I am now officially out of funeral mode, except for the yarzheit candle that will burn in my living room for a whole week, the endless stream of phone calls, and the pile of prayer books and yarmulkes that the funeral home guys are supposed to pick up. Now I'm fully in Thanksgiving mode. I left out all the extra tables, chairs, tablecloths, ice bucket, etc. from the shiva; the giant box I filled with all the clutter of our kitchen and living room will remain out on the porch until Friday.
I picked up two beautiful turkeys at Whole Foods this morning. T1 is brining as I type this; it will air-dry in the fridge overnight and spend tomorrow afternoon in the oven. T2 will brine tomorrow and roast on Thursday morning. This afternoon I made all the stuffing and am about to make the preliminary gravy. I think I will do some of the roasted veggies tomorrow and the rest on Thursday. Haven't really decided what to do with the haricots verts yet. Other people are bringing squash, dinner rolls, pumpkin bread, and fresh fruit.
One of Lauren's friends was so thoughtful; she came to the shiva yesterday with a package containing her homemade cranberry relish! She said she wanted to bring something that would take a little pressure off of me for the week. So that's one thing I don't have to worry about! I also decided I'm not making any desserts, although I was dying to try a new cake from Dorie Greenspan. Instead, I'm going to serve the leftover pastry platters from the shiva, and a few people are bringing other desserts. I'm also not going to make any appetizers; we will make do with purchased cheese straws, olives, and the like. As much as I enjoy preparing all these things, it's just not possible this time around. I'm also not doing any experimenting at all with my tried-and-true Thanksgiving recipes; this is not the year for any more surprises.
OK, I read this yesterday, but for some reason when I woke up this morning, I suddenly wondered...what do you do with that first turkey after you roast it a day before Thanksgiving?? Do you carve it and then use it for extra on Thanksgiving day? I've never hosted enough people to need a second turkey!
Posted by: Elena | November 21, 2007 at 08:11 AM
Yes, we refrigerate it and then carve it Thursday morning, while T2 is roasting, then just gently rewarm the meat and splice it in with the carved meat from T2 -- it works out fine! Logistics aside, two smaller (17 lbs.) turkeys come out better than one enormous one.
Posted by: Karen | November 21, 2007 at 08:15 AM