Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving.

In my college days, I would spend the day before Thanksgiving looking for articles on the internet about the genocidal legacy of the colonialists, so I can be ready to show up for dinner all righteous and indignant about this mockery of a holiday. I would get my Midwestern family heated by asking God for reparations for indigenous people and a little help in overthrowing the government during the Thanksgiving prayer, instigate charged and uncomfortable political conversations over dinner, eat until I pop, cry because my mom supports the war, and take a nap.

I'd like to think that I've cooled my jets a little. I do think that Thanksgiving offers a good time to reflect on the 500 year struggle of native people in this country, but less publicly, and less annoying-ly.

This year, my sis is coming up from Ohio and all I can think about is the amazing food that we will be cooking together. My new found love of cooking has taken the edge off this usually tense holiday, and I'm focused on asparagus and being a tourist in Philly with Nadia.

Thanksgiving Menu

Appetizer
Asparagus with roasted garlic aoli
Cranberry-champagne cocktail

Dinner
Chicken [portobellos for me] stuffed with havarti, artichoke and spinach
Aunt Cindy's mashed potatoes
Herbed Shallot Stuffing
Roasted fall veggies in balsamic glaze
Fattouch

Dessert
Pumpkin Cheesecake with bourbon sour cream topping
homemade chocolate truffles

Here is how it turned out:








Champagne cocktail











Asparagus with Aoli



















The Chicken!





The Whole Shebang...

Moroccan Couscous

My Christmas list is growing. I was determined to preempt the inevitable scented lotions and the way-too-femme-for-me handbags by having a simple, reasonable list of essential and inexpensive cooking supplies to guide friends and family through the process buying me a Christmas present.

My list started out as a simple cast iron skillet and a decent chef knife.

It has quickly blossomed into luxuries that are both expensive and hardly necessary. Amid the Williams and Sonoma glass spice jars, the microplane zesters, and baking stones, there is the tagine. My Moroccan Couscous has allowed my shameless consumerism to get the best of me, and I truly believe that owning a tagine will fundamentally change my life.

A tagine is both a dish and the clay vessel that it is cooked in. It's generally a meat thing, because the shape of the bowl allows the meat to get ridiculously tender. But I happen to love the thought of a bubbling eggplant and mushroom ragout, with the juices seeping into to a lemon or fruit scented couscous, all inside an earthy, red pot.

My Moroccan-style couscous was hardly that. It was, however, warm, hearty, and cooked up in one big pot. The generous amounts of Syrian mix and orange juice saved the day, because it started out terribly bland, all because I was too lazy to toast the almonds. Will I ever learn?


This is may be more onion-y that some would like, but I found that they polished off the dish so well. It was on the verge of being too sweet, and the onions reminded me that I was eating dinner, not dessert.

Moroccan-style couscous

5cups couscous
1 cup toasted almond slivers
2 cups golden raisins
2 large onions
1/4 c. olive oil
1 oranged, halved
2 bay leaves
1 large cinnamon stick
salt
water
a little bit of crushed red pepper
lots of syrian mix aka 7 spice

[Arabic 7 spice (bokharat) is mixture of spices you can buy ready at any Middle Eastern grocery. basically everything you would find in a pumpkin pie, plus black pepper, cumin and coriander. Basically, love in a spice jar.]

Heat olive oil in a large soup pot. Toss in the almonds and push em around until they are browned. Add onions, and sauté until translucent. Add in couscous and raisins and cover with water until there is about 1 inch of water above the couscous. Cover and bring to a boil. Once water is boiling, squeeze in the juice of 1 orange, scoop out all the seeds, and put the orange halves in the pot. Add lots of syrian mix, the cinnamon stick, the bay leaves, the red pepper and salt, give it a swirl, and cover until couscous is steamed. Fluff with a fork, incorporating all the spices.

Top with a pat of butter while still hot.