I was invited to the December gathering of a gourmet group that I had once been the cooking instructor for. When I initially received the call, I assumed I was going to be asked to lead the group in a cooking class again, but instead I was invited to be the group’s newest member. Fun!

The hostess had originally asked someone to lead the group in the making of holiday treats, but the woman backed out, so I became a co-hostess and we made the Oreo Truffles from yesterday’s post and this sweet treat.

We’ve all seen these pretty candied pretzel rods around during the holidays. They are a snap to make and serve at parties or give as gifts.

I will admit that having a group of nine fun and rowdy women making them at the same time was a bit of a mess, but a very fun mess. Especially because there were holiday Moscow Mules involved! You’ll find the recipe for those in tomorrow’s post.

These keep really well, so you can make them a week or so ahead for holiday gift-giving!

One important note – depending on the brand and flavor of melts, the coating may need to be set up some before heavier decorations and candies are sprinkled on. As you can see from the photo above, we learned the hard way.

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I was going to start this post with “Only ____ days till Christmas!” but I’m in denial and I’m afraid that if I say the number out loud, type the number or even think of the number – I might have a full-on panic attack, so how about I just get to my post about easy Christmas treats.

Oh, before I do that, I’d like to apologize for an error in my last post. I said that the segment featuring Steve’s Christmas Casserole would air on 12News yesterday (Dec 12) and it did not. I set up my TiVo and was disappointed to not see it. I asked Tram and she let me know that it is airing NEXT Monday, December 19th at the 6:00 a.m. hour. If you set your DVR or got up early yesterday, I’m sorry.

OK, back on track… I made these treats at a party last week. I’ll tell you all about the party in tomorrow’s post in which I’ll share “Easy Christmas Treats” Part 2. This is Part 1 and it is super easy and pretty darn yummy too.

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Tram used my kitchen to film another cooking segment, this time with the whole family. Steve & Tram’s new home will be finished in late December, so my kitchen is their surrogate TV kitchen until then.

The last time Tram filmed a cookie baking segment with Zak & Zoey, I had a hair appointment, so I wasn’t home for the filming.

This time, all four of them were here to make a Christmas casserole and it was so much fun to be a fly on the wall and watch it unfold. Look how adorably skeptical Zoey is of Zak’s cheese grating abilities.

Zak was going to town on that poor block of cheese the entire time … I was dying. Mom, Dad, and Zoey were all so focused on their own tasks that none of them noticed what Zak was up to. Late the next day I got a text from Tram saying that she just finished putting the piece together and couldn’t believe what Zak was doing to the cheese. I can’t wait to see how Tram edited it. It will air next Monday (Dec 12th) early morning (in the 6:00 hour) on (NBC) 12News.

My photos of the food aren’t all that great, since I was too focused on taking photos of the action, but trust me Steve’s family recipe is delicious.

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I first created this cocktail for the last class, a Comfort Food-themed menu, in my 3-week cooking series at Les Gourmettes. I served it again as my Signature Cocktail on Thanksgiving. If ever there was a Comfort Food Menu – it is Thanksgiving!

To me, it’s important to use one big ice cube for this cocktail, either a square cube or a round ice ball.

I have both types of ice molds, but my round ball mold only makes one at a time, whereas the square mold makes 6 cubes at once. Since I had 16 cocktails to make for the cooking class and 12 more for Thanksgiving, of course, I went with the square cubes.

I did find THIS cool multi-round ball mold on Amazon. I’m adding it to my Christmas list!

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I loved this Thanksgiving. It was such a joy to cook a big meal for more than just our immediate family.

For years it’s just been the five of us; Dave, Marissa, Connor, my dad and me. Every few years, Dave’s mom would join us, which made the six of us. Still, that’s not many people to eat a meal that you go to so much work for.

Happily, in 2014, Jeff and his parents, Dean and Amy, joined us for the first time. Since my mother-in-law was here too, that took us all the way up to nine people, the most ever at our table!

Fast forward to this year. Steve and Tram are in a rental while their new home is being built. Steve’s parents are in town.

Add in the twins, Zak and Zoey and there are fourteen of us.

For the first time in… ever… I am actually cooking for a respectable number of people, thus making the huge Thanksgiving feast worthy of being called a feast. I am in my element!

I mean, it’s the same number of dishes I make every year, but this year it made sense to go to all that work. Love it!!

And, of course, having 2 ½-year-old twins join in the day, makes everything more fun! Zak and Zoey are so adorable and well-behaved. I’m in love with them and so are Connor, Marissa, and Jeff.

I posted a few photos on Instagram and my friend, Sheila, called them Bigs and Littles.

So sweet!

OK, how about some tablescaping?

Since we were at fourteen and my dining room table seats only eight comfortably, we had to eat outside. Not a problem in Arizona, even in November. But just in case it did rain, I flip-flopped the furniture arrangements. Moving all the seating that is under the long covered “fireplace patio” to the open patio area and moving the oblong table that is usually out in the open, to the covered area.

I also brought over the rustic 60-inch wood round table from the other covered patio to create one long table. The photo above is of the two tables under the covered patio and the beginnings of my table arranging. This all took place early on Wednesday morning.

At the same time that I was setting this up, I was also cooking; smoking a turkey breast, making bread dough, cranberry-pomegranate sauce, butternut soup, and prepping the sweet potatoes and stuffing. So by the time this photo was taken of the finished tables, it was late afternoon.

The oblong table was covered with a tablecloth since it’s a patio table and not attractive enough for placemats. Not to mention that I don’t have 12 matching Thanksgiving placemats and napkins anyhow.

The two tables were joined by two large green Jarrahdale pumpkins along with a large white pumpkin. Jarrahdale is my favorite pumpkin. I drove all the way Chino Valley to buy some a few years ago when I couldn’t find them locally. Now that they are available in a few places, I’ll drive to half a dozen different stores to find them.

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I had fully intended to post my Thanksgiving tablescape today but I can’t let the opportunity slip by without wishing my most loyal follower, most frequent commenter, my best friend, one of my two favorite people in the world, my beautiful (inside and out) daughter – a Happy Birthday!

Marissa Lynn, I love you to the moon and back! Ever since you’ve lived away from home, basically since your freshman year in college, my favorite thing about Thanksgiving has been that it is so close to your birthday. You always come home for Thanksgiving, which means I always get to celebrate YOU!

I’ll keep with the Thanksgiving posts and show a few photos of the Thanksgiving centerpieces I made. How gorgeous are these Velvet Queen Sunflowers!

They really do look and feel like velvet. I found them at Trader Joe’s and went crazy over them.

I used my orange and green pumpkin soup tureens as the vessels for the flowers. I then set those, along with their lids, atop wood slabs that were set on top of dyed and natural burlap runners.

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Sometimes it seems as if sweet potatoes are the ugly stepchild at Thanksgiving dinner. The dish that is expected but not overly anticipated or appreciated.

I remember looking forward to them when I was a kid, but today we eat them more than just once a year. Sweet potatoes are in fashion all year long. Then there are sweet potato fries, which are offered and ordered nearly as often as their French fry cousins. If you’re like me, you select them over potato fries more often than not.

I have to admit that this was the case with this dish at our Thanksgiving buffet. Most guests took a small portion for their plate, but chose to fill up on the stars of the day; the turkey, dressing, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, and gravy.

And that was just fine with me. These maple-roasted sweet potatoes made great leftover dishes for breakfast (sweet potato hash with eggs) lunch (added to a turkey taco) and dinner (part of a black bean chili or puréed and added to risotto).

When shopping for sweet potatoes, I bought three varieties in a pretty trio of colors.

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I don’t know how other bloggers get recipes up for the holidays before the holiday! I suppose I could write up this recipe and date it to post in early November 2017, but that seems like much more forethought than I ever want to have to think about!

Instead, I’ll post this and another Thanksgiving recipe, along with my Thanksgiving tabelscapes this week and remind you about them next year, that sounds more reasonable and realistic to me.

Two notes: The first concerns the brine bag in this recipe: While shopping, I was in a hurry and could not immediately find a brine bag at the grocery store. Instead of asking for assistance, I spotted slow-cooker liners and thought, “They’ll work!”

Yeah, not so much! The liner was a smidgen too small. I could barely gather it all up and seal the bag. I was paranoid about the bag opening and leaking, so I put it into another bag. I still wasn’t secure in the leakage possibilities, so I put that into another bag. By then, I’d used 3 of the 4 bags in the box, so I thought, “What the heck!” and put all that into another bag! All ended well, as the four bags held and not a drop escaped.

My advice – for peace of mind – search out and use a true brine bag!

Second: I was at Cost Plus World Market the Wednesday before Thanksgiving and I found a yummy brine mix. I used 1 ¼ cups of it in place of the salt, peppercorns, and Italian seasoning in the recipe below. If you come across a good-looking mix, you can do the same or just follow the recipe as written.

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I know that I’ve been a slacker when it comes to posting lately. Things are finally getting back to normal around here and to be honest, I’m just enjoying the calmer feeling.

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You know that feeling when you are, or you think you are about to, fall down a flight of stairs?

That “heart-pounding, can’t catch your breath, your world is spinning completely out of your control” feeling.

Yeah, that pretty sums up how I’ve felt for the last two weeks. I’d say since my birthday, things have felt like they are constantly getting away from me and I’ll never catch up.

For instance, my birthday was Thursday the 27th, on Sunday the 30th, we had our neighborhood Fall Festival. I was in charge of it. I was in charge of it two years ago too but it didn’t feel like as big a job as it was this time. Granted, my committee was larger and more available in 2014, but this year it felt like a two-woman-show when it should have been a ten-woman-production. I worked for weeks leading up to it and for 16 straight hours on the day of.

As if being bone-tired wasn’t bad enough, I tore, chipped and cracked three fingernails of my 2-day-old, absolutely perfect, best-ever manicure! The photo shows the left hand before and after with the index fingernail ripped clean off. On the right hand, if you look close, you can see the tear in the middle finger and by the end of the day, the ring finger was broken off too.

The next morning, Halloween, I was up with the sun to get everything “Festival-related” cleaned up and put away and get ready for our traditional Halloween pizza-grilling festivities. Trick-or-treating with Zak and Zoey was so much fun!

My continuing birthday-celebration-mode complicated things further, as I had lunch and dinner dates still lined up the week after. Not that I’m complaining! I am not! I’m touched and love being loved by my friends and family, but this year, the timing took its toll. Yes, that is a screenshot of my calendar for the week. It may be too small to read, but you get the idea.

The next day was the first night of my 3-week cooking classes at Les Gourmettes. Shopping, prepping and teaching occupied all hours from dusk to dawn on Tuesday.

Add to that, on Thursday morning, Connor and I went to take part in early-voting and waited for 2 hours! I don’t have time to sit for 2 hours! But we did and we voted.

The one thing that had weighed especially heavy on me was a charity dinner I was cooking for guests at the Frank Lloyd Wright Price House on Saturday night. It was five courses; a signature cocktail, 3 appetizers, soup, salad, main course with two sides and dessert for a total of 10 recipes, most of which had three components to each dish. For instance, the dessert was a bread pudding with sautéed apples and crème anglaise and the soup had an avocado cream garnish and cheese puffs. Thankfully, my friend and colleague, Kim Howard spent a good part of the morning in the kitchen with me. Thank you, Kim!

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