Thanksgiving Dinner Q&A - Bring a Glass of Wine and your Questions

Darthis.

Okay, yeah, how do we get everything timed to get out at the same time? Well, the problem is sometimes you can't be as— you can't try and push your limits on what you're making. Okay, I don't know how to say it as delicately, but don't overachieve. Sometimes you want to think about what you're making and you want to try and plan it out so you can use the space that you have. Now, first thing we know is when the turkey comes out, okay, you've got a half an hour before dinner's going to get served. So we want to time it that way. And we're talking about turkey and any other questions you have. Anybody wants to come in, come on inside, you know, seats are open, or ask your questions. But the question is, how do we time everything? So I will make some things ahead of time. All right, let's talk about a vegetable. So let's say we're going to do some sweet potatoes of some kind. Whipped sweet potatoes are great, or mashed potatoes. You can cook those up ahead of time. You can get them done while the turkey's in the oven. You want to start prepping your vegetables, your side dishes, till they're almost ready. So then you want to put them in some kind of a baking dish and get those ready to go into the oven to reheat while the turkey is resting. So that's where you have to work on some timing. And so that's, that's how you got to kind of plan it. The other thing you can do is if you have some room on your stovetop, Okay, instead of having everything out in pots, if you put a pan, a deeper baking pan with some water in it, you can heat up water on your stovetop and then you can put items in there like your gravy in there or something that has to stay reasonably hot. You can make like we would have a little steam table at work. So you can kind of craft your own steam table at home, that's good. If you have a slow cooker, sometimes getting your slow cooker out and using that plugged in somewhere else. And even if you divide it, you know, put foil in it and make divisions in it, or put your— just put your bowls in there with your food. If it's big enough, it's an oblong slow cooker, you can put some stuff in there to keep warm so it'll come out timing. So timing, think about what you're going to serve. Like, generally I'll serve a sweet potato or whipped potato or both. If I roast vegetables, they're going to take a good half hour to 45 minutes. So I might start them on the very bottom shelf underneath the turkey because I have a little bit of room under my turkey, and put them on a baking pan and put them in there so they get about 10 minutes before I pull the turkey out. Let them finish, and then if you have your mashed potatoes or mashed sweets on the side, you can put them in a baking dish, cover them up loosely, put them in the oven, uh, And you might not— if they're warm, you might not put them in for like another 10 minutes and then turn your oven down. If you're going to do a green bean or another vegetable that you're just going to finish right at the end, have it par-cooked on the side and then pop it into a frying pan or into a pot at the end and finish seasoning it up and give it a quick heat on the stove. Your gravy can be hot and sitting back on the side. I mean, you can even put that into a a warm oven to hold. Think of your oven as a holding chamber while you're getting everything together, and that's about the best way to time things. But don't get overambitious. Remember, Thanksgiving isn't about stress, it's about, you know, enjoying the time together. I don't use the microwave to heat. I really only use my microwave to heat coffee, to melt butter, you know, that's, that's kind of— I don't want to put too much in a microwave because of what it does to food. It's just not, not what I like in terms of cooking. So, you know, I then I want to plan a little bit better. But think about what you can put in the oven, you know, what you can almost like halfway cook or cook through and then pop them, wrap them, put them in the oven. So then at the end, you're pulling out baking dishes and putting them into your serving dishes and then taking them to the table all at one time. So, well, you know, if you have any other questions or if someone wants to come in, please come on in. I have seats open. Rolls go last, that's right. And if you're going to warm up your rolls, you know, you can always pop them in pretty much just before you're— while you're taking the turkey and everything else to the table, just give them a quick warm and they're good. I also have an induction cooker. I know it's a little late this Thanksgiving, but anytime you do any kind of extra cooking, an induction cooker is good to have along with your crock pot for heating things and for getting things out to the table all at one time. I'm gonna take a break there, I was talking too much. Seriously, if anyone would like to come in, come on in, seats are open. Ask your questions. Anybody else have a question about Thanksgiving dinner? You saw me make a variety of things over the last couple weeks. Today we roasted the turkey. Yesterday we brined the turkey. I carved it, carved the turkey. Could you give the exact ingredients for your pie crust recipe? I had everything pre-measured. Well, actually, I do have it on my blog, and that's askchefdennis.com. You can get a pie crust recipe. I also did buy— you can find it on the blog. I will try and find it and send it to you then. Send me a tweet and I will, I will do that because I have a couple different pie crust recipes. But it's, it's basically, and I don't know the exact amounts, it's cold butter cut into cubes, flour, a little bit of salt, and some sugar, depending on how, what kind of a sweet crust you're making or not. That's good. Any questions about what we're doing for Thanksgiving? Some of them will have the pie crust recipe later or refer you to another page. And then again, I did buy, you know, there's nothing wrong with buying a pre, pre-made pie crust. I know you wanna make 'em gluten-free, and I have not made gluten-free pie crust, so I, I can't help you on that one. I have bought gluten-free pie crust. So tomorrow should be a good day. What are some of the side dishes everyone's making? You have any questions about what you're making? Tomorrow we're going out, but normally my table would have coleslaw because coming from a Philadelphia area, that was kind of a staple at Thanksgiving time. A lot of other people don't seem to feel that way about it, but for us, it's, uh, it If there's no coleslaw on the table, it's not really Thanksgiving. That, and it's great to have on sandwiches, you know, afterwards. We make a turkey sandwich that has stuffing, coleslaw, and I put cranberry sauce on it. Lisa doesn't like cranberry, but I put all of that on it. I also will make mashed potatoes or smashed potatoes depending upon what kind of potatoes I get. Sometimes I leave the skin on, sometimes I don't. And they're pretty easy to cook for those of you that have tried to make that, eluded the perfect mashed potato. You pretty much just want to take your potatoes and you cut them up. The problem that a lot of people have is they cut them in too small of a piece. Well, you don't want them to be like half a potato. You want it to still be a decent chunk of a potato. And you cut your potatoes up, skin or no skin, and put them in a pot. Fill it up with water about an inch or an inch and a half above where the potatoes are. Put them on the stove, bring it to a boil. As it's boiling, turn it down a little bit and just cook them till they just start to be fork tender. And when they're fork tender, you're going to drain them. And while they're draining, you're going to throw your milk and your butter into the pan or into your mixer if you're going to be using a mixer. If you're mixing a lot and you have a mixer, You know, it's probably better to use that and just add them in as you're making them and whip it in and put a little more milk in. You know, I like them chunky because, and I like them with skins because then people know that they're real potatoes, you know, and salt and pepper them. You know, I think people tend to not put enough salt and pepper in the potatoes. They should have a little taste on their own. You don't want them to be over salty, but you do want them to have some flavor. So, you know, that's how I make mashed potatoes. And anymore, when I'm making it just for the two of us, I pretty much mash them up by hand. I use a wire whip and just go to the pot and go to town with it. I was looking at a potato masher the other day thinking I should probably get that, but the whip works fine. And they're a little chunky, they're real. I can get a good enough turn on them that they still have some— they're kind of fluffy without being overly whipped. Because if you over-whip a potato, it gets starchy on you, and that's something you don't want to do. And then it kind of gets a funky flavor. So just whip them enough to make them nice and not too, uh, not too chunky. How do I keep my knives sharp? Well, I bought a knife sharpener on, uh, I think I got it at Macy's. It's a just a regular kitchen knife sharpener that you can buy. I'm trying to remember the brand, but there's really only one big brand out there. And I think I paid about $40 or $50 for it, maybe $60. I don't buy expensive knives. I have carpal tunnel, and it would be like buying really good speakers when you can't hear really well. So for me, buying a really good knife at this point isn't an important thing. I buy good knives, I buy commercial knives, and I sharpen them, and if they go bad, I throw them out and I buy a new one. So I don't feel bad about my $25 or $30 knife being replaced. But I, but I sharpen them on that, and it's important to have a good sharp knife. A lot of people just use a steel, and the steel doesn't sharpen your knife. All it does is take the burrs off of it so it feels like it's sharper, but it doesn't really sharpen it. It just makes the edges a little bit smoother. So does anyone have any questions, or anyone like to come in and talk for a little bit? I'm getting kind of talked out here. I'm having a little wine, just getting ready and joined the— enjoying the night. So feel free to take a seat. What day is it? Oh, it is Wednesday.

Woohoo!

It is Wednesday, the day before Thanksgiving. It's a big travel day. And what else would I cook for my Thanksgiving dinner? Well, I have some Brussels sprouts, and I like Brussels sprouts. And for my Brussels sprouts, depending on how big they are, I might cook them whole or I might cut them in half. And there's a couple ways to cook Brussels sprouts. I, you know, anything you roast in the oven, any kind of vegetable you roast in the oven, is wonderful. You know, olive oil, salt, pepper, sea salt and pepper in the oven, maybe a couple cloves of garlic with your vegetables and let them roast and get nice caramelized, you know, in a hot oven, maybe 350 to 400 degrees, nice caramelized flavor.

Or—

excuse me— or you can, if you cut them in half, Or if you do them whole, you can give them a quick blanch in water and then sauté them. Or if they're in half, you may not have to do that. You can just sauté them. And that's when I like to throw some bacon into at that point, maybe some onion or a little leek in it. And, you know, think about your vegetables, what you can add to them that'll make them just a little different without getting crazy, without adding sauces and a lot of fat or calories to them. I tend to do all my vegetables in olive oil when I cook them, whether they're sautéed or whether they're in the oven. Leave the butter off, you know, the oil is a little bit better for you. Not that, you know, I do use butter. I don't think there's anything terrible with it. Hey Susan, come on in if you're there and want to stop in and say hello. Tell me how you're doing, or if you're just listening. Yeah, but olive oil is a good way to cook vegetables. So Brussels sprouts, I have them. I may just roast them. I think I'm gonna roast them because we're gonna have our sit-down here Friday. So we'll have mashed potatoes, the Brussels sprouts. Someone was asking me what to do with green beans that's a little different, you know, other than almonds or making the green bean casserole. And I like green beans, you know, I like to parcook them a little bit, boil them, and then sauté them with some— and, you know, with just salt and pepper and olive oil again. And then when you're finished, I'll have toasted some pine nuts. Pine nuts are wonderful. You put them in a pan, in a hot pan, and let them toast a little bit. Let them get— you'll start to smell the nuts roasting a little. Take them off. And then when you're going to serve, sprinkle some roasted pine nuts on them. You can take a zester and zest a little bit of— orange or lemon on them. Other good thing to use is maybe if you want to caramelize up some leeks and, you know, mix those in. And I wouldn't necessarily cook them together and toss them, but you want to think about a presentation when you're serving. And when you put them in your serving tray, you know, you— because you can make all these garnishes up ahead of time— have some chopped parsley, have some chopped mint, Have some chopped basil if you think it's appropriate, or some sage or some fresh vegetables. Have little bowls of these set up. Have some salt and pepper out ready to use. So have all these little garnishes set up for when you're ready to start serving. You don't have to do it. You can get them all ready ahead of time. You can put them in your refrigerator if they're cold. Parsley and all that stuff will hold chopped for at least a day. And the zest, zest from an orange or zest from a lemon or zest from a lime and have them set up. And then when you go to serve your different vegetables, you can like sprinkle some of these on top of them when you're taking them to the table. Caramelize your leeks, you know, you want to get those probably right before, you know, the last half hour or so. That's something you couldn't do too far ahead of time. But if you want to candy some walnuts or pecans, very simple, you know, we're gonna start with a little butter, some brown sugar in a pan, and just toast your walnuts or pecans in there with them. Put a little cinnamon or a little chili chili powder in them if you want to kick up the nuts a little bit. And, you know, that way you can have those ready and then on the side to dress up something that you're doing. And do you prepare zest in advance and freeze it? No, I don't freeze it because once you freeze it, it's going to break down, get soft and ugly. You can zest ahead of time, but I wouldn't do it too, too far, a couple of hours at the most. But I would not freeze it because it'll get funky. It's too much moisture. And anytime you freeze something with that much liquid, it's going to get ugly real fast. So I'm Chef Dennis Littley and this is a Thanksgiving Q&A, and I'm having a glass of wine and asking your questions about what you're doing. If you have any questions, you know, or you'd like to come in, seats are open. Come on in and join me. Happy to have some company. Tell me what your, what your favorite side dishes are, or what you're gonna be serving. If you have any questions for Thanksgiving, this is a good time to ask. Any last-minute jitters about what you're preparing tomorrow? I think the most important thing, a bit of advice I can give everyone, is to kind of take a deep breath tomorrow, calm down, And remember what you're thankful for as you're getting your dinner ready. And remember that, you know, this is a celebration, you're with family and friends, and not to get too stressed out and enjoy the day. The other bit of advice would be when the turkey comes out of the oven to make sure you give it about 20 minutes before you cut into it, okay? And that's where you have time to get the rest of your dinner together. Chef, oyster dressing, is it best prepared tonight? If you're going to make oyster dressing, I would set it up tonight and then bake it tomorrow. And that's pretty much true for any dressing. You know, that's something you can make ahead of time, have in your baking dish and ready to go into the oven. And that's, that's probably going to take— that's probably going to take a good hour and a half, an hour at least for stuffing to get done right. So make sure you time it right, you cover it, get a little, you know, make sure you use enough butter in your regular stuffings, whatever you're making, and plan them out, you know, cover them when they go in, uncover them a little towards the end so they get a little bit of brown. Something else you can do ahead of time is you can candy carrots. Don't overcook them or don't cook them all the way and then finish them in the oven, let them sit in there and get a little caramelized in the oven. Baked sweet potatoes are always wonderful, and it's something really simple too. You can cook up some sweet potatoes just like you would regular potatoes, regular baked potatoes, and then don't serve a whole one. It's a lot for people to eat, but cut them in half or cut them in quarters and let someone have like a quarter of a baked sweet potato. Finally got on. Hey Susan, come on in if you want. We're just talking about her. I'm just talking away. There she is. Good to see you. Have you ever made Morton Thompson's turkey? No, but I've heard about it. Have you made that before? I have heard about his turkey and I heard it is like legendary, but I have not made it. This is my first year dry brining a turkey. And I was ecstatic over how it came out. It was really, really good, and that was with just 1 day dry brine. Dry brine is supposed to take, you know, at least 2 days, preferably 3 days, but I only got 1 day out of it. I don't know what's going on, Susan. I'm gonna back you out and make you a co-host and see if we can get you back in here again. Let's make you Co-host. There you go. All right, you're a co-host now, so you should be able to come back in. Um, think of a deep-fried turkey. Well, I've had— not had deep-fried turkeys. I have seen deep-fried turkeys, uh, and I know they have a new fryer now that doesn't take hardly any oil at all. Uh, so, uh, I have not tried that, but I know a lot of people swear on them. I swear about them. And yes, with some success. The person's oven I use required lots of cleaning. Hey there.

Hi, do I look a little different?

You do. I do.

I cut off all my blonde, my platinum hair.

You look younger.

I went natural.

Well, it's good. Yeah, I was wondering who stole Susan's computer. I thought maybe you were a daughter. Well, you could have kind of thought you were a daughter there for a minute. You look younger.

Thank you. Yeah, good, good. That's good. So I have— I'm in the middle of a little break. I'm pacing myself.

Okay.

Which is a good thing to do. You know, otherwise, you know what? I feel like if you look at the forest, you know, you can get overwhelmed, you know, with everything that has to be done.

Absolutely.

So I'm trying to look at the trees.

Yeah, and you're in a good spot to look at the trees because you have quite a nice view from your home.

Yes, yes. And now it's all lights and everything else. So my stock is simmering away.

Okay, I have my bones on the stove from deboning the turkey. That went very well. I was pleased. I didn't cut anything that I needed off, and it worked really well. The turkey was really good with the the dry brine.

It looks great.

Oh my God, it was really tasty. I was surprised because it's my first dry brine.

So yeah, I mean, me too. I dry brined it and, you know, put it upside down. And for those of you who didn't know that, that's what, you know, you recommended yesterday, I think, to put it upside down. And I've never done it before. So I look, you know, I look forward to doing that.

Now, the only thing I had happen was, although the skin didn't tear when I was putting the butter under it, I think now the dry brine will make the skin less pliable. So I did get two tears in the breast skin, I think, when I turned it over.

Oh, okay.

Just so you know that before you roast it, I don't know if you have any cheesecloth in the house.

I think I do.

But if you soak the cheesecloth in butter and put it under it, so when you turn it, it might keep your skin intact.

But, you know, I was wondering, and I missed the 5 o'clock, your 5 o'clock show. I was wondering, should I have put butter and things under the skin before I brined it?

I did. I did it while I was— and you can still go in now and do it. I mean, you, you could have put some butter. The only place I put butter was under— on top of the breast, in between the skin for the breast and the turkey, because the thigh meat stays pretty good. It really doesn't get dried out, and it cooked a lot more evenly because I started it rear end up, you know, bottom up, and it got the— the dark meat got to cook a little bit more being up than the breast would have. So I think it came out well that way. And that's, you know, I've cooked them that way before, so that wasn't a surprise. But the dry brine, like I said, considering it was only one day, was really good.

Yeah, mine will be just one day too. And then, you know what I did? I sous vide. The boneless turkey breast. I sous vide it just before, and then you put it in an ice bath so it quickly gets cold, you know, so it doesn't hang around in that yucky temperature, you know. And then tomorrow I'll just put it in the sous vide bath to warm it up. And I'm not sure how I'll brown the skin. I could even— I could either sauté it on a— cast iron pan, or else I guess I could put it in the oven.

Well, maybe a cast iron pan would be wonderful. You could, you know, season it up with, you know, whatever kind of flavors you want to have on it, or some, some sugar always helps because it caramelizes— a little brown sugar with it. Or you can put it under the broiler, and just as long as you watch it, you're careful.

But, uh, the—

actually, the, the cast iron pan might be the best way to go.

Interesting.

Okay.

Yeah.

Just, you know, and then you can flop it over on the other side to heat it up through. I mean, you can do both sides and you can keep an eye on it. Again, might be the best way to go. And, you know, people are—

go ahead.

Yeah, no, I was gonna say people are worried about their turkey not being real hot. Well, you know, turkey is one of those things that does not have to be steaming hot and is actually better it's not really, really hot. But you wanna have your gravy really, really hot. Okay, and that—

You know that you're so, you're always so right because that's the last thing. I will not put the gravy on the table until everyone's seated.

Yep.

I'm that fanatic about it. It has to be hot. Yep.

And here we have Robert B. just wants to know what sous vide gadget do you use?

I have the one called, I think it's called Anova, A-N-O-V-A. I think it's about $150 and I use it a lot. I use it a lot and I'm crazy about it.

Yeah, you sous vide all kinds of things.

I do, and so what I didn't, what others may not know is that I have a 17-pound regular turkey Plus I have this boneless breast as well, just because I didn't want a gigantic turkey and I didn't want 2 turkeys. So I figured this is, you know, white meat's always good for leftovers.

Absolutely, 'cause you can use it for sandwiches, you can use it for anything. And people tend to go for the white meat more with turkey and with chicken even, although I think there's more flavor in the dark meat. Hey, Jana, why don't you come in? Come on in. I see you plussing us there, or giving us props. I saw you change your name on Twitter too. I saw that. I hope everything's right. Go get your headset. Sounds good. Anybody else wants to come in, come on, pop in and ask some questions. We're just doing a quick Q&A. I'm having a glass of wine, relaxing. You don't see me drink very often. This is one of those—

some big round glass.

I know, isn't it? Oh, that's so I can pretend I know what I'm doing and I can swirl.

Right, right. Well, you got the swirl anyway. What are you drinking? What kind?

It's a red blend. It's nothing great. It's called Dark Horse. I tend to buy— I'm not a discriminating wine drinker or any kind of wine critic, so I tend to buy not the lowest price wine, but something that's reasonably priced. Generally on sale is a good thing too. But I've been going towards red blends. I don't drink a lot of whites. I do prefer red, and I'll tend to be— get a blend rather than a specific grape because it reminds me more like the best wines I ever had were in Europe when you got just table wines, when they were pouring like jug wines or something out for you in the back. They were just the best.

I know, I know, it's true. So you have a good question there.

Robert says every time he sees me, I have a glass of wine. Well, you haven't seen me too often then, because every show I do in the afternoon, I never drink. So you've caught me just as the right time, Robert. And we had a question about favorite ways to use leftovers. This is the first time. Okay, leftovers. Well, Croquettes are one of Lisa's favorite ways for us to use leftovers. I make turkey croquettes.

Well, hello!

How are you?

I'm good.

Jonna, do you know Susan?

Well, I've watched— I don't know that we've met, but I watch a lot of these Blabs either live or on replay, so I feel like I know you. Good to meet you!

Great to meet you. Happy Thanksgiving!

Yes, you too, for sure.

So how are things in Utah?

Things in Utah are well. I'm actually preparing to have 61 people over tomorrow. No way! It's true. In fact, maybe I'll just turn my laptop around and you can see how many tables we've got here that are set up.

Oh my God.

Wow. Oh, there's my daughter. So that's just some of them. Then they continue on. There's my husband preparing. You've seen the kitchen.

Yeah, and this is the upstairs kitchen.

Yes, this is the upstairs kitchen.

There's a downstairs kitchen as well with a pass-through bar to the hot tub and a theater room.

That's true.

And a bar. She's got a sports bar in her basement.

I do. And you need to come do your cooking show here one day, right?

I will. Oh my God, if I come to Utah, it'll be just for you. Awesome.

Do you ski?

No, I don't, but I watch.

Okay. I have met a lot of people on Blab that ski that are going to come pass through and stay here.

Yeah, I'd be more inclined to come when the weather was nice, the flowers were blooming, and I could go out in the mountains and twirl and sing "The Hills Are Alive." Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, we've got a really fun garden, so I would say May and June are the prettiest here, for sure.

That sounds like a planet.

Where in Utah are you?

What's that?

Where in Utah are you?

Right in the middle of Salt Lake City.

Oh, okay, beautiful. I used to have some friends, I can't remember the name of the town. It's one of the suburbs, very well known. Maybe it began with the W. I don't know. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. But, um, yeah, beautiful country.

Yeah, it really is. It's, it's gorgeous. And we're lucky enough to live on an acre by one of the rivers that passes right down the center of Salt Lake City. So we've got a fun piece of property that doesn't have any neighbors around and stuff. It's cool.

Very nice. Very nice. So what are you serving special tomorrow? Anything, uh, really fun?

Well, the thing is, since we have so many people coming over, everyone does their own thing. Meaning, um, we've got— I have 3 of my aunts making turkeys.

Okay.

And so everybody kind of has their own assignment, and they bring a lot of one thing, and that's kind of the tradition. And this used to be at my parents' home in Park City. It's all my mom. My mom has 8 siblings, and they all live in Salt Lake City. And so Yeah, it is kind of cool. So it's my mom's side of the family. So it's all my aunts and uncles and all of their kids that are my age and all of their kids. So it totals this year 61, which is less than we usually have, actually. Yeah, I know. It used to be my parents' home in Park City. And then my dad unexpectedly passed away 2 years ago. And it was right at the time where this house was built, which was is definitely big enough to be able to host everyone. So that was quite a blessing that we could move the festivities to my house and host everyone here and have a good time. But so everybody brings their own thing, and I usually do the lemon meringue pies. Ooh. Yeah. So I love, love, love doing that. So—

Now, how many of those do you make?

I make 4. I make a— 3 for the people and then, sorry, I'm just moving out of this noise. I'm not sure I can get away from the noise. There's people coming over. I make, so I make 3 for the festivities and then 1 for the leftovers.

Okay, that's good. Gotta have that.

Yeah, exactly. So I love Thanksgiving. It's so fun.

I made pumpkin rolls this year. I haven't made them in a while.

Is that the one that you put the mascarpone cheese in the middle? Yes, I saw that and I actually bookmarked it on my computer so that I can check it out.

Oh my God, it was too good. I made a gluten-free one to take with us tomorrow where we're going to eat as a gluten-free Thanksgiving.

Oh, you're kidding.

My friend Chef Bob cooks all gluten-free and so that's, that's going to be fun. And the regular pumpkin roll was amazing. It was so Moist and rich.

It looked— I know, I showed it to my daughter, I showed it to my husband, it looked fantastic.

Oh, that is so cool, that is so cool. I love what you're doing on Blab, and as a matter of fact, I'm trying to remember who it was last night. Oh, I was on Joel Comm and Vincenzo Landino's Blab Talk live show.

Yep.

And they were asking me what some of my— we were all just discussing different you know, people who use Blab in a really unique way, and your name came up, and it was really fun to brag about you. Everybody was— about how you use the multiple cameras and that kind of thing, so it was cool.

Oh, he's like, you know, an innovator. I mean, I'm just following, you know. He is just— he really began, I think, those multiple cameras, and, you know, it just brings it to life.

And you're using your, your version of screen share now without any, uh, third-party apps by just moving the, the camera over to the other computer screen. Yeah, so we've got that down too. So we, we have, we have defied the odds on that. We have made this, and I refuse to use those third-party apps. I don't want to muddy this up. You know, people are coming on with Manycam and these other things, and I don't like— I didn't like them on Hangouts. I certainly don't like them on Black Hat.

Yeah, I mean, why complicate it, you know? Yeah.

And the people on Hangouts are going crazy right now because evidently it's really hard to start one.

They're—

yeah, they're transitioning or doing something, and how you start and set up events and, you know, I think—

so it's more difficult?

Well, yeah, they're streamlining it, they're changing it, they've removed it. Like, if you haven't been on Google lately, Google Google is all different now, their profile page has changed and it's a little less intuitive for us to use it.

Oh.

Based on how we used to use it but possibly for new users easier, I don't know.

You know it's really funny, as soon as they changed I went to check it out and I kind of took a little break from Google+ but when I saw the new changes I went back to it. I like it. I like the collections. I have 4 collections, which is just a really, um, an elegant page to put your interests. And you know, I, I like it. I think it's great. It's kind of attracting me back to it.

Well, I get 300, 400, 500 notifications a day now again on Google.

Oh my word.

I know. I mean, it had dropped off. To, you know, almost nothing. And with the collections now, I'm back the way it was when things were prime.

Oh, interesting.

Yeah, I'm getting hundreds of followers a day and people going back through my collections to all my old recipes. I'm getting action on recipes that are like a year and a half old.

Oh, that's fantastic.

Yeah, so it's just a matter of getting them out there and using them, you know. So it's not— it's changing. Google is an ever-changing entity.

Yeah.

And you think it's a social media, you're going to be disappointed. But if you use it as the tool that it is and take a deep breath every time they change and go, I'm one with the universe, you know, it kind of makes sense to me.

It doesn't— it's not trying to be Facebook now. It's about focused interests, you know, between the communities and the collections. I don't know, it seems more organized to me. You know, you can really filter out the noise. You can have the noise if you want, or you can filter it out. I, you know, it makes more sense.

Yeah.

So, you know, I'm saying it's not going away, it's hanging in there, and I'm certainly not going to walk away from it with what I have compared to the following. Yeah, I'm closing in on a million, and I'm going to wait till I do.

That's good.

Yeah, I still have 100-some thousand to go, but this is as close— I think I can see the tunnel now. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Wow, that is amazing. That is amazing. So at the beginning of this Blab, I was working on some of my Black Friday stuff for my company as well as getting ready for setting those tables. So what did you do today?

What did I do today?

Yeah, here on Blab.

Oh, okay. At 12 o'clock, I showed how to roast a turkey.

Yesterday, right?

That was at 5 o'clock.

Okay, my husband was watching that one.

Yeah, I broke it down. I broke— and you know, it was so, it was so easy. And it's been a while since I've just broken a turkey down after cooking it too. I usually don't break it down until after we're done eating it. I haven't broken one down prior to eating in a couple years, and it always amazes me how easy it is to do. You know, granted, I've done it a lot, but still I'm like, "Ah, this looks too easy. I should make it look a little more difficult. People are gonna think, you know, anybody can do this." Well, you can, you know. It's all about gravity, letting gravity take over in a lot of situations. That's how I learned to cut meat. Like, we would hang meat up, and the butcher would say, you know, you start and you let gravity take over as you're coming down the joint. So you're really not working as it's hard, you know, you have to let nature help you sometimes. And, and with the turkey, the same way, finding the joints, finding the creases, crack it, you know, break it a little if you can't find it, and then go in, uh, simple.

Yeah. So tell me what your plans are tomorrow.

Well, tomorrow I'm going to Chef Bob's house, and I think there's gonna be 6 or 8 of us there, and it's a gluten-free Thanksgiving, and, uh, be having fun with him. Over there. He's got a pup, so I'll be able to have a dog around as we miss our babies. Um, and, um, that'll be it. Laying low. I'm gonna hopefully watch Dallas not embarrass itself. Yeah, but other than that, uh, you know, just an easy day. Nothing big planned. And Susan, how many people you have coming over?

Um, I think we're gonna be 12, so not, not a big crowd. You know, my sister, my kids, you know, my two grandkids, uh, you know, so it'll kind of be just us. And but, you know, I'm in full production over here. In fact, I gotta jump off and, you know, do whatever I have to do. I don't know, this next phase. Yeah, back to work. But, um, yeah, so I'm looking forward to it. I love it. Favorite holiday. So then, so happy Thanksgiving, everyone.

Happy Thanksgiving. And we had one last question is, do you find your Thanksgiving meal traditions change when you move to different parts of the country? And I, like I said, with coleslaw, I found down here no one really eats coleslaw. But, you know, I did do it. So I mean, that was the only real change in it for me. Do you, have you gone in different parts of the country and seen anything, Jana?

Or— Yeah, I mean, I grew up here in Utah and I obviously live here in Utah again, but I lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for 4 years. And I didn't really notice any change because either family would come visit us and I would cook only the Utah way that I knew. And then, or, you know, I would fly back to Utah. So I didn't really discover anything different. But I kind of wish that I would have, instead of like the years that I stayed at our home and I just made dinner for the family. Sometimes I wish I would have actually ventured out because Silicon Valley has so much diversity with so many different cultures that I really love to learn about. So I think I missed some opportunity there to learn some cool stuff.

Well, I'm half Mexican. I don't know if I ever, if you knew that or—

No.

Yeah, and my wife is Polish and we'd have her family over and I always threatened to stuff the turkey with beans and rice.

That actually sounds excellent.

Not that I would— not that I— yeah, not that she said not to her family. I would ever do that, but I mean, I was always saying, yeah, I'm gonna get a piñata, you know, we're gonna have a piñata. You know, her family, we had a butter lamb, and God bless her soul, her mother had this butter lamb that had seen about 5 East— thank you, but it didn't— that had seen 5 holidays, and pretty soon you can't really tell it even is a lamb anymore. It just looks like a— because she'd put it back in the freezer. She wouldn't— we're allowed to use it. That they'd save that butter lamb. It was $1.49. You know, you can't keep buying those things. Wow. But yeah, I would always tease her with that. But, you know, Thanksgiving, I think, is pretty traditional and Thanksgiving. And yeah, except for a few different twists and turns that people might add their ethnic part to it. You know, or spices to it. Maybe, I know some Mexicans will make some mole, and that would be wonderful with turkey.

Yum. You know what? You'll appreciate this, Chef. This year I grew pasillo bahío peppers in my garden, 2 plants. I started them from seed, and I dehydrated them in the oven. And those are the ones you use for mole, correct?

Yes.

And so I've never made mole, and I've never grown that pepper, but I did them specifically to make mole. So now I have— 2 full freezer bags, Ziplocs, filled with perfectly dehydrated pasillo peppers.

Well, they're, they're waiting for something. You're gonna have to give them— you know, I have not ever made mole by myself, so, okay, I, you know, that might be a show we need to do. Maybe we could do one together and make mole.

Let's do it.

Yeah, do it, because I love it.

Lasts a long time. I'll save them till you get out here one day.

There you go. That is definitely a taste of my childhood. You know, there's certain things I remember that my grandmother would make that, you know, I hadn't had in years. Or I remember going into a Mexican bakery one time, just stumbling across it and seeing pan de dulce, pan dulce, and different things and almost crying because I hadn't seen these things since I was a kid, since I was little.

So, oh, wow. Well, so mole is pretty difficult.

Right?

It is.

That's why I haven't made it. I keep looking at the recipe going, oh, hell no.

Yeah, I just figured, you know, as I started to research it last year and then I discovered that you needed the pasillo pepper, I thought, you know what, I'm going to— I'm going to grow this stuff and see what I can do with it. But I grow so many peppers because I make all my own Tabasco sauce. I do all my own cayenne peppers. I grow almost 12 cayenne pepper plants.

Oh, wow.

Yeah. And I make my own red hot chili pepper flakes as well as cayenne pepper. Obviously, it's just blended more, right? Same thing. But it is so much better than the store-bought. It just has that roasted flavor that's just incredible. Yeah.

Even just doing your own spices. I mean, buying the whole spice when you can find them, the the nuts or the seeds or whatever you're gonna use and then grinding 'em up fresh, you know, toasting 'em and grinding 'em makes such a big difference. You know, fresh herbs as opposed to some of the dried ones. Now, some dried herbs have their place. I mean, there's a place you'd use 'em rather than fresh to get the different kind of flavor. But fresh herbs and spices are just, you know, ah, add so much to it. And the aromatics, the aromatics are what get you, you know, just, having them in the room with you.

Ah, it's wonderful. Totally. You know what else I did this year? I've got a tremendous amount of jalapeño plants because we love to do jalapeño poppers and I love to do jalapeño jelly and pickled halps and everything. So this year we decided to do something new with the inside of the jalapeños when you gut them to, you know, make poppers. So I would dry all of the seeds and the lining and then grind it up with sea salt, and we just made jalapeño salt. Ooh. And I am telling you what, it is freaking delicious.

I bet.

It is just— the flavor it adds, just a subtle amount of heat, but then since they're homegrown jalapeños, you actually get like the pepper flavor. Oh my word.

Have you used that salt for margaritas?

No! Best idea I've ever heard.

That's where my mind went right away.

Oh my word, I am so happy you said that.

There you go. I know I do have every now and then I do have a gem or two.

That is a gem. That is a gem. Oh my word.

I have a—

my son is— my oldest son is 21 and he's really into cooking. Cooking as well. And, um, he's actually the one that said, Mom, let's dry this and see if we can make like a salt out of it. And so now he's really into the, you know, which kind of sea salt we're using. It has to be the special one from France.

Yeah.

Anyway, so he's going to be really stoked at that suggestion. Oh, cool.

And, and then you want to try to smoke your salt sometimes.

I have a Traeger. Okay. The Traeger grill.

Because that'll add a little different kind of— I mean, it doesn't have to be the jalapeño, but you can try and smoke some for different flavors. And they're good on sweets. So if you get like a different kind of smoked salt, like where you see a salted caramel or something. So that's when it's really going to be pronounced when you have something like that.

Yes.

Oh my word. I can't wait.

Now, you know what I made? I candied some cranberries. I don't do them that often. But have you ever candied cranberries?

I have not.

Well, it's easy. It just— you, you make a simple syrup and it's just like equal parts of water and sugar, like a cup and a half of each. Yeah. Boil it down and then pour it over your cranberries. And I threw a couple of pieces of orange in there and you let them sit overnight. And then in the morning you take them out, you put them on a wire rack and let them get a little dry and then you roll them in sugar.

Oh.

And they are wonderful. Now you take that simple syrup. Now I made 2 batches with the same syrup. I'm going to take that syrup, I'm going to cook it down a little bit when I'm done with it, when the other batch is done, and then I'm going to use it for cocktails with cranberry-flavored simple syrup.

That sounds incredible.

Yeah, so you know, you got to find uses for everything, you know, you— it's, uh, not wasteful, you know.

It's true. It's true. Even the baguettes, you know, if they go a little bit bad, then, then, you know, breadcrumbs, that kind of crumbs, or toast them and have them have toasted garlic bread pieces with them, or melba toast.

There we go. I was trying to think of that. It's always something to do with stuff. I just did a post for, of all people, Hidden Valley, and they didn't want me to use their stuff. All they wanted me to do was a post on not wasting vegetables. It was, um, Taste Not Waste is their campaign.

Oh, that's very cool.

So I had some vegetables that had seen better days, but you know, they weren't dead, they were just more pretty anymore. So that was it, and that's all they wanted. I thought that was pretty cool, you know, not pushing their name out. They're not making you use their product. They just want to get across to people that, you know, that just because they're not pretty doesn't mean they're bad.

Absolutely. I love that. Yeah, that's right up my alley. I dig that.

Yeah, I like that. That was pretty good.

Yeah.

So every now and then I get one of those. All right, well, this has been great, but I, you know, I guess we're done. It was so nice getting to spend some time with you.

Absolutely. Happy Thanksgiving to you.

Happy Thanksgiving. And I will make it out there one of these days, and we're gonna definitely have some fun and party in there. And enjoy that kitchen of yours making some mole.

Yes, we should. I would love that. Happy Thanksgiving to you and everybody watching.

Everyone. All right, bye-bye.

All right, cheers.

Cheers.