
November 26th – Deconstructed (Pre)-Thanksgiving Dinner
Pumpkin White Bean Chili
Cornbread
(slightly) Spicy Cranberry Jam
Salad
The Dinner before Thanksgiving is always an exercise in devising a menu that is somewhat light in anticipation of the excesses of Thanksgiving, and isn’t based around roasted chicken of any description. This year I decided early on that what I was craving was hominy, and I figured I’d make my standard Butternut Squash Chili which is light, un-Thankgiving-y, and involves hominy, plus is quick and easy to put together which fulfilled every requirement I had for a meal that week. A minor wrench was thrown in my plans when unexpectedly a friend’s husband was going to be able to come to Dinner because they were acquiring a babysitter in the form of a grandparent – the wrench was that he’s vegetarian (or, okay, kosher, but effectively vegetarian for my purposes). I initially regretfully said that wasn’t going to work, slept on it, hit myself upside the head and emailed to say I clearly shouldn’t talk after 9pm at night because I’m moronic. And with a week to think about it, cobbled together a recipe for a vegetarian chili that was easy, involved hominy, AND HAD PUMPKIN IN IT. Ahem, I’ve been feeling an unseasonal lack of pumpkin in my life lately. So really, the hitch in my carefully laid plans, was all to the good. Read the rest of this entry ?