Thankfulness

Things I am thankful for this morning:

An opportunity to mop my bathroom floor.
And clean the closet carpet.
And wash the towels.
And having homebirthed so I had a bunch of towels to mop up the mess from the overflowed sink.
And for finding my pink running hat under the homebirth towels.
And for the tupperware of absorbent things under the bathroom sink.
And for the used absorbent things that I can now replace with Mamacloth.
And for having to clean out the undersink tupperware and finding one last set of contact lenses.
And for my "Mamacita needs a margarita" shirt being clean today 'cause that's how I'm feeling.
And for friends--for a bajillion reasons right now.
And for new friends who teach me great words like "awesomesauce".
And for Confession since "awesomesauce" is not anywhere near what I said first.
And for, for once, making my Morning Offering when I was feeling crabby so that all this goodness didn't go to waste.

Another Failure

I love the flavor of pumpkin at Thanksgiving, but no one in our family prefers pumpkin pie.  More often we make a chocolate pecan or an apple pie for after dinner, so I came up with the idea of putting the pumpkin on the breakfast table in the form of empanadas de calabasas, yummy Mexican pumpkin turnovers which most of us enjoy when we are visiting my parents in California.

Unimpressed and even disgusted by last year's attempt, I decided to try another recipe for the empanadas today.  Last year I chose my recipe based on the anise seeds that are found in the bready part of this pan dulce.  I could only find one recipe that used anise, and I didn't look carefully at what else formed the dough to my deep regret.  In my mind, there is no food more disgusting than pie crust.  Flaky, dry and mostly flavorless, it is a revolting packaging in which to place sweet desserts.   The anise flavored recipe was nothing more than pie dough with pumpkin filling.  Yuck.

Today's recipe turned out better.  I looked for a dough which included yeast, hoping that I would avoid the pie dough recipes and find one for the soft, slightly sweet bread surrounding the creamy pumpkin.  With a little tweaking from the original recipe I ended up with creamy pumpkin filling in...a glorified pie crust.

Everyone was satisfied except me, so next year I will be searching out Yucca flour before I try again.
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Failure #2 Empanadas de Calabasas

(in case desperation makes me try this again)

Filling  Stir together 1 can of pumpkin, 1/2 C sugar, 1/4 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/4 tsp gr. ginger, and 1/8 tsp cloves.

Dough  Stir together 2/3 C water, 1/4 C sugar, 1 tsp salt, 2 pkg dry yeast, 1/8 tsp baking powder, 2 generous pinches cinnamon, and 2 tsp anise seeds.  Blend in 1 1/2 C flour.  Stir in 3/4 C veg shortening and 1/8 C brandy.   Stir in remaining flour and let dough rest.


Preheat oven to 350.  Divide dough into 16 balls and roll into circles about 4" in diameter.  Put filling on one half and fold over, sealing with a fork.  Bake 15-20 min, or until golden brown.  Watch them carefully since they burn quickly.

November--Holidays

Today when James started throwing up, I realized how woefully unprepared I am for the season, Thanksgiving, Christmas or flu.  Since Bill has to make a commissary run for flu supplies anyway, I decided to make a Thanksgiving shopping list too.  But first I had to confirm the menu.  And as a tone of annoyance crept into his voice, I realized what a waste of time it is for us to discuss it.  Not only do we eat basically the same thing every year, I cook it all, so I get to pick!  I sent him to school and wrote down the menu:

Thanksgiving Day:
Breakfast
Empanadas de Calabazas, Scrambled Eggs, Bacon, Coffee

Lunch
Roast Beef Sandwiches and Fruit

Dinner--5pm
Turkey with Herbed Stuffing and Cranberry Sauce
Grandma Mapson's Sweet Potatoes
Mashed Potatoes and Gravy
Spinach and Strawberry Salad
Parker House Rolls
Sparkling Cider, Wine and Water
Chocolate Pecan Pie and Pumpkin Pie

Of course, then I had to pull out 4 cookbooks and look at multiple websites to 1. discover this is the menu I already had written in my cookbook and 2. double check recipes and ingredients and make a grocery list.  Once the list was compiled, I had to dig through the kitchen to see what we actually need--my least favorite part.  Why, oh why, haven't we just come up with a master list years ago? 

Here it is, although Bill will fix the order so it's shoppable.
Deli
Roast Beef
Cheese

Produce
onion
celery
3 sweet potatoes
6 oranges
10 potatoes
bag of spinach
lettuce
tomatoes

Dry Goods
White wine vinegar
mustard
mayo
shortening
walnuts 1/2 C
1 1/2 C halved pecans
sugar
flour
dark corn syrup
dark brown sugar
yeast
baking powder
confectioner's sugar
semi sweet choc chips
mini marshmellows
poppy seeds
sesame seeds
paprika
salt
pepper
ginger
gr. cloves
thyme
sage
majoram
basil
cinnamon
vanilla
anise
pumpkin pie mix
evaporated milk
can of pumkin puree
6-8 C chicken broth
saltine crackers
canned chicken soup
ramen
7 up
apple juice
sprarkling cider
liquid tylenol
liquid motrin

Meat
Turkey over 10 lbs
bacon

Frozen Foods (if can't find fresh)
2 pkg cranberries
4 C sliced strawberries

Dairy
Milk
36 eggs
2 lb butter
pint heavy whipping cream

Alcohol
Wine
Brandy

Now I just have to get out my Christmas gift spreadsheet, send out lists, and beg for lists so that I can go shopping this weekend.