Yesterday’s dinner went off almost without a hitch. All the food was ready on time and it all lived up to expectations.
The only minor mistake was that, in the rush to get everything on the table, I forgot the stuffing. Not a disaster, though. I remembered it when I was putting gravy on my mashed potatoes and realized there should have been one more thing to put gravy on. No harm done. It just sat in the oven an extra 20 minutes.
Here’s the behind the scene view of the dinner. I’ll post the recipes later today.
I put the turkey in the Big Green Egg at 10:30. I smoked-roasted it at 350° F over a mix of apple and pecan wood.
These are for the bourbon maple glazed sweet potatoes.
And these are for the Sesame Garlic Ginger Green Beans
The kids helped set the table.
Four and a half hours later, the turkey is ready. That was about an hour faster than I’d expected, so I put it in my big Igloo cooler. That kept it hot (and at a safe temperature) for the extra hour.
This is the fortified stock I started yesterday. With about a 1/2 cup of blond roux, it becomes gravy.
It was a four burner, two oven and a smoker effort.
There’s the roux for the gravy.
And the sweet potatoes in their glaze.
The turkey was fantastic. It was so moist and tender the dark meat was actually hard to slice. It just melted under the knife. Even the breasts were juicy enough to leave a puddle on the carving board.
We’re ready to eat.
Except for that poor stuffing I left in the oven.
