I’ve never done a post like this one before, but I had some items I wanted to pass on, so here goes:
First, a push for you to consider coming to the Cherry Creek Chorale’s Christmas concert this weekend. I just went onto our website and as far as I can tell there are still tickets left. (Link is to the sales page.) I didn’t go all the way into the checkout process, but I think you should be able to come if you want to. However, I wouldn’t suggest that you just come on Friday or Saturday night and expect to buy your ticket at the door, as our Christmas concerts usually do sell out. They close down the online ticket sales on Thursday at noon, so be warned. I don’t want anyone to come and be turned away!
Eating real food involves a certain amount of effort, unfortunately. Your great-grandma wouldn’t recognize frozen pizza. Learning to make something that’s good for you and tastes good is a true life skill and a test of your ability to take care of yourself. You can’t just eat cold cereal for dinner or order takeout every night. You can’t go out to eat for every lunch. And you can’t skip breakfast! If you do these no-no’s you’ll spend way too much money, almost certainly weigh more than you should, but, more importantly, you’ll be eating lots of processed food, which means you’ll be eating lots of salt, non-healthy fats, and weird stuff. That’s the technical term: weird stuff.
This isn’t a cooking blog per se, especially for regular weekday meals. Most of the recipes you’ll find on this site as it is going to be re-branded and re-purposed will be for party food, and even
First, fuel. We know this. We know that, given enough time without food, we’ll die of starvation, and we also know that there are plenty of people in the world right now who risk experiencing exactly that.
But we live in a society of abundance, indeed over-abundance. While there are certainly people in the US who go hungry every day, the experience for most of us veers in entirely the opposite direction: Not only is food readily available to us at all times, we are also constantly urged to eat by means of advertising.
As I’ve said a number of times, this website is switching over to an emphasis on food and hospitality. But I plan to still include book and movie reviews in some way, and since we haven’t made the complete switch yet I’m just writing a regular post on a movie I think you should see. Jim and I had been very intrigued with a segment on the PBS NewsHour about the film, and after our rousing success at our voice recital we found a location and time that worked for us. Jim was a little doubtful about it as there’s been some backlash, especially from the brother of one of the main characters portrayed in it, but I was all gung-ho and he was willing to be a good sport. Honestly, we just sat laughing in pure delight throughout most of the two-hour running time. The interplay between two award-winning actors, Viggo Mortenson and Mahershala Ali, is brilliant. One of my big tests for a movie is, Would I want to see it again? The answer is YES. Maybe we’ll go see it with our son when he gets home for his college break.
As we head further into the holiday season I think it’s a good time to launch my series on respecting food roles. Indeed, sometime over the next few weeks you’ll see this entire site transform before your very eyes! The banner will change from its leafy tendrils to a food-related theme and the name will change from “Intentional Living” to “Respect Food Roles.” And what are those roles? Glad you asked. As I’ve thought about that question I’ve come up with only two legitimate ones:
How was your Thanksgiving? I have to say that this was one of the nicest I can remember in an unbroken string of enjoyable holidays. We had our 15 people who ate, played games, talked, watched college football, and hung around for a long time. That’s always my yardstick for measuring how successful a party is.
But since I’ve been writing about the food, I’m going to tell you how that part went. Also, if you don’t particularly care about my results, at least scroll down and read about the two things you shouldn’t do when cooking a turkey. As I said in an earlier post, this is a bit late for Thanksgiving but you may end up having a turkey for Christmas too. (I’m hoping to be asked to do some cooking for that meal, too.)
Who am I kidding? (Actually, whom am I kidding?) If you’re the cook for tomorrow you’re not reading blog posts, and this won’t arrive in your inbox until 6:00 this evening, at which point it will be far too late for you to go to the grocery store and buy a butternut squash. I actually should have posted this additional material on Monday, or even Sunday afternoon, as a friend told me at church that morning that she hadn’t been able to access the New York Times articles/recipes by Melissa Clark. But there it is. Maybe you’ll decide to make her pie for Christmas dinner. And you can still roast your turkey the way Melissa says to do it even if you decide not to do the dry marinade. I think you should be able to access the video at least:
Here it is, Saturday morning, and the Big Meal is, well, four days if you don’t count today or Thursday itself, or six days if you do . . . I never know how to do the inclusion/exclusion bit. Anyway, if you’re in charge of dinner you know when it is! So I thought I’d share my own timetable for the meal in case it helps you get
Everyone reading this probably has TG dinner all planned out, but just in case you don’t, here’s what I’m planning to do right now. We’re up to 15 for the count, with possibly more to come. I’m so thrilled! Back in our old house I always wanted to have 20, but the most we ever had was 13. Which was WONDERFUL, of course. But to me this holiday should be completely and utterly over the top. It’s my favorite holiday of the year. So here goes: