Chicken Night!

On November 1st, my tiny mini was having calendar time at preschool.  Her teacher asked the class, "It's November, does anyone know what holiday is in November?"  To which my tiny mini shouted, "Chicken Night!"

Or Turkey Day.  Close enough.

In the past, I have made a complete Thanksgiving dinner following the Pioneer Woman's recipes.  Her turkey, mashed potatoes, and stuffing recipes are to.die.for.  Seriously, if I were dying and could request you to make me one last meal, that would be it.  Of course, if you didn't have an entire day to cook that one last meal for me, I would settle for Cheez-Its, twizzlers, and a McDonald's Diet Coke.

This year my mom invited the McGhee family over for Thanksgiving.  And, while I would love to share all of her recipes with you, I can't.  Because my mom is one of those cooks that doesn't follow recipes, rather she just adds a little of "this" and a little of "that" along with a few sticks of butter and it tastes amazing.  

So the only Thanksgiving recipe I have to share with you today is a vegetable dish I have been making for years at Thanksgiving.  I only make this dish once a year, because it's one of those dishes that is really dessert disguised as a vegetable.  

Now, I saw that the week before Thanksgiving there was a "best-squash-ever" recipe floating around on pinterest.  Well, this is what I have to say about that.  I am over pinterest's "best _____ ever" recipes.  I have now tried at least 10 of them and have sadly discovered that they are all average, at best.  So, don't trust what you see on pinterest.  But, you can trust Heids McGhee.  If you're looking for a side dish that resembles a vegetable, but tastes like a dessert, here you go....

Squash casserole (I apologize to the source of this recipe. I have this saved on my computer from 7 years ago and can't track down where I got the recipe....I publicly admit that this deliciousness is not my own work).

• 1 butternut squash
• 1 cup white sugar
• 1 1/2 cups milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 pinch salt
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 3 eggs
• 1/4 cup butter, melted         

Topping

• 1/2 (16 ounce) package vanilla wafers, crushed
• 1/2 cup butter, melted
• 1 cup brown sugar

1.  Preheat oven to 425 degrees F (220 degrees C).

2.  Put butternut squash in the microwave and cook on high, until soft, 2 to 3 minutes. Cut in half, scoop out seeds and cube. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Add squash and cook until tender, about 15 minutes. Drain and mash.

3.  In a 9x13 inch casserole dish combine 3 cups mashed butternut squash, white sugar, milk, vanilla extract, salt, flour, eggs and 1/4 cup melted margarine.

4.  Bake in preheated oven for 45 minutes, or until set.

5.  In a medium bowl combine crushed vanilla wafers, 1/2 cup melted margarine and brown sugar. Crumble over top of cooked casserole and return to oven to brown.

I feel at this point, there are a few things I need to address.  #1.  Yes, that is processed Nilla Wafers.  #2.  Yes, that is a heck of a lot of butter.  #3.  Yes, that is a heck of a lot of sugar.

In my defense, I warned you...this is more dessert than veggie.  And guess what?  Eating veggies that taste like dessert make people happy.  And isn't that what Thanksgiving is all about?  Isn't that how those suffering pilgrims were hoping we would celebrate their pilgrimage?

Here's your squash, softened and ready to be cut into cubes.  

 Boil the squash until tender.

Mix your ingredients.

Scrape out the squash....

....and mash.

Add your other ingredients to the squash.

Pour into a dish and bake.  

While squash is baking, run around like a chicken with your head cut off getting minis showered and into their coordinating outfits.  Mop the bathroom floor, since the middle mini forgot to close the curtain while showering.  Change tiny mini's outfit after she wipes pink toothpaste all over it.  Then, realize boy minis need to be changed too, in order to keep them all coordinating.  Question Mr. McGhee's time management skills (really?  an hour to pack some beer in the cooler?)  Pause to watch Macy's Day parade.  

At this point, your squash should be firm and done baking.  Prepare your topping and add to the squash.  Return to the oven for a few minutes.  I did all of this, I promise.  Somehow I managed to forget to take pictures of the finished squash.  I also have zero pictures of my minis from Thanksgiving day, which is actually a good thing because if I did, then you would realize I was lying about the coordinating outfits.  

Happy eating!

Superheroes and kohlrabi

So we had a little situation at our house the other day.  There was a bomb in the bottom of our swimming pool that was about to detonate.  And as if that wasn't worrisome enough, there were powerful gems surrounding the bomb that needed to be overcome before the bomb problem could even be addressed.  


Thank God I live with these guys.  

It was touch-and-go for about an hour, but they were able to capture all the gems.  They then discovered that the gems gave them superpowers, which they used to save the neighborhood (and, more importantly, their mom) from that ticking bomb that was in the bottom of our pool.

I don't know about you, but when someone saves my life, I want to do something nice for them.  And when I want to do something nice for someone, that usually means I want to cook for them.  And then I realized since my minis used their super powers to save me, I should use my super power to feed them.  So, I went shopping in my garden and realized I had kohlrabi that was ready to be picked.  My minis usually eat raw kohlrabi dipped in my veggie dip.


But I wanted to do something special for them so I decided I would try roasted kohlrabi.


Roasted Kohlrabi

• 1 1/2 pounds fresh kohlrabi, ends trimmed, thick green skin sliced off with a knife, diced
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 tablespoon garlic (garlic is optional, to my taste)
• Salt
• Good vinegar

1.  Set oven to 450F. 

2.  Toss the diced kohlrabi with olive oil, garlic and salt in a bowl. (The kohlrabi can be tossed with oil and seasonings right on the pan but uses more oil.) 

3.  Spread evenly on a rimmed baking sheet and put into oven (it needn't be fully preheated) and roast for 30 - 35 minutes, stirring every five minutes after about 20 minutes. 

4.  Sprinkle with a good vinegar when serving.  (I left the vinegar out for the minis).

My beautiful home-grown kohlrabi.

Coated and ready to be roasted.

Roasted (perhaps a little over-roasted?).....but still was delish!

My superheros were thrilled with their kohlrabi.  And anyone who is concerned that it is child abuse to reward your minis with roasted vegetables should know that I also gave my superheroes a smoothie to go with their kohlrabi.  And they assured me that they felt properly fueled to go back out there and save the neighborhood again.