkin puree (approx.)
1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Dry ingredients:

1 1/2 cups old fashioned rolled oats
1 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
heaping 1/2 tsp Chinese 5 spice powder (optional; I did an extra heaping teaspoon of fresh cinnamon instead)
1/4-1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Optional:
dried cranberries
chopped candied ginger



Instructions:

Preheat oven to 375.
Mix butter and sugars together, then add in the rest of the wet ingredients. Then add the dry ingredients until well mixed.

Bake 12-14 minutes, until they feel mostly firm in the center, with just a little give.
Makes approximately 30 cookies, 105 calories each according to LoseIt!




The nice thing about the soup and the cookies is that you can make them now if you have leftover pumpkin or any potatoes or veggies. Just because Thanksgiving is over doesn't mean these recipes have to be put away until next year!

Next post: potatoes, stuffing, veggies and turkey!!

Thanksgiving shopping

I love Thanksgiving grocery shopping. Almost as much as I love cooking Thanksgiving dinner!



It was a lovely November Saturday, kind of brisk but sunny out. In my closet review, I pulled out a grey knit Old Navy vest from a few years ago, added a lighter grey Loft long-sleeved tee, a cotton black-and-ivory scarf, my Gap long and leans, and my silver Privos. When it got warmer out, I removed the scarf, but it all still worked fine.



Onto the shopping!

My first stop was Target, where I picked up general staples and brand items.



My menu includes a cranberry-pomegranate cocktail, thus the Ocean Spray. The gravy is for my mother-in-law; Hubby and I use the fresh cranberry sauce on our turkey, but she likes gravy and I don't know how to make it, nor do I have time in the heat of the preparations to make some from the drippings. She'll be happy to have one "normal" thing on her plate anyway. ;-)



Next stop was Whole Foods for the good seasonings and organic vegetables and eggs. Didn't like any of the Brussels sprouts at any of the stores, so they're still on my list for Tuesday night.



Jewel was quick and easy; they always have the size turkey breast I like, at the right price. A few more brand staples that they didn't have at Target too.



Last stop was Tony's Finer Foods for all the basic veggies. They had good prices on fresh herbs too -- sage, rosemary and parsley -- so I grabbed those to use instead of the dried versions I have at home.

So after all that, here is the menu:

Appetizer
Cranberry-pomegranate cocktail (either sparkling wine or vodka depending on what Hubby picks up)
Bacon-wrapped dates stuffed with goat cheese (inspired by Shopping Friend!)

Main meal
butternut squash soup (which I may make and serve on Wednesday night instead)
herbed roast turkey breast
homemade cranberry sauce
roasted Brussels sprouts with balsamic vinegar and thyme
roasted green beans with shallots
crescent rolls with roasted garlic and onion jelly (or butter, for the non- adventurous)
cornbread stuffing with sweet Italian turkey sausage (half of which will go to Shopping Friend)
cheesy horseradish mashed potatoes (or just plain roasted, Hubby is still choosing his preference)
slow-cooker spicy sweet potatoes (for me)

Dessert
pumpkin pie for MIL, apple for Hubby; hopefully I can find smaller tart versions because no one needs a pie to themselves.
(I don't like pie, so I save any remaining need for food for The Sandwich later that night.)

There are a couple of extra dishes in there than previous years, so I am not sure if I will keep them all. It's a crazy amount of food for three people, even if we are going to eat it for several days, and even if most of it is healthy and can be turned into other meals. I would love to ditch the mashed potatoes altogether; I can throw the sweets, green beans and turkey into a soup easily, but mashed potatoes are harder to turn into something else. I doubt MIL and Hubby will want to give them up, though.

We shall see what happens. I am already a day behind on preparations; I had planned to make the cornbread and a batch of oatmeal-pumpkin cookies on Sunday, but we got side-tracked on a different project. MIL is staying with us, so Hubby decided he needed to bring an old couch up from the basement to the spare room that he uses as an office. That plan did not work at all (he hadn't thought through how he was going to maneuver it through the kitchen and up the stairs without smashing everything in both rooms and ruining our new paint job), but instead I convinced him to deep-clean the office to make room for a new futon. He cleaned out closets and cabinets that had filled up with unused crap, and I tackled the various piles of paper that had become hidden into any corner we could find. In the end, we tossed about 10 bags of junk, I have a tub of paper to get shredded, and a trunk full of miscellaneous office things for donation. Then we got our new futon and put that together.



The futon cover is tan, Hubby bought a throw to cover it so the cats don't trash it too badly. Because we all know who will be using it more than the humans!



That shelf way in the back is all that remains of anything I used to store in the office. Thank you electronic bills; you have knocked down the amount of paper I need to have down to four little boxes. 

Anyway, today wasn't quite what I had in mind to prepare for Thanksgiving, but I think my MIL will be much more comfortable now than on an aerobed.

But! Lest you think I am some kind of amazing Thanksgiving planner/shopper, going to 4 stores with one list and preparing food for a week. Somehow I managed to do this:



Uh, didn't I cross it off the list after I bought it at...whoops, guess not. One will go in the freezer tomorrow.

I was proud that I did all that shopping and only bought this for myself as a treat:



Heh, I love my stories. (General Hospital is on a roll these days. All my favorite veterans are returning, hurray!)

What did you do this weekend to get ready for Turkey Day? Are you hosting or guesting? :)