Ever since Mom bought me a subscription to Cook's Illustrated five years ago, I've become obsessed with trying new things with one exception: candy. It's sticky, messy, gloppy, easily burned, hard to bring to the right consistency, and is a total pain to clean up. At least that's what I thought.
Serious Eats featured this recipe on their weekly e-mail blast earlier this month. It seemed easy and I decided to give it a shot. Sunday night yielded caramel soup, thanks to my lazy replacement of "1/2 cup maple syrup" with "1/2 cup of Mrs. Plasticworth's". I had a feeling, about halfway through the last step, that I should have paid attention to Cook's Illustrated's quarterly reiteration that "kitchen science" should never be overlooked. The icky fake syrup that my mom abhorred, preferring the "real stuff" that came in the glass bottle, produced a relatively thin and syrupy concotion that didn't even set in the refrigerator. I dumped it in the trash can (which, in retrospect, was a less than adequate solution) and tried again Monday night. That worked out a LOT better and the entire first (successful) batch ended up in the tummies of my coworkers. Wednesday's batch was even better; I had a way better idea of what it was supposed to look like after I mastered the uneven burner's intricacies. Unfortunately, my "stop the drip" reflex gave me a potential second degree burn on my index finger and made me fling caramel all over the kitchen (and my neck). 4 hours of ice-water submersion later, I had the equivalent of a sunburn on my finger and a wax-paper-wrapped batch of 37 maple syrup caramels.
Mom let me in the kitchen, kind of, this year and I made the turkey again. Part of the reason I say "kind of" is because, in Richmond, the Ukrop's Kitchen routinely provides the holiday fixings. My carrots didn't turn out so well because I got distracted and forgot to cover them in the oven... never, ever roast carrots without a loose aluminum foil or askew glass lid covering them. The turkey was a lot better - like, one of the better ones I've ever made. I separated the skin from the breast all the way down to the base, and smeared some butter in between the skin and the meat. I tried a rub of some herbs, spices, dried garlic/onions, and sage - but with my greasy hands it didn't work too well. I ended up liberally dousing the buttered turkey in this mixture while adding water to the pan. Not really sure what temperature at which is was cooked - it was supposed to be at 350 in the oven by itself but, as usual, the sides were crammed into the oven as well. An attempt to change the temperature of the oven was not well-received and the turkey ended up taking a little longer than expected; the skin wasn't as crispy as it would have been if I'd broiled it the last 10 minutes but I didn't have the luxury of a warming oven for the sides. Despite the minor obstacles in the path to turkey enlightenment, it actually turned out really well - and Dad liked it too :-)
2010 Thanksgiving highlights: Aunt Joanne's homemade tiramisu, my turkey, Shari's banana bread, Dad's accidentally frozen wine, and whatever that mead was in Mom's refrigerator. Nom nom nom!
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