Thanksgiving Feastby Angie
23 Nov 2007
10:11 pm1
What a Thanksgiving Feast we had today! We wanted to eat at about 1pm, so we all started pitching in this morning. Kelly already had the turkey brined, Kathy woke up early to start deviled eggs, and while I started toasting bread for stuffing, my sweet husband made me scrambled eggs for breakfast. He also looked up napkin-folding online and directed the folding of the cloth napkins to help make the table look lovely. We all spent the next few hours cooking, cleaning, chasing children, and asking Kelly for directions about her kitchen. We had additional guests over for dinner: Joseph & Kelly’s Bishop and his wife joined us and stayed into the evening for pie and treats.
After dinner, we shared things we were grateful for and all helped in cleaning up. Kathy, Jim, Jon, and I made a run to the store to pick up more firewood and some marshmallows, which we brought home and put to immediate use. We talked, played games, ate some more, and cleaned some more, until we were all plum tuckered out… which brings me to now. It’s only 10pm, but it’s been a long day, so I think I’ll say goodnight. Here’s hoping everyone had a wonderful, delicious Thanksgiving!
Try-Me-Night Review: Crock-pot Meat Loafby Angie
19 Nov 2007
9:11 am0
This recipe was pretty good, but I had some problems with it. I didn’t follow it exactly (which was, I’m sure, the source problems): I had some zucchini and carrots that I wanted to use up, so I grated them and added them with the onion. I should have realized that additional veggies would add liquid, and adjusted the rest of the recipe accordingly, but I didn’t. So, the meat mixture didn’t stay in a “loaf” very well – it kind of just melted all over the top of the potatoes. Because it spread out so much, quite a bit of the mixture touched the sides of the crock-pot and was burned. I just scooped those bits out, though, when it was done cooking.
Actually, the flavor was still quite good, and we really liked the way the potatoes were cooked. It ended up more like a beef & potato casserole than meat loaf, but it was tasty anyway. I will definitely try it again, because it was super easy, but I’ll follow directions better next time 🙂
For the full recipe, visit the “Try-Me-Night Recipes” page.
Congratulations to Me…and Whitney!by Angie
16 Nov 2007
9:11 pm2
Tonight we attended the Springtown Ward Thanksgiving Pie Bake-Off. There were lots of people there and about a dozen pies were submitted for thorough scrutiny. I had spent the afternoon preparing Whitney’s Famous Apple Pie. Although I think it will take me a few more tries to approach Whitney’s prowess on this recipe, my pie actually took second place!
It was a very fun evening. We also did a white elephant gift exchange: the first gift we unwrapped was an aerosol can of Pledge, and we actually had it stolen away from us; we ended up with a babysitter’s reminder white board thingy. Not very useful to us, I’m afraid; but we couldn’t convince anyone else to steal it from us.
The most surprising gift was actually the most unique white elephant gift I have ever seen in my life: A live salamander, with a cage and sand and water and everything, that had been captured/rescued from someone’s backyard pool this very morning. The poor sister who unwrapped it was obviously very uncomfortable with an amphibian and was very unwilling to take it home. Luckily it was stolen from her by a mom who knew her kids would love it.