Miso hungry

A highlight of the Vancouver trip was the festively tricked out cement truck near our hotel on Granville Island. I think it should be next year's Christmas card, don't you?

My sister-in-law made some fabulous panforte, a treat I've never had before - it was gooey, nutty and spicy - what more could you want in a Christmas snack? I'll never eat fruitcake again. She's sending me the recipe and I'll post it as soon as she comes through. She also makes an incomparable sour cherry pie, and butter tarts with no butter! My brother-in-law handled the meals, including caesar salad with prawns - the dressing had a fab tarragon mustard in it; one of my all time faves braised lamb shanks; and another cooked-forever taste treat, beef bourguignon. Christmas dinner was traditional with a 21 pound turkey, a sweet potato ragu, mashed potatoes, peas and mushrooms, et al. The Christmas movies were Bad Santa and my top 20 favorite Grosse Pointe Blank.

It's big, it's ugly, it's Christmas. Download it.

The cookie photo filled me with the spirit of giving, so I made a downloadable Christmas card.

Gingerbread Men on Steroids

Just think, if they get cranky or cheat at baseball you can bite their heads off.

This was Nana's recipe for gingerbread men. Back in the day, Mom and I would make 6 batches for the Moultonborough Elementary School Christmas Fair each year and they would sell out instantly. They're very cakey, so use a big cookie cutter. I roll them out to 3/8 inch thickness, and that makes a mighty fat cookie. We would decorate them with buttercream frosting, cinnamon hots and silver dragees. They freeze pretty well. As you can see, Mom didn't write down the oven temperature or baking time since she kept most information in her head, so I'll have to figure that out tomorrow when I make them, and let you know. Until then....

I have nothing intelligent to say about Thanksgiving...

...except that last year we covered our turkey with an entire package of bacon (having stolen the idea from our brother-in-law) and it was so wicked good that it's a do ovah. Yeah, the gravy did taste like cured pork but I didn't care.

The only change in this year's stuffing (Pepperidge Farm with mirepoix) is the addition of dried chanterelles.

The rest of the menu is standard - squash with maple syrup, mashed carrot and turnip, lumpy mashed potatoes (I don't like white food unless it has lots of texture) and pumpkin pie ala One Pie canned pie filling. No green vegetables allowed, especially green beans with those canned fried onions.