'twas the day before Christmas and . . .

[kindkit]

Things to do this morning/early afternoon: do a load of laundry, cook and eat lunch, wrap a present for a friend, hopefully do one last edit of my Yuletide story, go to the grocery store for cheese and brussels sprouts.

Things to do from 4-9 pm: work. *sigh* At least it's a short shift.

Things to do after work: bake the bread that is currently on its slow rise, cut up the duck for tomorrow.

It's not really that much, I'm just tired thanks to Christmas retail.

Tomorrow's plan is much better: cook a nice meal (menu: sauteed duck breast with cherry pan sauce, tiny potatoes roasted in duck fat, brussels sprouts with chestnuts and cream, fruitcake, too much chocolate), watch the Doctor Who special, and of course Yuletide.

Since I always like talking about food, I'd love to know what your Christmas menu is if you'll be celebrating tomorrow.

Comments

[amalnahurriyeh]

Oooh, your dinner sounds great!

We're doing a beef roast with a mustard-white wine glaze for the omnis, this ridiculousness, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes with smoked gouda and optional chipotle-farmer's cheese, green beans with sweet chili sauce, and something made from kale and sunchokes. Dessert is going to be boiled fruitcake and a trifle made from brownies, custard, frozen (thawed) dark cherries, and coconut (I haven't yet decided if the coconut is going in the custard or if I'm making a round of macaroons to mix in).

[executrix]

I'm not celebrating Christmas, but with a little time on my hands I think I'm going to try making my first batch of seitan. I love seitan but it's ridiculously expensive to buy, so if I can get good results after a few tries I think it'll be like bread--I don't *insist* on making all that I consume but I make up a batch every once in a while.

[kindkit]

I'm thinking of trying to make my own yogurt, because I go through so much now that I'm cooking a lot of Indian food. It'll save a little money maybe, but mostly I feel guilty about all the plastic jugs. I save some of them for storing leftovers etc., but I still throw more away than I'm happy with.

[kindkit]

That sounds fantastic and a great combination of traditional and modern. How did you make the sweet potato dish? I'm going to have to try that, because the description is making me hungry.

[starlady]

Eating dinner tonight to have leftovers tomorrow. Roasted Brussel sprouts, cider-brined turkey,with gravy, bourbon mashed sweet potatoes, apple onion sage stuffing, julglogg. Plus tofurkey for my sister. Dessert: Christmas cookies.

What is that Brussels sprouts recipe? It sounds delish.

[kindkit]

Yum! I posted the brussels sprouts recipe in a later post.

[lilacsigil]

I hope you make it through work unscathed! We're having a roast lamb with rosemary from the garden (in the oven now) and a trifle to follow (setting in the fridge). st_aurafina suddenly made egg, onion, chive and sausage baked in little cups made out of bread for lunch, which was delicious!

[kindkit]

Mmmm, lamb. I hope the weather was cool enough where you are that roasting it didn't give you both heatstroke!

[st_aurafina]

Duck! Awesome! Our butchers had to order a goose for someone. Someone's goose is probably cooked.

I'm slow cooking the lamb, because that's a thing we just started doing this year, and I like it - it's in the cast iron pot now with white wine, some garlic cloves and shallots, and rosemary from the garden. It should be done in about five hours. With it, we're having roast beets with toasted walnuts and goats cheese - we have a really nice local goats cheese that is creamy and delicious. And I'm making couscous with currants, slivered almonds and parsley.

I've been making that overnight no-knead bread from the New York Times recipe, and we've got a loaf of that cooling now, but probably will eat it tomorrow, thanks to the eggy-sausagey bread cups I ended up making. And I roasted some left over cherry tomatoes to go with those. It was a bit of a clean up - we had a piece of pumpkin saved for the roast but it had gone bad, and so I went into a frenzy of fridge clearing.

But to balance up all this tasty stuff, I burned a packet of bacon. Like, black. DAMN IT.

Good luck with work! Survive the brainless hordes of shoppers. We're free and clear until Thursday now, it's quite nice.

[kindkit]

Burnt bacon is a tragedy. All that lovely bacon wasted. *sadface*

The beet dish sounds excellent, and I'm interested in finding out new things to do with beets. What kind of dressing do you use for it, a vinaigrette or something more elaborate?

[st_aurafina]

I think the problem with bacon is I don't cook it often enough, and so I misjudge it every time. (The solution obviously being to cook it more often!)

I don't really like dressings ever, so I didn't make one for the beets, though the recipe had a mustard type thing described. In the end we saved the goats cheese for the bread and used sheep feta for the beets, and that came marinated in olive oil and peppercorns, the traces of which made enough of a dressing for us. It was a good salad - we kept eating it for lunches a couple of days afterwards.

I wish we could get golden beets here - they look so pretty.