Having A Smashing Thanksgiving

Well, as you may or may not have noticed, it was Thanksgiving last week.However, we were still reeling from Clark's unfortunate moment of incarceration and his troubles with Henri Petit and the now-disgraced Officer Sixpack Bicep and were too tired to do anything about Turkey Day Dinner. However, the Unbelievababes were on hand, saw how down in the dumps we were and pulled out all the stops to make our Thanksgiving a pleasant and happy one.

It was unseasonably warm on Thursday here in Stiletto Flats, so Barby Kewribbs whipped out the charcoal grill and got some spatchcocked pheasant starters sizzling and getting our mouths watering.

Then the beautiful Sue Donymm surprised us with some whoppers, glistening and moist and ready to be tasted. Turkeys, that is.

There were some lovely side dishes prepared by the delightful Jill O'Salad...

and the groaning board was a sight to behold.

The whole thing was so enjoyable that we completely forgot about all that unpleasantness with Petit.

Well, almost completely. Clark spent a couple hours playing his newest favourite video game - The Unbelievables (in stores just in time for Christmas, folks!) - specifically the special level named Clark's Defenestration Station where you can relive again and again some of Clark's best out-of-window-kicking-and-chuckings (see below).

Ciao!

Cheers!

As one third of The Unbelievables, for me half the fun of the cooking process leading up to Thanksgiving itself is the socialization. The preparation of all things edible demands discussion ... suggestion ... and the display and implementation of the vast knowledge gained during comestible formation. (More fun? Passing along some of those culinary tricks and recipes, too.)

While Clark got us stuffed and Jeff breaded us, in the same (sort of) vein it rests on my shoulders to put the cheer in everyones' "Cheers!"

Yep ... I'm talking cocktails.

Sure, you can uncap your favorite brew or pop the cork on a bottle of wine, but where's the adventure in that? With a minimal of effort you can put a few imbibical concoctions to task and wow guests who have gathered in your home to mooch a free meal! Added bonus! The processes involved in putting these aperitifs together are so simple even our "directionally challenged" foes can whip them up. Here we go ...

Sangria. Who doesn't like sangria? (No one I know of.) It's a no-brainer to elevate this popular fruity wine into a tasty cocktail ...

Ingredients:
Carlo Rossi Sangria (Available in various size bottles as well as humongous jug containers practically guaranteed to prevent running out!)
Squirt
orange juice
crushed ice
fruit garnish: slices of orange / lime / lemon, strawberry or, really, whatever trips your fancy

Directions: Into a tall glass with ice, fill 3/4 full with sangria. Add Squirt and orange juice in equal measure to top off the glass. Stir. Add fruit garnish directly into mix. (Or get all fancy and arrange on the glass rim. Fancified!) Makes 1 serving. You can also make a full pitcher (or more!) portioning the ingredients accordingly.

Ginger Cocktail (Not for redheads only!) Perfect for Thanksgiving, the night before Thanksgiving, during dessert, Black Friday morning inspiration, whatever.

Ingredients:
2 fresh cranberries, washed and patted dry
2 pieces crystallized ginger
2 ounces chilled cranberry juice or its varieties
Chilled prosecco or champagne

Directions: Add cranberries and ginger to decorative champagne flute, add cranberry juice. Top with prosecco or champagne. Makes 1 serving.

Classic Cape Codder

Ingredients:
6 ounces chilled cranberry juice
1 1/2 ounces vodka
1 lime wedge

Directions: Pour liquids into a tall glass filled with ice. Squeeze lime into mixture and stir. Makes 1 serving.

See? Incredibly simple stuff. You'll be a hero! And ... ply your guests (or that annoying relative who does nothing but complain) with enough pre-dinner drinks and they'll forget all about the fact you forgot to make a green bean casserole with those crunch onions on top.

Skoal! 

And Happy Thanksgiving from The Unbelievables ... !!!

Get Saucy

Today it's my turn to share my culinary pièce de resistance, my coup de grâce, my je ne sais quoi... and for me, being English born and raised, it's not about the turkey, the veg or the potatoes, it's about sauce. Cranberry is well-known to most Americans, so I'll focus on my favourite sauce, which is also dead easy.


It's called bread sauce and this is because it is the sole remaining remnant of medieval cookery that we Brits still make on a regular basis.

You see, back in the day, medieval cooks would use up day-old bread by adding the breadcrumbs to sauce in order to thicken them. Sensible idea - waste not, want not.

Bread sauce is made with milk, onion, cloves, butter and bread. Here's what you do. 

I take a couple of decent-sized onions, cut off the tops and bottoms and peel them. Then, take some cloves and use them to stud the onions in a ring around each one, about a third of the way up the side. Sit the studded onions in a saucepan and fill it with milk to about two-thirds of the way up the side of the onions, and then simmer on a low heat until the onions are soft. This is the bit that throws people off now - discard the onions. What you have now is hot milk infused with clove and onion flavour. 


Take some slices of white bread and remove the crust, then break the slices into little pieces and add to the hot milk. Stir every so often till you get a sort of thick custardy consistency, then  take a potato masher and mash the mixture a few times to break up any large bread pieces. Add a knob of butter and stir in. Et voila! Bread sauce! The best thing for turkey and taters, believe you me. Try it, you'll wonder how you ate turkey without it.

If that sounds too complicated, you can buy bread sauce mix in a packet, ready-made, but really, how lazy are you? 

How about you just go all-out and open a can of something made by Dinty Moore? 

Better still, just skip straight to the after-dinner drinks - here's a good one to get you going, a recipe by that famous English loon, Fanny Cradock.

Churchwarden

1 lemon
6 cloves
1 bottle red wine
1 pint weak tea


Stick cloves in lemon and bake in oven at Gas Mark 1/4 or 225F until light brown. Heat wine, dunk lemon in and add hot tea and sugar. When sugar is dissolved, raise heat to just below boiling and serve.

Cheers (hic)!

Unbelieva-Thanks, 2015!

The holiday season is upon us once again and we're in full celebration mode. Even Jeff, who is British and legally not allowed to have Thanksgiving because they lost the war. But he simply loves the whipped potatoes too much to exclude him.

Which brings me to this week's theme: We, The Unbelievables, are going to share our favorite recipes with you! These are the actual recipes we will be using when we prepare this year's feast for Marissa's Home for Wayward Showgirls

CLARK'S UNBELIEVA-STUFFING!

INGREDIENTS

• 1 lb breakfast sausage
• 3/4 cups margarine, melted
• 3/4 cup finely diced onion
• 1 1/2 cups chopped celery
• 8 cups, soft bread cubes, divided
• 3 teaspoons poultry seasoning
• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

1. Place sausage in a large, deep skillet; cook over medium-high heat until evenly brown, about 10 minutes. Remove sausage from the skillet and let drain on paper towels. Combine melted margarine with the sausage drippings until there is 1 cup of drippings and margarine combined.
2. Cook and stir onion and celery in the margarine-dripping mixture in the same skillet over medium heat until onion is tender but not browned, about 10 minutes . Stir in about 1/3 of the bread cubes. Pour onion mixture into a large bowl and stir in remaining bread cubes, sausage, poultry seasoning, and pepper. Mix well.
3. Insert stuffing into the turkey's gaping orifice and throw the turkey in the oven . Or use a casserole dish, cover it with tin foil, and bake in the oven at 325°F for 30 minutes. Then take off the foil and bake it another 15 minutes.
4. While waiting for it to cook, go over to Henri Petit's house and put some rotten eggs in his mailbox.
5. Get back home and take a phone call from an upset Henri Petit, saying "Why would you do that? It's Thanksgiving!"
6. Reply with "Do what, you disgusting, mewling, cabbage-headed infant? I'm over here making stuffing."
7. Hang up when he says "I saw you, you dolt! And for the thousandth time, I AM NOT A..."

This recipe serves you and 11 hungry showgirls. Increase ingredients proportionately if you have more showgirls.

Afterthanks: Clean-up time

Well, Michael and Jeff are off to the Stilleto Flats Galleria for some shopping, taking advantage of those "Black Friday" special discounts. I know Jeff is looking for a new, high-tech (3 speeds: Agitate, Mangle and Fluff) potato whipper and Michael is always on the hunt for more mesh garments. Years ago, we made a pledge to never use our superior fighting skills when it comes to dealing with shopping mobs, yet somehow, those two always make it home with the newest televisions, iPoods and phlippity-phones.
I don't know.
I don't really care for shopping so I happily stay home and take care of the post-festivities clean-up.

I mean, someone has to supervise the housekeeping staff.

Thanks For Giving

Yes!

With the bird having been in the oven since last night, the cranberry freshly prepared and all other foodstuffs ready to go, The Unbelievables are looking forward to tons of festivities this long weekend, festivities to rival ... well ... past Thanksgivings.

And that includes the first ever Unbelieva-Babes all-Thanksgiving calendar.

Jeff showcased some of the pictorials the gals are planning for the extravaganza and I - in between food preparation and getting Jeff to peel the potatoes (not such a difficult chore) - managed to kype a few myself. 

Care for an additional pre-ogle? That's what I thought ...

Some of the girls are ecstatical about doing the calendar ...

Some of the gals? They're being a bit to literal about the entire affair.

"Wishfully" cute ...

This one (entitled "dead bird walking") was a reject.

 

One of the Unbelieva-Babe's moms tried sneaking one in.

This one was nixed before it got too far ...

Yes, we wondered if there was anything underneath that apron.

Your guess is as good as ours.

Cheeky!

One caring Unbelieva-Babe thought it a good idea

to make the bird feel a bit more "loved" ...

... prior to its decapitation.

Both Clark and Jeff "stood in" for the fowl in this image.

To see if the pose worked, you understand.

(Uh huh.)

Clark will wrap up the week (tomorrow!) with ... well ... we're not certain. 

But whatever it is it's probably a good idea to be prepared. In the meantime:

Cripes and cripes! I need to get to gettin' ... !!! The guys have already started polishing everything off!

Clark and Jeff in au natural. Typical.

We've Got Plenty To Be Thankful For

Well, after the craziness of the last few weeks, it's nice to finally settle down and have a few days off for that most gluttonous of holidays, Thanksgiving. One thing we love is some good ole down-home non-fancy prelude-to-Christmas-type cookin', a fine cigar, expensive cognac, and the company of one's nearest and dearest, or failing that, a Swanson TV dinner, a cheap stogie, a bottle of Blatz beer and the effusive company of Michael and Clark.

Our Unbelievababe friends have been planning something exciting for Thanksgiving - they've been coming up with the first ever Unbelievababe calendar. It's apparently a Thanksgiving calendar - so all the pictures are themed around America's favourite holiday, despite the fact that it only takes place once a year. But oh well - they've never steered a foot wrong before, so who are we to judge? I've managed to swipe some of the pictorial proofs, so let's have a gander, shall we?

That's NOT what is meant by turkey and dressing.

She's just trying to sweet talk you, turkey. Seriously, run for it.

Seems to be a theme forming here.

Okay, now she needs to make a run for it. That thing is a monster!

One thing I can glean from all of this is that turkeys are exceptionally dim.

Any pics in the calendar that DON'T involve turkeys, I hear you cry? So glad you asked.

Okay, well, there is a turkey, but there's also a cornucopia, and it doesn't seem like the turkey is in mortal danger.

Pumpkins, pilgrim, stockings, angry savages, massive shoe buckles - all the ingredients of a Thanksgiving Jamboree.

There's that gun again - but not a turkey in sight. However, I do see something to be thankful for.

Honorary Unbelievababe Barbara Eden seems a little mixed up about her holidays. Never mind, Barbara.

It all seems very warlike, though, doesn't it? Arrows, blunderbusses, hatchets - have we got anything a little more, uh, peaceful?

"Happy Coachella! - uh, I mean, Thanksgiving. Dudes."