It's a cooking miracle

Well, not really, but I did SO much cooking today: pies, pies, pies, a bourbon caramel pumpkin tart, Brussels sprouts galore, many pounds of beets...the list feels like it must go on but for now, the rest escapes me. Here is a terrible picture of the tart, but I know it will be delish.

Wishing you all a Happy Thanksgiving tomorrow. Stay warm, eat well. I'm doing my best to work through and/or ignore any blues!

Are we Europeans? Sunchoke and collard tart; it's frigid

It was so, so ugly in DC today: gray, rainy then icy, windy, cold. The kind of weather that chills you literally to the bone. I exercised, went to the dentist, made two pies and some rice dressing, candied some pecans and pumpkin seeds, found an ophthalmologist, trimmed Brussels sprouts, and.... and was cold most all the time. I wish I'd thought to light a fire this evening, but betwixt and between putting together an Ottolenghi tart and reading stories to the boys, well, it just didn't materialize.

The tart, however, warmed where the fire could not, emerging from the oven like a magnificent, steaming gift. As it did so fully 90 minutes after we usually eat, we felt as if we were dining a la family across the pond and went with it as best our untrained stomachs could. The recipe called for chard but T grabbed a bunch of collards so we went with that too, and they definitely fit the bill. I used Molly Wizenberg's tart crust recipe instead of Yotam's, but other than the collard sub followed the rest of things to a T. It was a scrumptious dinner which paired perfectly with a new Pinot from the Russian River that T discovered.

I've got miles to cook before TG so am heading off to a slumber respite now. Back tomorrow! Hope you're warm!

Hilarious critique of cupcakes

On the Tuesday before the Thanksgiving break each year, the boys' school has a thanks-themed Meeting for Worship (they attend a Friends school). I really enjoy attending it but today simply could not. Instead, Tom went, and I sent him with two darling cupcakes I'd bought from a local bread company that I adore. The vanilla cupcakes were topped with perfectly formed, swirly mounds of snow white frosting on which sat a sweet little Thanksgiving turkey. Though Jack can often give or take cupcakes, I thought he'd like the festivity of this one; Ol has never been known to not wolf down a cake-based dessert of any kind. I stayed home cozily cooking, and when the boys pushed the back door open upon returning home, I said, "how are you, sweeties?!" Jack, sounding very grim, immediately launched into an extremely well thought out diatribe about why the cupcake was the worst he'd ever tasted.

"That was a terrible cupcake, Mom. It was soooooo sweet, and that turkey tasted sooooo artificial. The cake was hard and not good. The frosting was awful, hard too and too sweet. Really, I can't tell you what a bad cupcake that was. Oliver didn't even like it."

A) I did not know he could recognize or articulate artificial tastes but am wildly proud that he can and did, and B) I was laughing so hard by the end of his goings-on that I couldn't even say hello to T. Oliver said the only part he liked was the turkey decoration but otherwise he agreed that it simply was NOT a good cupcake.

I'm still laughing about it.

Cooking is coming along at a good clip! Back to it!