Saturday, November 28, 2009

Thanksgiving!

The Balls (the Itinerant Eater and her charming younger sister) came to indulge me with a lovingly prepared safe Thanksgiving feast.



The chef is a vegetarian, so rather than feasting on a turkey of our own, I swooped some spare bird from my loving Minnesotan coworker, who overestimated her turkey poundage and scheduled her meal earlier in the day. Looks a little worse for the roadtrip, but it was moist and delicious (Samantha brined it like a good girl, and took Elton Brown's carving tips).


In lieu of turkey as the main course, we had stuffed squash. The containers were lovingly harvested by our Colombian farmer friend Juan Jacobo and traveled cross-country in the chef's backpack. She created a marvelous rice and nut filling, with goat cheddar and wild rice and who knows what else to culminate in this heavy and satisfying main course:

Nut & Sage Stuffed Delicata Squash by Eve Fox, Garden of Eating blog

Sage and Nut-Stuffed Delicata Squash (modified from The Garden of Eating's recipe)
Serves 4 as a side dish or 2 as a main dish

Ingredients

* 2 delicata squashes, halved length-wise and seeded
* 2 Tbsps fresh sage,chopped
* 1/3 cup lightly toasted pinenuts, chopped
* 1/3 cup lightly toasted almonds,chopped
* 1/2 cup cooked short-grain brown rice (I usually cook the rice in some vegetable broth for added flavor)
* 2 eggs, beaten (use organic, pasture-raised if you can get 'em) - replaced with EnerG fake egg
* 1/4 cup goat cheddar cheese
* 2 medium onions, finely chopped
* 4 cloves of garlic, minced
* 2 Tbsps olive oil
* Salt and pepper to taste

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350°. Heat the oil in a large frying pan over medium-high heat. Add onions, garlic, and salt. Cook, stirring occasionally, until onions are soft, about 3 minutes. Stir in sage and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute. Stir in nuts. Set aside.

2. In a large bowl, combine the rice, eggs, parmesan and half of the cheddar cheese. Stir in the nut and onion mixture. Divide the stuffing among the squash halves, sprinkle with the rest of the cheddar cheese, and bake until tender when pierced with a fork and tops are browning, about 45 minutes.
The only recipe I brought to the table was a white trash finger food that required some convincing and modification to be acceptable to the chef. We used beets instead of cranberries in this festive favorite (goat cheese, walnuts, chopped beets all nested in fresh endive leaves). I loved it, and gladly wound up with a spare bowl o' filling I'll be reusing for days.


The unsafe eaters of the group desserted on a classic pumpkin pie, while I enjoyed another fresh espresso and some rest to digest a delicious meal.

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