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
cooking
Thanksgiving Menu for 2018
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:
Bake Sale Bashing
Hello everyone! Watch for the name and design of these blogposts to change sometime over the next few weeks. You’ll start seeing “Respect Food Roles” as the title of the blog and the header will change to something food-related. I’m excited about the new content that I’ll be publishing. So don’t be freaked out if things look different soon. I’ll tell you exactly when the change will take place so you’ll know what to look for.
What I Had for Lunch Yesterday
I said in a recent post that I was planning to scale back on my regular what’s-going-on-with-my-life posts and invest my time in projects that I hope will actually make a difference to my readers. One such is a set of videos on various topics concerning healthy eating. I also said that I might start some once-in-awhile posts about “what I ate today.” This is the first of those. They won’t be on any kind of regular schedule; they’ll just show up when I think a specific meal is particularly good and easy to make. (I remembered as I was writing this that I did include a picture and recipe for a lunchtime salad several years ago in connection with a memoir by the chef Nora Pouillon. Scroll down to the bottom of that post for that material.)
You Crave What You Eat.
Interesting quotation from Anne Lamott in today’s Washington Post, “A Few Quick Thoughts on that Diet You Are About to Fail.” (I’ve read her non-fiction books but could never get into the one novel of hers that I tried. She can be pretty strong stuff, both in subject matter and language, but I have really enjoyed Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life, 
Mindful vs. Mindless Eating
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life
I’ve just started listening to a great audiobook by Stephen C. Meyer, but I won’t be ready to post about it this week. So I was reminded of a great book I read some time ago, well before I started this blog. It won’t inspire you to move out in the country and start raising vegetables and turkeys any more than it did me, but it’s well worth reading for a number of reasons:
1. It’s a charming family story, with a husband, wife, and two daughters working together to fulfill a goal, that of relocating and then limiting themselves for one year to food grown within a predetermined distance from their home. The younger daughter is a special joy: we learn all about the ins and outs of her egg business, for example.
Two Great Cookbooks from My Two Great Guys.
Image from Amazon.com |
Image from Amazon.com |
We had a great Christmas at our house. How about you? I wanted to make my book(s) of the week the two cookbooks I received as gifts, one from my husband Jim and the other from my son Gideon. I love both, but they’re very different from each other. I thought it would be fun to do a comparison review for my weekly book post.
Life Lessons from a Chef
Are you a fan of the PBS TV show “A Chef’s Life“? Lots of people are. The star of the series is Vivian Howard, a young woman who is immensely talented in the kitchen but who is also immensely talented in front of the camera. (That’s not actually a picture of her. I’m very wary of posting pictures of celebrities without permission.) I’m sure that part of her popularity comes from her willingness to be filmed in the midst of various crises, where she often does not maintain her cool. She also often says something that I say: “What was I thinking?” She’ll come up with a menu for some big event and then realize that she has put herself and her long-suffering staff on the spot, trying to make and plate some menu item that is completely impractical given the situation. It all seems completely genuine and unstaged, and I believe that it is. I am typically very sympathetic to the fixes she lands herself in, and she doesn’t have the option that I have of deciding at some point to cut an item or two. If it’s on the menu or the program, she has to do it, no matter what.
An Easier Version of Julia Child’s Beef Burgundy
I hope to add a better picture the next time I make this. It’s a great family dinner, but it also works very well for company, especially if you want to have a make-ahead meal. I made this for an after-church Sunday lunch and it was great.