Archive for November, 2011

I’ve had at least three friends ask about gravy this week.  Yesterday when I got an email from a blogging friend’s husband,  I decided the gravy question must be the question of the week.

Gravy has got to be one of my favorite parts of the Thanksgiving meal.  I generously drown not only my turkey and potatoes, but I also love it on my stuffing and even sometimes my green beans.  What is a hot homemade roll for, if not to mop up gravy from my plate?

As a girl, I took great pains to form a perfect, gravy basin in my heaping spoonful of mashed potatoes.

Bland or lumpy gravy would never do!

Even though I don’t have the step by step photos to accompany this post (since we won’t be making gravy until Thanksgiving day) I’ll share our gravy tips and recipe.  On Thanksgiving, my husband makes the gravy and it is by far my favorite gravy of the year.  He usually makes an obscene 12 cups of gravy, since running out or not having leftovers would be a tragedy.

My husband uses a gravy recipe adapted from Emeril Lagasse.  Between my Dad and Emeril, Drew was well educated on how to make a killer Thanksgiving feast.

Here are our step-by-step gravy tips:

The first step is making the turkey broth.  For that, Drew uses that very unappetizing bag of giblets and neck. He also uses:

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

Turkey neck and giblets (of course)

1 large onion, coarsely chopped

1 large carrot, cut in large chunks

3-4 of the small inside leafy stalks of celery

1 bay leaf

3 cups of canned low salt chicken broth

3 cups water

In a large saucepan heat the oil over medium-high heat.  Add the turkey neck and giblets and saute until just turning brown (watch out they pop and sizzle!).  Add the vegetables and bay leaf and cook for several minutes until start to soften.  Add the chicken broth and water.  Simmer until reduced by about 1/3.  Put a strainer over a bowl and pour the broth through the strainer to catch all the large pieces.  Set the broth aside until needed for the gravy.

We usually just let the broth simmer on low on the stove most of the day, until we are ready to make gravy. If it starts reducing too much, just add a little more water.   We strain the broth just before making the gravy, so the liquid remains hot.  Here’s one place we depart from Emeril, he chops up the giblets and puts them right into the gravy.  That’s WAY too gross much for me.

The next key to the best Thanksgiving gravy is the turkey drippings.  Last year I wrote about how we make our turkey.  If you read that post you’ll know my husband places all sorts of good stuff on the bottom of the turkey roasting pan: carrots, celery, onions, and chicken broth.  All that combines with the drippings coming off the turkey and to make a flavor that is sinfully AWESOME.

After the turkey is done cooking, Drew puts the turkey on the rack on a large cookie sheet and covers it with foil to rest, then he takes all that super pan goodness and pours it all through a strainer into a glass bowl.  In the bowl is the drippings and a whole lot of fat.  That’s when it’s nice to have one of these:

It’s a Fat Separator.  It allows you to pour off the good stuff leaving several inches of fat behind.  If you don’t have one, you can use a ladle and then large spoon to skim off all the fat.

You can now make the gravy in your turkey roasting pan or in a large saucepan.  If you are not using the turkey roasting pan, still deglaze the pan by putting the roasting pan over medium high heat and pouring in a cup or so of your turkey broth.  Scrape up all the brown bits of flavor and pour it all into the bowl of turkey broth.

Since our roasting pan pulls double duty, we make our gravy in a large saucepan (very large since we make so much). The first step is making a roux.  Melt 1/2 cube (1/4 cup) of butter in the pan.  Sprinkle in 1/4 cup flour and stirring constantly cook the flour for a couple of minutes.  Add 1 cup of white wine plus 1 cup of turkey broth whisking constantly to avoid lumps.

Simmer for about 10 minutes to thicken.  Add all of the drippings and about 3 more cups of the warm turkey broth. Add 1/8 teaspoon of poultry seasoning and season to taste with salt and pepper.

If our gravy is not thick enough, Drew makes a slurry by adding 1/4 cup of cornstarch to a bowl.  Whisk in 1/4 cup of turkey broth (or chicken stock or water if you don’t have broth) until their are no lumps and the cornstarch looks dissolved.  Slowly add it into your gravy until you reach a desire thickness.

Here’s the recipe ingredients for the gravy:

4 cups turkey broth

reserved turkey drippings

1/4 cup butter

1/4 cup flour

1 cup of white wine

1/8 teaspoon poultry seasoning

salt and pepper to taste

Optional for making a slurry for thickening if needed:

1/4 cup cornstarch

1/4 cup turkey broth (or chicken broth or water)

Well there it is.  It’s my favorite gravy of all time.  One more day…  I can hardly wait.

For a incredibly helpful gravy troubleshooting tips be sure to visit this post by the very talented Dara of Cookin’ Canuck.  I love her tip about a potato for salty gravy.  Simply brilliant.

With Thanksgiving just a few days away, I’m sure there are more than a few of you out there getting ready to bake pie this week.  I have 30 people for dinner this year and I have been debating which pies to make and how many of each.

My list looks like this right now:

• Pumpkin
• Pecan
• Chocolate Pecan (my favorite)
• Apple
• Banana Cream
• Coconut Cream
• Lemon Cream

I know, there are no fancy pies on the list, just my tried and true favorites.  I may top one of the pumpkin pies with a fun and unusual topping, but mostly I’m sticking with what my family loves.  There is something comforting about these delicious old-fashioned pies on the very traditional day of Thanksgiving.

Since my oven will be full of turkey on Thanksgiving Day, I will be making the pies with my girls on Wednesday.  We will be watching/listening to movies and baking to our heart content.

Here’s a few tips that might make your pie making easier.

• Give yourself plenty of time. Pie is one of those things that just can’t be rushed.

• Cut in the fats and flour by hand, either with a pastry cutter or with your hands. My mom once tried to shortcut this process with her food processor.  Though she only pulsed the ingredients together, my brother-in-law asked her, as he ate his pie, “What happened to the crust?”  It just wasn’t as flaky or tender.

• Make sure your fat of choice (lard, butter or shortening) is very cold. Cold fat = flaky crust.  My mom taught me to measure my lard and put it in the freezer for the 10 minutes it takes me to measure and sift the dry ingredients.

• Don’t dump all the cold liquid into your pie at once. The amount needed really depends on things like humidity and your flour.  If your crust seems right, stop.  You may even need more than the recipe calls for occasionally.

• When making a pre-baked crust for a cream filled pie, be sure to pierce the crust all over with a fork. This prevents the crust from shrinking in the oven.  With the recipe I use, I’ve never found the need for pie weights.  It can also help to chill your crust before baking to prevent shrinkage.  If you do need pie weights, you don’t need to buy them- just line your pie with foil and fill with dry beans or rice.

• You can make and pre-bake the crusts for cream pies several days before you need them. Let your crusts cool completely and cover gently with a piece of foil.  Put them in a cool dry spot until you fill them.

• Since cream pie filling is made on the stove top, I make the cream pie fillings on Thanksgiving morning. That still gives plenty of cooling time in the refrigerator, but ensures the pies are fresh.

• One tip for a banana cream pie: I slice the bananas on the pie when I serve them. That way they don’t go brown, and taste fresh.

• When putting the top on a double crust pie, I like to use a small cookie cutter to cut a fun shape (acorn, heart or scalloped circle) from the center of the pie as a vent and for decoration. I cut it out while I still have the crust on my pastry frame.  Then I roll the crust halfway on the rolling pin, center my cutout and roll the top crust into place.

• Before rolling the top crust into place, I dip my finger in water and run it around the bottom crust. That little bit of moisture helps seal the two crusts together.

• I also love to brush my top crust with a little evaporated milk, half/half or even milk, then sprinkle it with granulated sugar. It makes a lovely golden crust.

• Make pie a tradition. This past week, my mom and I taught a pie class for about 50 people.  Together we made around 100 pies.  It was epic.  And fun.  One of the women there makes pie with her sisters and sister-in-laws each Thanksgiving.  She said they all make their favorites and they make around 20 pies together.  It’s something they all love and look forward to. Some of my fondest memories of childhood are of making pie with my mom.  I remember stirring the fillings, helping flute the edges of the pie, and best of all baking and eating cinnamon pie scraps.  It’s a tradition I’ve carried on with my girls and one we love and look forward to each year.

• If you have a good pie baker in the family, make a date and bake pie together. Those family pie traditions are treasures.  Several years before my husband’s 90 year old grandmother passed away, my husband went to her home and baked pies with her for Thanksgiving.  He took notes as they baked.  That memory is priceless to him as are the tips she shared (that now I use).

I’ve shared a tutorial on Perfect Pie Crust here and here.  The tutorials are one way to make pie, but there are many ways to make a great pie crust.  It’s more of a method that can be used with many recipes.  The recipe I use most often, the recipe from my mom, is a fabulous crust that is tender, flaky and easy to make.

This Thanksgiving seems especially poignant to me.  My heart has been so full of gratitude.  I look forward to all the lovely moments this week of preparation and spending time with my loved ones on Thanksgiving day.

Last but not least, I’ll share a few fun quotes I found in preparation for the pie class we taught.

“Good apple pies are a considerable part of our domestic happiness” ~Jane Austen

“When you die, if you get a choice between going to regular heaven or pie heaven, choose pie heaven. It might be a trick, but if it’s not, mmmmmmmm, boy.” – Jack Handy

“One little thing can revive a guy/ and that is a homemade rhubarb pie/ Serve it up nice and hot/ maybe things aren’t as bad as you thought.” ~ A Prairie Home Companion

“Cut my pie into four pieces, I don’t think I could eat eight.” – Yogi Berra (Thanks Judy!)

“In the childhood memories of every good cook, there’s a large kitchen, a warm stove, a simmering pot, and a mom.”  Barbara Costikyan