Thanksgiving Day Plans!

For the past few years, we have spent Thanksgiving day with my husband's family. It has always been a sweet time of fellowship. Last year was even sweeter, as his sister and I teamed up to "take on" the meal together. Although I have always missed being with my own family on Thanksgiving day, I think that the past few years away has helped to prepare me for Thanksgiving 2009.

This year, we are just too far away and there are too many impending tests and papers for us to be able to go home to either side of the family. (And we will miss them. It makes us even more thankful for our time with them. It makes us long for Christmas break, when we will be able to spend two weeks with them!)  So, we will have our Thanksgiving feast, just the two of us, on Wednesday. It will be a sweet time for us to celebrate and to recognize how many gifts and blessings that we have right now.


Why on Wednesday?  Well, because we will be going with a few friends to spend the day in New York City!  That's right, we'll be there to see the 76 trombones and the giant snoopy balloon!  Watch for us in the crowd at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.  Don't worry, we'll have our turkey sandwiches, sweet potato chips, and cranberry almond bars.

I hope that you have a wonderful Thanksgiving meal, whether a large feast with your family, or a picnic lunch while watching the parade.  If you are looking for something simple for breakfast before you get to the big meal, make up a batch of this wonderful pumpkin butter to serve with toast or spread on toasted Bay's english muffins.

Pumpkin Butter

from Allrecipes.com


1 (29 ounce) can pumpkin puree
3/4 cup apple juice
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1 1/4 cup brown sugar
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
 
Combine all of the ingredients in a heavy oven-safe pot and cover with a lid.   Bake at 300 degrees for one hour, stirring every 20 minutes with a whisk.  Cook longer for a thicker consistency, or add more apple juice (one tablespoon at a time) to thin.  Store in the refrigerator or freeze in small portions (canning pumpkin butter is not recommended).

Free Apples

A couple of weeks ago, my husband and I were walking through our neighborhood and saw this:

We had seen the table (and an accompanying sign that said "Free Apples") a few other times, but there had never been any available bounty. This time, however, the table was full of apples. These apples were the kind that you don't see at the grocery store; they had bumps and bruises and lopsided parts. Nevertheless we stuffed our pockets full and snagged as many as we could hold in our hands and headed home.

It didn't take me long to know what I would do with my new found bounty. I was talking about it before we even reached our front porch. I would make apple butter, loaded with spices and sugar and just delicious. By 2:00 the next day, I had two beautiful jars of apple butter to put away in the pantry, and one container in the refrigerator to eat immediately.

This recipe was developed from several others; I primarily went off of my mother's pear butter recipe which I have made in the past, but I also referred to Elyse's recipe at Simply Recipes and some posts on the web. I read several posts on a message board about cooking apple butter in the oven (after the initial 20 minute cooking). This resulted in a gorgeously dark and rich apple butter.

By the way, you can use several different kinds of apples, particularly those that you would use for a pie, crisp or baking. Stay away from Golden or Red Delicious.

Apple Butter

2-3 pounds apples, peeled and cored and sliced
1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
1/4 cup water
zest and juice of one lemon
1-3 cups brown sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon allspice
1/2 teaspoon cloves

Place the apples, vinegar, water, lemon juice and zest in a large oven-proof pot. Bring to a simmer and cook over medium-low heat for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Pour the cooked apples into a blender or food processor and blend until well pureed.

Return the pureed apples to the pot, measuring as you go. For every cup of blended apples that you have, add 1/2 cup brown sugar.* Add the spices to the pot. Cover the pot and put the whole thing in the oven. Cook for 2-3 hours at 300 degrees, stirring every half hour. When you stir the pot, taste for sugar and spices; you may want to add more depending on your preferences.

Store in the refrigerator, or seal in canning jars to store for months (or years) in your pantry, give away for Christmas gifts, etc. If you're not familiar with canning process, The Pioneer Woman gives step-by-step instructions here.

*You might want to go easy on the sugar to begin; you can always add sugar as you go.

Oh, and "thank you" to our kind neighbors, for sharing your apples.