Giving Thanks;

I had a wonderful Thanksgiving this year! Family, cooking, baking and a nice healthy dose of vitamin D made for a great time. The greatest part was getting to cook with my mom for two days straight. Cooking has become the main form of expressing creativity in my life, and sharing that with my mom was such a great feeling. My mom has always been an excellent baker. Growing up she could whip up a batch of cookies like they were nothing and on holidays she would make pies. It was so much fun to be together in the kitchen, her baking away and me knee deep in cooking. She made two amazing black & blue berry pies, one with lattice work across it, and another with hearts carved into the top crust.
Funny story: I woke up the morning before thanksgiving and told eric that i would do anything to eat one of the arkansas black apples I had left in our fridge back home. And much to my surprise when we went to the Ventura Farmers Market that afternoon there was a vendor selling my favorite type of apples! So, luckily I got to make a cranberry apple crumble, rye bread stuffing and of course our cider glazed turkey all with the arkansas black apple!!
I hadn't made a turkey before and my mom was more than a little apprehensive about us being in charge of the central dish of her favorite holiday. But I think we made an excellent turkey. We used my great grandmother's turkey oven, stuffed the bird with thyme, onion and apples & let her roast for 4 hours. In my opinion, the quality of the turkey comes out not only in the meat but also in the gravy made from the roasting juices. Oh! The gravy was divine. When testing it out I had eaten three tablespoons of it just to check, double check and triple check that it was as good as it tasted the first time.
A Big Big thank you to everyone in my family who came over and ate with us. I had such a good time cooking for you all and my only regret is that we didn't do thanksgiving up here at my house so I could hoard the leftovers!
PS. Check out my mom's amazing 1950's kitchen. I was coveting those cabinets every second...