I think I turned into a professional eater over the holidays. At one point, I was so full of cheese ball that I couldn’t even think about dairy. There were several things I wanted to share with you, but I just didn’t have time. I was busy being a glutton, and now I’m trying to remember that other people in the world need food, so I shouldn’t be such a pig. Also, I was busy cooking, buying (locally!) and making presents, wrapping presents, doing extra work work since I had missed quite a bit from being sick, and, of course, attending parties. Now that life has gone back to normal (no holidays to prepare for, no work to make up, no illness to keep me in bed), I’d like to share some of the pictures and recipes with you.
First, the Thanksgiving feast: Tofurkey with homemade vegetarian gravy, mashed potatoes, cranberry jam, steamed green beans with pine nuts and Greek oregano, and bourbon sweet potatoes with walnuts.
The cranberry jam is simple, and if you double or triple the recipe, you’ll have enough to can for gifts. Heidi Swanson shares the recipe on her blog, 101 Cookbooks, but, as she notes, it’s originally from Falling Cloudberries, a gorgeous, gorgeous cookbook by Tessa Kiros. It can also be made with lingonberries if you can find them.
I relied heavily on 101 Cookbooks this Thanksgiving. You really can’t go wrong with any of Heidi’s recipes. For dessert, I made two of her pies. The first is essentially chocolate cheesecake, which she found under the name “Heavenly Pie” in Country Wisdom and Know-How and tweaked to get it just right. You’d never know it’s full of tofu. Seriously. It was divine, especially with hand-whipped cream sweetened ever so slightly with vanilla and agave nectar.
The second is Spice-kissed Pumpkin Pie with a rich layer of toasted hazelnut paste that adds depth and a nice contrast to the spices. A photo of the finished pie sits atop this post. I really wish I had some now.
If that’s not enough for you, behold my dining-room table laden with cookies. Some friends and I got together and had a baking party. We licked spoons while arguing over Twilight (Team Edward, of course), laughed over burnt cookies and X-rated shortbread men, sipped mulled wine, and boxed up treats for gifts.
I made Pine Nut Rosemary Shortbread, from Heidi yet again.
And Balsamic Chocolate Drops from Fatfree Vegan. SusanV offers an adapted recipe from Habeas Brulee and a fat-free version. I tried the latter, which used prune puree as a fat replacement. These were good, but they don’t do well after the first day. Eat them at once, warm and cakey, or try to the first version.
The rest of these sweets were made by my friends, who went above and beyond to get that perfect foodie sugar high.
Rum balls
Caramel-filled chocolate cookies
Three kinds of gingerbread cookies: pear, crystallized ginger, and cranberry jam
Pecan balls
Cranberry pistachio shortbread
Not shown individually but included in the group picture are lavender honey-liquer sugar cookies, cranberry rosemary sugar cookies, peanut-butter fudge, macaroons, and some kind of cookie made from white-chocolate chips, candied fruit, and potato chips. Wooh, that’s a lot of baking. Hungry yet?
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