Rosemary Potato Soup w/ Crispy Carrots

My husband was home sick today so I decided to boost his spirits by making him homemade soup for dinner. I swayed from Martha today and used a recipe from Better Homes and Gardens December 2011 issue.

1 tbsp butter

1 yellow onion, chopped

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

4 medium russet potatoes, peeled and cut in 2-inch chunks

4 c water

1 spring of fresh rosemary chopped (my variation)

1/3 cup veg oil

4 baby carrots (my variation)

Thanksgiving left over turkey (my variation)

Saute onions in butter until translucent. Add chopped potatoes, salt, and pepper along with 2 c water. Bring to boil and simmer for 20 min covered.

While potatoes are simmering, fry baby carrots ribbons for 2 minutes. Remove from oil and coat with sea salt while on a paper towel.

Mash potatoes, add remaining 2 c of water and bring to a boil then simmer uncovered for 10 minutes.

Serve with cracked pepper and fried carrots on top of the soup. I backed some garlic butter cressant rolls for dipping.

My husband had 2 servings without me pushing him so you know it was good. I only have a little left for lunch tomorrow :-)

Leftover Turkey Soup - Mom's Genius

Mom decided we needed to make some turkey soup with the Thanksgiving leftovers. The secret ingredient is curry.

We also made mushroom cream sauce pizza.

Leftover Ham Biscuits

For Saturday easy breakfast for the family, I had my husband pop in some Grands biscuits. Then I cut up leftover spiral ham and mixed it with cheese and scrambled eggs for some delicious ham biscuits. Strawberry jam was an excellent addition to my biscuit.

Finale

Food was good, but not cooking again for at least a month! Thankful for my family and all of the food we had today!

Home Stretch - Turkey 40 min

The turkey is looking beautiful and golden brown. 40 minutes left then adding the sides to heat up while the turkey sets and I make white wine gravy.

Thanksgiving AM

Yesterday on my day off I got to see Rachel Ray for the first time. She made homemade mushroom soup for a green bean casserole. She made it look so easy. I forgot to purchase a can of Campbell's soup for my traditional mixed veggie casserole. I didn't have mushrooms so I used onions instead.

Heat olive oil, onions about 5 minutes. Add dry white wine and have most of the liquid evaporate. Then add a little chicken broth, flour, and heavy cream. This is the cream substitute in my veggie casserole.

As for the turkey, I heated olive oil, 7 stings of lemon zest, minced rosemary (from the backyard), and garlic. This is what I'm using to baste the turkey. It is smelling pretty good.

As for the stuffing, I mixed everything together with my homemade bread from yesterday that I left out overnight to let it get hard.

I put the ingredients in the bread machine for the dinner role dough. Can't wait to smell fresh baking bread throughout the house.

Breakfast Casserole

Thanksgiving AM was accompanied with breakfast casserole. It is basically a plate of breakfast food in 1 bite.

Layer cressant roles, sausage, hash browns, and cheese. Top with scrambled eggs and bake. It is pretty easy.

Thanksgiving Prep - Wednesday

As part of my post-college graduation tradition, I host Thanksgiving at my house in Raleigh. I love putting all of the stress on me and making an amazing meal for my loved ones. The first few meals weren't always the best, but they are getting better with experience. I normally take Wednesday off work so I can slowly prep everything.

At 8 AM I poured all of the ingredients into a borrowed (thank you Mom) bread machine for homemade stuffing! No kitchen bought stuffing this year. I'm following Martha's mushroom and walnut stuffing recipe.

Next, I cut up the sweet potatoes and followed Martha's sweet potato casserole, but added a requirement of pecans and brown sugar.

Finally, I followed the canned pumpkin - pumpkin pie recipe and made 2 pies this am. My mom is going to bake the pecan pies (1 traditional and 1 chocolate) tonight because I have never been able to create one that was as good as hers!

Nothing else to do until Thanksgiving day.

Cranberry-Orange Pancakes with Cranberry-Maple Syrup

My husband's father is visiting our house this weekend. When anyone comes to visit, you are never hungry. I found an excellent recipe in the cranberry section of the November 2011 Coastal Living magazine - Cranberry-Orange Pancakes with Cranberry-Maple Syrup. Since my husband is the breakfast man, I asked him to try it out and see if the recipe was worth keeping.

This was excellent with fresh cranberries. I believe we will be saving this recipe and making again next weekend when my family comes for Thanksgiving.

10 Minute Lunch

Portobello mushrooms sauteed in butter are an excellent substitute for ground beef in regular spaghetti. This strawberry salad mix is an easy 10 minute lunch on a vacation day.