Turkey Day sides, Recipes

We had Thanksgiving with my friend Amy, and I ate my weight. I prepared the sides since she was frying the turkey (fried turkey is amazing, by the way), and began thinking I’d go easy since there weren’t many people, but I ended up exploding and making mashed potatoes, fried okra, pasta, stuffed mushrooms, bacon wrapped water chestnuts and a green bean casserole. Good stuff. Here are a few of the things we made, then follow the collapsible more link for the recipes, if you’d like.

This became the green bean casserole, which I did not photograph. It tasted great, but I hate the fact that the beans lose all their color when you cook them, so I didn’t bother. This isn’t even a recipe so much as a hodge-podge of readily available ingredients. Throw your beans in a big mixing bowl with one chopped onion softened in a fry pan with butter, and 8 oz. of sour cream. Season with lemon zest and salt, and a pinch of four and mix. Transfer to casserole dish, cover with cheese and bread crumbs. Cook for 30 minutes at 350. Voila. Decent green bean casserole that isn’t covered in canned soup.

These are so amazing it’s not even funny. Wrap your water chestnuts in bacon, soak in soy sauce for 30 minutes or so. Cook them at 450 for about 30 minutes, or until your bacon is sufficiently crispy. Yum.

I decided to make this pasta dish for the kids since Dash isn’t too fond of meat. I’m sneaky though, and can always manage to sneak it in with some pasta sauce. Apparently it doesn’t work when the sauce is white and he can easily see big chunks of ham. He ate a bit of the Farfalle, though! (recipe after the jump.)

This recipe is after the jump as well, but in case you’re wondering, that is indeed an entire 8 oz. container of cream cheese, and an entire stick of butter there. This one is always a big hit, especially when I cover it with bacon.

Creamy Mashed Potatoes
2 1/2 lbs (or so) of whatever potatoes you like - I use big red ones or Yellow Finn - peeled.
1/4 lb (one stick) of unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1 8 oz. package of cream cheese, cut into pieces or softened
1/3 cup heavy cream
Coarse salt and pepper

Cut the potatoes into quarters, put them in your stockpot and cover them with water. Boil them over high heat for 30 minutes, or until they slide easily off a fork. Drain and mash them or run them through a food processor. While still hot, add the butter, cream and cream cheese. Whip with a wooden spoon until smooth. Add salt and pepper until you’re happy.

These potatoes stand on their own easily since they’re so rich, but sometimes I chop some bacon and fry it up, let it soak on a paper towel for a sec then top the potatoes with real bacon bits. Other times I cook green beans in chopped bacon, then put the beans and the bacon on the potatoes. This year I just did bacon since I had some leftover from the water chestnuts and we already had green bean casserole. The key to putting green beans in your potatoes, however, is to cook them until they’re just barely done: still green and crispy. This way, your textures are perfectly matched - you have creamy, soft potatoes and crispy beans, and it’s amazing.

Farfalle with ham, peas and cream
7 oz. Farfalle or other short pasta
2/3 cup frozen peas
2/3 cup heavy cream
1 1/4 cup diced ham
2 tbs grated Parmesan

Cook your pasta according to the box (salt your water), add peas after about five minutes. When the pasta is cooked, drain it with the peas. Put the empty pan back on the stove and heat your heavy cream, ham and Parmesan. Warm it through and make sure to mix it well. Throw the pasta and peas back into the pan and mix again.

Holy crap…I’m SO going to have to try the bacon water chestnut thingy….

YUMMMMMMMY. Thanks Paige! I hope you had a good holiday!

all of that looks DELISH! i hope you had a happy day! i can’t wait to get home from work and eat LEFTOVERS! YUM!

I do potatoes sort of like that….I call them heartattack mashed potatoes.

3lb red creamer potoates
1 lb salted butter
pint of heavy whipping cream

cut the potatoes up into cubes with the skins still on, boil them in water with 1/4 lb of the butter in the pot until soft. Drain add the rest of the butter and the whipping cream and then beat with a hand mixer until smooth.

Oh my god, I’m a vegetarian but I want those bacon-wrapped water chestnuts!

And I passed the mashed potato recipe on to Hoover, because for as good of a cook he is, he just fucks up potato dishes left and right. I think potatoes seriously hate him. The mashed potatoes he made yesterday were…just ugh.

That looks freakin’ awesome. I hereby invite you to thanksgiving next year wherever I am.

Quick Question….

Did you hand out free rib-spreaders with that Meal? Or do you figure the paramedics will have them handy when they have to manually re-start your heart?

=)

Mmm. Your Farfalle sounds a lot like what passes (in our house) for Fettucine Alfredo — only we use proscuitto instead of ham. Plus there’s usually several bits’o'butter involved. And a grind or two of fresh pepper. And then more butter and parmesan.

(grabbing chest, keeling over)

Mmmm. Those bacon wrapped water chestnuts look awesome. And the Farfalle avec Jambon et petite pois looks fantastic. I wish I were a kid.

Entirely unrelated but still very important to a person with a major literal identity crisis and huge issues with “this space for that”… how do you decide what words to place on this site, what words to place in the Flickr descriptions of your Flickr photos, and what words to put into your LiveJournal? I can never decide when to use which for what.

I know it’s trite to say something at this point, given your other comments, but that bacon/waterchestnut combo has my mouth a’waterin…Mmmmmm.

Have I told you how much I like your food photography? I can’t cook for crap, but I can admire pretty food. And right now I’m admiring the hell out of your bacon.