Thanksgiving 09 Post 1: Cocktail meatballs (p. 82), Salami rolls (p.83), and Crudites (p. 78)

Thanksgiving 2009! A couple items before I start the Thanksgiving blogs:
1. The pictures are TERRIBLE, I know it, I apologize. I forgot the charger for my camera and my mom's is not good for food pictures. They are all dark and/or blurry. I'm really sorry!
2. It was our biggest Thanksgiving we've ever thrown! There were 6 of us, which was exciting!)
3. Mom was complaining last year that she was just a flunkie and didn't actually get to make anything. Since I've made so many TJOC Thanksgiving style recipes already, mom was able to throw in some of her favorites. So she's graduated from flunkie to sous chef, which she seems happy about.

Like the last couple years, I decided to make some appetizers for lunch on Thanksgiving so that I could knock some of the appetizers and hors d'oeuvres recipes off the list. This has became an anticipated tradtion.

I made three appetizers, starting with Cocktail meatballs (p. 82). This recipe has intrigued me for a while due to the sauce which includes brown sugar, jellied cranberry sauce, lemon juice, and an entire bottle of chili sauce.



The meatballs were made out of ground beef, cornflakes (strange!), catsup, soy sauce, onions, parsley, garlic, black pepper, and eggs. Josh and Jordan took over the balling of the meatballs--they were tiny (it makes 70!).



The sauce was then poured on the meatballs and they were cooked.



Watch them carefully! The sugary sauce started to burn on one of the trays, although no meatballs were harmed. They were really tasty! As strange as the sauce sounds, it really worked, and they were tender and flavorful. They would be particularly good in a little slow cooker at a potluck (I never go to potlucks--do people bring stuff in slow cookers to them? It seems like they would).

I also made Salami rolls (p.83). The recipe is really simple--take cream cheese, add sun-dried tomato halves, some chopped scallions, and a little pepper, and grind it in the food processor. The problem was that it became a ball of cream cheese and wouldn't mix! So I had a smoking food processor, clumps of cream cheese, and annoyingly whole tomato halves and scallions. This problem was never fully solved, I just quit worrying about it and smeared the cream cheese, chunks and all, onto the salami slices.




I know the picture is dark, you may have to use your imagination.

They were then rolled up and cut in half. They were good although I would rather have them with less cream cheese. I would make these again but change the cream cheese to include garlic and chives or something. So I suppose I wouldn't actually make these again but, instead, a similar roll-up.

I then chopped up some celery and cauliflower for Crudites (p. 78) with blue cheese dressing. The blue cheese dressing is so delicious that it makes people who say they hate blue cheese change their mind :)



You can see all three finished dishes in this picture :) The salami roll recipe is online.


Thanksgiving means that all three dogs get to spend some time together, too, and bond with the rest of us (the third dog is hiding in this picture). Mostly, they just sleep.



I hope all of my American blog readers had a great Thanksgiving! There will be more Thanksgiving blog posts :)