I cried during Thanksgiving dinner.  Those who know me well will not find this terribly unusual.  I really feel all my feelings.  But this year, I cried over stuffing, and not because it was bad.  I cried because it was so, so good!  And also because when I went gluten free in 2013 I thought my days of eating stuffing at Thanksgiving dinner were over.  I hadn't eaten stuffing in nearly a decade.  To be truthful, rarely do Brian and I make a traditional meal at Thanksgiving.  We've eaten paella, various roasts, and last year we enjoyed a butternut squash lasagna.  The lasagna was so rich we are still recovering from it!  The stuffing I made for Thanksgiving was not made from gluten free bread because frankly so much of gluten free bread resembles styrofoam peanuts that have been pulverized and are being held together by air only to crumble when you take a bite.  Here we have a benefit of moving to the South: cornbread!  Many cornbread recipes call for a combination of cornmeal and wheat flour.  Traditionally, though, cornbread was made with just cornmeal.  And we happen to have locally milled cornmeal.  This stuffing requires you to make traditional cornbread one day and then the stuffing the next day.  It's worth it, and honestly, it's pretty easy.  The most difficult part is planning your time.

NOTE: Bake the cornbread the day before you plan to make the stuffing.

Gluten Free Cornbread Stuffing
Serves 6-8 

Cornbread:
1 1/2 cups cornmeal
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 large egg
1 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup high quality grapeseed or canola oil

Stuffing:
1 8-inch square pan of baked cornbread (using above recipe)
2-3 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
1 large yellow onion, not sweet, peeled and chopped
5 stalks of celery, with leaves on if you can find it this way, chopped
1 4-ounce package of diced pancetta, optional
2 tablespoons fresh or 1 1/2 tablespoons dried thyme leaves
4-5 fresh sage leaves, finely chopped, or 1 teaspoon (or more) dried sage
1 teaspoon sea salt or kosher salt
1 teaspoon (or more to taste) freshly ground black pepper
2 cups unsalted chicken broth (bonus points for you if it's homemade)
2 eggs, beaten
1/3-1/2 cup fresh Italian parsley, finely chopped
1 cup toasted pecan pieces, optional

1. Make the cornbread.  Preheat the oven to 400 F.  Grease an 8-inch square baking pan.  In a large bowl, whisk together all the dry ingredients.  In a smaller bowl or wide-mouth pitcher, whisk together the wet ingredients.  Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and stir until well combined.  Pour into the greased baking pan.  Bake for 20-25 minutes until it is golden brown and starting to pull away from the sides of the pan.  Let cool in the pan.  Cover and let sit overnight.
2. Make the stuffing.  Preheat your oven to 375 F.  Grease a 9x13 baking pan.  Heat a large skillet over medium heat.  Add the olive oil and swirl it around.  Add the onions, celery, and, if using it, the pancetta.  Cook until the onions are translucent, stirring often.  Once the vegetables have softened, add the thyme, sage, salt and black pepper.  Cook for another two minutes.  Turn off the heat and let the vegetables cool a bit.
3. While the vegetables are cooling, crumble the cornbread into a large bowl.  Stir in the stock, eggs, parsley, and, if using them, the pecans.  Place the stuffing into your greased 9x13 pan.  Bake for 30-33 minutes, until it's light golden brown on top and starting to brown around the edges.  Let cool for 5 minutes and serve.  

Make it vegetarian: omit the pancetta and use vegetable broth instead of chicken broth.  

Like a lot of Americans we are having a very small Thanksgiving celebration this year with just my husband and me and two dogs.  We can't bring ourselves to have anything bigger or to travel when it feels like that would be so disrespectful to the health care workers who are on the front lines of this pandemic. I've been reading their stories, and it's all so heartbreaking.  Also, we don't want to get sick and we don't want to die. 

I have some Thanksgiving recipes to share with you to help make your holiday delicious.  I loathe difficult recipes, especially ones with hard to find ingredients that use every pan and utensil in my kitchen so the recipes shared here are easy!

If a whole turkey will be way too much food for you this year, consider turkey thighs.  We'll be having this as our main course!  Also, we had it as our main course last year!  

If turkey does not excite you or you just don't feel like having it, I invite you to consider serving an easy roast chicken with root vegetables.  Even if you don't have this for Thanksgiving, save this recipe for winter because it's satisfying during the cold months.  

Let's talk about side dishes.  By far and away, the best side dish recipe I have developed over the years is this one: Roasted Green Beans with Chickpeas and Fig Vinaigrette.  It has great crunch from pecans, it has both tart and sweet notes from the vinaigrette, and, frankly, it's lick-the-plate good.  If chickpeas don't interest you, just omit them.  

My friend Kathryn reminded me the other day that my husband, Brian, makes the best Roasted Broccoli.  It's another easy and delicious recipe that deserves space on your holiday table.  

How about soup?  A lovely way to start your Thanksgiving meal would be with this Pumpkin Soup, which I created after sampling many delicious versions on a trip to Italy some years ago.  It's Italian so it must be good!

Since Thanksgiving foods tend to be rich, a salad to cut through the fat and cleanse the palette is recommended.  It's the beginning of citrus and avocado season so this Avocado & Grapefruit Salad is appropriate.  

While all the recipes mentioned above have been personally developed by me, there are a couple of holiday standards we have on the table every year.  I always make the Barefoot Contessa's Cranberry Conserve which is loaded with citrus, nuts, and apples.  I modify her recipe to make it the best cranberry sauce ever!  It has an obscene amount of sugar in the original recipe, 1 3/4 cups of sugar.  I reduce it to one cup of sugar, and it turns out sweet enough without feeling like you are having dessert in the middle of dinner.  

For Thanksgiving dessert last year, I made a pumpkin cheesecake, and, honestly, I regret it, save for the bourbon pecan caramel sauce.  It took so much time.  Plus the water bath failed so there I was blow drying a soggy cheesecake.  We haven't quite settled on a dessert for our holiday meal this year.  I am lobbying heavily for this Pumpkin Cake with cream cheese frosting.  

Wherever you are this year and however you choose to celebrate, I hope we will all do the right thing and celebrate Thanksgiving only with immediate family.  It's a small sacrifice to make to ensure that we can be with our families next year during the holidays.  
​

About a month ago, we took two acorn squash on a trip.  Yes, really.  We hadn't used them the week before and we reckoned they might go bad while we were away.  With no plan for them, we brought them with us anyway.  

Growing up, I mainly experienced acorn squash as dessert for dinner.  My mom would cut the squash in half, take out the seeds, fill it with a large amount of honey plus butter and seasonings and roast it.  It was a sweet treat that my sugar addicted younger self was always eager to eat.

Now, I'm an adult and I need to be thinking about my nutritional needs and not triggering my sugar addiction.  With that in mind,  I decided to make stuffed acorn squash at the lake home we rented for a week.  It's easy to make at home and it's easy to make on vacation.  It doesn't call for any speciality ingredients or a lot of equipment, and it all comes together in an hour or a bit more.    As the weather is turning cold, stuffed acorn squash is nourishing and filling, not to mention delicious.  Try it and see for yourself!

Stuffed Acorn Squash*
Serves 4

2 acorn squash, cut in half, seeds removed
Olive oil
Sea Salt and Freshly Ground Pepper
1 onion, diced
2-4 cloves of garlic, minced
2 carrots, peeled and diced
2 celery stalks, diced
1 pound of ground meat such as turkey or pork

Preheat the oven to 400.  Rub the squash with oil and season  with salt and pepper.  Roast squash for 40 minutes on a foil lined baking sheet or in a roasting pan that will fit the squash halves.  

While the squash are roasting, prepare the filling.  Place a large sauté pan or skillet on a stovetop burner and heat to medium or medium-low.  Add 2-4 tablespoons of olive oil (or a neutral oil like grapeseed).  Once the oil starts to shimmer, add your onions.  Cook, until the onions are translucent, about five minutes or less, stirring frequently.  Add the garlic, carrots, and celery.  Stir frequently to combine and for even cooking.  Season with salt and pepper.  Let the vegetables cook for approximately 10 minutes.  Add the meat and break it up with a wooden spoon or a fork.  Stir to combine the vegetables and the meat.  Sauté until the meat is cooked through.  If the mixture is looking dry, add a couple of tablespoons of water or chicken broth.  If the vegetables are getting too dark, turn the heat down.  Once the mixture is cooked through, turn the heat to its lowest setting and stir occasionally until the squash are done roasting.  

When the squash have finished roasting, take them out of the oven.  Spoon as much filling as you can into each squash half.  You will have some extra filling that you can pass around at the table.  Once the squash are filled, return them to the oven for 10 minutes so the filling heats through.  Serve one squash half per person.

*I kept this very basic as I wasn't traveling with much more than my salt and pepper grinder.  However, there are a lot of ingredients that would bump up the flavor of the stuffed squash, including:

• Dried sage - add one teaspoon to the filling after you have added all the vegetables but before adding the meat.
• Dried or fresh thyme leaves - add one teaspoon to the filling after you have added all the vegetables but before adding the meat.

​

When I hear various objections to eating healthy or changing eating habits, one of the complaints I hear most often is that healthy food does not taste good.  Let's go ahead and eliminate that idea because frankly it's just not true.  I used to teach a cooking class called Get Saucy! which showed people that combining just a few ingredients could really boost the flavor of your meal.  Sauces are probably what your dinner is missing.  I'm not talking about fancy French sauces that require special tools or fancy techniques.  I am talking about ingredients you can find in your grocery store or that you may already have in your pantry.  And the method for making the sauce could not be simpler.  Maybe it involves a little chopping or perhaps heating on the stove, but that's it.   And when food tastes good you're more likely to eat it.

In the past, I have featured on this blog such flavorful and easy-to-make sauces as Romesco, a surprising combination of roasted red peppers and almonds that is a real crowd favorite around here.  Today I bring you another sauce which is just a handful of ingredients, thrown together and simmered on the stove.  It's not taxing to prepare it, and yet it is so flavorful.  It boosts everything from grilled chicken to roasted cauliflower.  But I'm clearly having a hard time telling you about it.  Why?  Well, it contains anchovies.  And anchovies for a lot of people are a hard sell, but in a sauce they add an addictive salty and umami element that makes you want to lick the plate!  Well, it makes me want to lick the plate.  Also, anchovies are low in mercury and a good source of omega-3 fatty acids and B vitamins.  They can be high in sodium so a little will go a long way.  

The sauce I share today is just a lot of darn good olive oil, some minced garlic, capers, and anchovies.  That's it.  I'm pretty sure the hardest part of this recipe is actually opening the can of anchovies (why?  why does it have to be so hard and dangerous?).  I hope you'll make it and give it a try, especially if you have cooking fatigue, as many of us do from sheltering in place.  One note, all measurements of ingredients, except the olive oil, are suggested.  You are free to put in more or less garlic.  My husband loves capers so I put in an obscene amount of those.  If anchovies are not your thing, or you are just unsure about them, start with one.   This sauce is super easy and super forgiving.  Also, the recipe can easily be cut in half or doubled.

Garlic Caper Anchovy Sauce
Makes approximately 2/3 cup or less

1/2 cup really good quality extra virgin olive oil
2 to 4 garlic cloves, peeled and minced
1 to 2 tablespoons capers, drained and patted dry
1 to 5 oil-packed anchovy filets

Combine all ingredients in the smallest sauce pan you have.  Place the pan over the smallest burner on your stove and turn the heat to low.  You want to simmer the sauce, and keeping the heat on low ensures you will not burn the garlic if you walk away or accidentally check email for 30 minutes.  Over low heat, it's really hard to screw up this sauce.  Stir it every once in a while because you want the anchovies to mostly, if not completely, dissolve in the sauce.  

How to serve: In a bowl passed at the table so people can choose their own amounts.  We like it drizzled over roast fish, grilled chicken, roasted cauliflower, or baked fingerling potatoes.   Enjoy!

One of the main reasons to meal plan during this pandemic is that it will eliminate excess trips to the grocery store.  When every trip means possible exposure to COVID-19, going to the store as little as possible makes good sense. ​I've been posting my meal plans on my Facebook page these past couple of months hoping people find them helpful, that people are inspired to do their own meal planning, and that they see it can be done fairly easily.  Meal planning is one of the main tools I use to thrive while living with three autoimmune diseases (yes, three!).  It helps me focus on those foods that are most nutritious for my body and stay away from foods likely to cause autoimmune flare-ups.  Flare-ups for me look like exhaustion, joint pain, and brain fog.  

To create a new habit, you need to prioritize it.  And this leads to tip #1: schedule time to meal plan.  Sit down with your calendar and a weather forecast (for grilling) and determine what you will have each night of the week.  Tip #2: write your meal plan down in a place where you are likely to see it.  We use a notebook that we keep on the kitchen counter.  Some people I know meal plan on their phone and set up reminders to do it.  Once you have that done, then write your grocery list based on your meal plan.

If meal planning is a new habit you are creating, you want to set yourself up to succeed.  Tip #3: keep it simple so that the habit is more likely to stick.  What do I mean?  Start with planning dinners using recipes you already know how to make.  Tuesday night after a long day of Zoom calls is no time to try some fancy Martha Stewart recipe that uses every pot in the kitchen.  Instead, start with what you know.  Make the more challenging recipes or ones you've never tried before on the weekends or evenings when you have more time to prepare.

​When I was a student at the Institute for Integrative Nutrition, Dr. David Katz, at the time a professor at the Yale School of Medicine and an expert in nutrition and obesity, was one of our lecturers.  I'll never forget when he said that a lot of dietary theories agree on one thing: Americans do not eat enough green vegetables.  Tip #4: focus on vegetables, especially green ones.  We include a big salad every night with dinner as our main source of greens, and I tend to eat spinach at breakfast.  There are lots of benefits to eating more green vegetables, including improved brain function and they are good for your bones.   And if you find yourself resisting and coming up with excuses, it's worth eating them to protect your health!

To recap, here are four tips to help you meal plan:

1. ​Schedule time to meal plan.
2. Write it down where you will see it often and remember it is there.
3. Keep it simple so you are more likely to do it and form an awesome meal planning habit. 
4. Focus on vegetables, especially green ones.

And there you have it.  I hope you find these tips helpful.  If you already plan your meals, what are some of your best tips?

The other night I posted on my Instagram stories that I was making clean out the fridge soup and it seemed to resonate with people.  This is likely because we're all cooking more due to sheltering in place.  And because we are all cooking more, most of us probably have some leftover veggies wandering around the bottom of the fridge.  Wasting food is never a good idea, but especially not right now when so many people, from farm workers to grocery store employees, are risking their lives to make sure we all have food to eat.  That's where this soup comes in.  It makes use of what's laying about in your fridge.  It's easy.  It's delicious.  And frankly it's more of a formula than a recipe.  As it is a formula, I've broken this down into the base of the soup, the veggies, and the extras.  I hope you make it because it's very nourishing and that's something we could all use now.

Clean Out The Fridge Soup
Serves 4-6

Base:

• Fat: Please use olive oil.  Thank you.
• Salt: We have a salt grinder filled with coarse sea salt.  It's less salty than table salt.
• Black Pepper:  If you can, always use freshly ground black pepper.
• Spices: Red pepper flakes.  This is personal preference so you can use whatever spices you have to season the soup to make it delicious.  I tend towards less is more.  
• Onion: whatever you have on hand is fine.  In this soup I used one yellow onion plus three scallions.
• Garlic: I used four cloves, but this is personal preference.
• Carrots: I used three medium-sized carrots that we had lying about in the crisper drawer.
• Celery: I used two stalks of celery.  Whatever you have on hand is fine.  Be sure to use the stalks and the leaves as the leaves add flavor.
• Broth or water: Use 6 cups of chicken broth or vegetable broth or a combination of broth and water.  Again, we're cleaning out the fridge so use what you have.
• Base extra: tomato paste or white wine to deglaze the pan before adding the other ingredients.   

Veggies:

• Honestly, use whatever veggies you have on hand that are headed towards past their prime and haven't been assigned to a particular meal.  In this soup I used two zucchini rolling around the crisper drawer.  This is a good time to use spinach, swiss chard, kale, any squash, peppers, tomatoes, etc.

Extras:

• Cheese: If you have a Parmesan rind in the fridge, toss it in the soup as it will add a lot of flavor.  Alternatively, you could grate some Parmesan or Pecorino on the soup at the table.
• Meat: You can tell in the photo above that I added meatballs.  We had some ground pork in the fridge so I rolled it into very tiny meatballs made with just some garlic, salt, and pepper.  You could throw in leftover chicken, Italian sausage, ground turkey or beef, cubed ham, bacon.  Again, use what you have in the fridge that needs to be used so it won't be wasted.
• Herbs:  If you have thyme, throw a couple of sprigs in.  Some rosemary leaves might be nice.  Garnishing the soup with some chopped parsley at the end will add a touch of color and might even go so far as to remind you of dining in a restaurant.  

Method:

1. Chop the onion, garlic, celery, and carrot.  
2. In a 4-quart or larger soup pot or stock pot, heat about three tablespoons of olive oil over medium heat.  Stir in the chopped onion, garlic, celery, and carrot to the pot.  Add a pinch or more of red pepper flakes, 1 teaspoon of salt, and many grinds of black pepper.  Cook until the onion is starting to brown, stirring occasionally to prevent the garlic from burning.  If the pan is looking dry, by all means add another bit of olive oil as it is what an Italian grandmother would do.  
3. If you are using tomato paste, add 2 to 4 tablespoons (1/4 cup), and stir it around the pan both to mix it with the onions and to cook it.  Cook the tomato paste for one minute. 
4. If you are using wine, add up to 1/2 cup and stir it around the pan to deglaze it and scrape the brown bits off the bottom of the pot.  
5. Add the broth or broth-water and stir to combine.  Scrape the bottom of the pan to incorporate the brown bits into the soup.  The bits have a lot of flavor.  Chop any vegetables you are adding, such a squash or a tomato, spinach or chard, and then add them to the soup.  If you are using thyme or rosemary, add them now.  Also, this is the time to add a Parmesan cheese rind if you are using that.  Turn the heat down to low or simmer and put a lid on the pot.
6. While the soup simmers, this is the time to prepare your meat.  If it's already cooked, then chop it or shred it, whatever is most appropriate.  If the meat needs to be cooked, do that now.  Once the meat is cooked and in bite-sized pieces, add it to the soup. Simmer for an additional five to 10 minutes.  Taste the soup.  What does it need?  It might need some salt.  If it tastes flat, a splash of red wine vinegar or some lemon juice (~2 tablespoons) can brighten it.
7. Ladle the soup in bowls, and garnish with parsley if you have it.  Serve hot.  

​

This delicious and easy chicken recipe was born of malaise.  This winter has had so much rain, no snow (which I was promised by the husband when I agreed to move from California to North Carolina), and frankly very little sun.  To top it off, I got a cold (no fever, congestion, a little fatigue).  I love cooking, but not when I am sick.  So I asked my body what would taste good and be easy to fix and it responded, "Roast chicken with veggies."  Seriously.  And that's how I ended up with this very simple and delicious roast chicken recipe that can be made on a weeknight, but also is good enough for company.  

There are a couple of things you need to know about this recipe.  It calls for a spatchcock chicken, which means the backbone has been removed so the chicken can lay flat.  The chicken will cook more quickly this way.   I always buy a whole chicken and cut the backbone out myself, which Brian then uses with the rest of the bones to make homemade broth.  I can't remember the last time we bought chicken broth at the store.   Some of my local grocery stores sell chicken in spatchcock form so the work is done for you.  If this is not the case for you, and your preferred grocery store has a butcher counter, ask the butcher to remove the backbone for you.  Or watch this video to learn how to do it yourself.  Note: Do not skewer the chicken the way the chef in the video recommends.  It's unnecessary.  You'll need a sharp pair of kitchen shears.    

The other thing I need you to know about this recipe is it employs my new favorite insurance policy against burning the veggies.   Why?  Well, have you ever burned butternut squash?  It smells horrible and is completely inedible.  But hey, I learned not to do it.  And to avoid making the same mistake twice, I put some chicken broth in the bottom of the pan.  This has two benefits.  One, your vegetables will not burn.  Two, both the chicken and the vegetables are very moist using this roasting technique.  Win!  Win!  Yum!  Yum!

Easy Roast Chicken with Root Vegetables
Serves 5-6

1 whole chicken, 4-5 pounds, with backbone removed
5-6 whole parsnips
5-6 whole carrots
1 yellow onion
4-10 cloves of garlic, optional
Good quality extra virgin olive oil
Sea salt
Freshly ground black pepper
3/4 to 1 cup of chicken broth
2-3 sprigs of fresh thyme, optional

​Preheat your oven to 400 F.  

Peel the parsnips and carrots and cut off the ends.  When roasting vegetables, you want the pieces all to be about the same size so they finish cooking at the same time.  Looking at each carrot and parsnip, cut each about where the narrow part begins to widen.  Then take the wide pieces that are left and either cut them in half or in fourths so they are about the same size as the narrow pieces of carrot and parsnip.  Set aside.

Cut off the ends and peel the onion.  Cut the onion in half.  For a medium onion, cut each half into thirds.  For a large onion, cut each half into fourths.  Set aside.  If you are using garlic, peel each clove and leave it whole.  Add the garlic to the onions.  

In a large bowl, toss all the vegetables with 2 tablespoons of olive oil, 1 teaspoon sea salt, and 1/2 to 1 teaspoon of freshly ground black pepper.  Spread in the bottom of a roasting pan (Note: A 9-inch by 13-inch baking pan will work as long as the sides of it are 2.5 inches or higher).  ​Pour the chicken broth over and around the root vegetables to coat the bottom of the pan.  Evenly space the thyme sprigs on top of the vegetables.

Rinse and dry your chicken.  In a small bowl, make a paste of 1-2 tablespoons olive oil, 1 teaspoon sea salt, and 1/2 teaspoon of black pepper.  Either brush or rub this mixture all over the chicken, including between the skin and the meat if you can do that without ripping the skin.  Lay the chicken on top of the vegetables in the roasting pan.

Place the chicken in the oven and roast for 1 hour.  After one hour, the internal temperature of the chicken should be around 165 F.   If it's a little below that, continue to cook in 3 to 5 minute increments.  

To serve, move the chicken to a cutting board.  Cut off the thigh with the leg attached, and then separate the the leg from the thigh.  Slice the breast meat.  On each plate, spoon some vegetables and the pan juices.  Top with the chicken.  Delicious!  Hearty!  Perfect for a cold day or a rainy day or a rainy, cold day.

Risotto is one of those dishes that I find intimidates people.  It need not be this way.  Risotto is time consuming, yes, but it is also very simple.  If you can stir and chop, you can make risotto.  And once you understand the basic ratio of risotto -- 4 parts liquid to one part rice -- you can create a lot of delicious meals.  I find a warm bowl of risotto, loaded with seafood, deeply satisfying, especially during what I call the comfort food months (also known as late fall + winter + early spring).

I have a couple of tips to set you up for risotto making success.  First, read through the recipe and have all the ingredients prepped and ready to go.  Second, the recipe calls for an onion.  You want to use a yellow onion, often labeled Spanish.  Do not use a sweet onion, please.  The rice and seafood already have sweet notes.  To balance this sweetness, the recipe calls for lemon zest and parsley.   You will need two large pots, one 3-quart or larger pot, and one stock pot or Dutch oven, the kind of pot you would use to make soup or stew.  In the smaller of the two pots, you will boil the seafood to create a seafood stock that will then be used as the liquid in the risotto.  

Seafood Risotto
Serves ~4

1 to 1.25 pounds of frozen or fresh mixed seafood or shrimp*
4 cups water
2-3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1/2 yellow onion, not sweet, diced
1 cup arborio rice
1/2 cup dry white wine
freshly ground salt and pepper
2 lemons, washed, dried, and zested
1/3 cup fresh Italian parsley, chopped
Pecorino cheese, freshly grated, ​optional

*Both Whole Foods and Trader Joe's sell one-pound bags of mixed seafood.  If you are using frozen seafood, defrost it in it's original plastic pouch or in a Ziploc bag in a bowl of warm but not hot water for 60-90 minutes.  If the water has turned cold before the fish is fully defrosted, pour it out and fill the bowl with warm water.  If you are using fresh seafood, especially shrimp, prepare it by deveining it and cleaning it.

Place the seafood, any liquid that has accumulated in the plastic bag the seafood was defrosted in, and the water in a 3-quart or larger pot and heat to a boil on the back burner of the stove.  Once it comes to a simmer or a boil, check the seafood for doneness.  Shrimp, depending the variety, should be pink and firm.  Scallops should be firm but not hard.  Using a slotted spoon remove the seafood from the pot to a bowl and set aside.  Cover the pot with a lid and turn the heat to low.  This is the seafood stock you will use.

Place a Dutch oven or 4-quart or larger pot on the burner in front of the pot holding the seafood stock.  Heat the olive oil over medium-low.  Add the onion and a 1/2 teaspoon each of salt and pepper.  Sauté the onion until translucent.  Add the rice and stir to combine, ensuring the rice is coated with the olive oil.  Stir the rice for one minute to toast it.  Add the wine.  Stir until the rice has absorbed the wine and pot is looking a little dry.  Add one to two ladles of seafood stock to the rice.  Stir frequently until the rice has absorbed most of the liquid.  Again, add one to two ladles of seafood stock.  Stir frequently until the rice has absorbed most of the liquid.  Keep repeating this process until the rice is cooked.  You will know it is done when the risotto looks creamy, not dry, and the rice is still a bit firm, not mushy.  This whole process will take about 20-25 minutes.  

Once the rice is cooked, turn the heat to low.  Add salt and pepper to taste.  Stir in the cooked seafood, the lemon zest, and the parsley.  Cook just until all ingredients are heated through.  Quarter one of the lemons you zested.  Serve the risotto in bowls with a lemon wedge for squeezing over the risotto.  If you serve it with cheese, and an Italian never would do this, sprinkle freshly grated Pecorino over the risotto to taste.  Enjoy!

The problem with traditional holiday meals if you are dining solo or with just a few people is that it's a lot of food to make for small numbers.  Brian and I encountered this issue when it was just the two of us this past Thanksgiving.  We wanted some of the traditional foods, but did not want to put in the effort for making a whole turkey dinner when we were setting a table for two people.  What to do?  The answer is to scale down and cook just what you need, which is why turkey thighs are ideal for a small holiday dinner.  Also, unlike a whole turkey, which can sometimes be dry and flavorless in my experience, thighs are moist and oh-so-flavorful!  We served them with wild rice, and the turkey pan drippings spooned over the rice was so good.

Where do you get turkey thighs?  This part may be a little bit tricky.  Sometimes they are readily available in your grocery store.  This was the case when we lived in New York's Hudson Valley.  However, now that we live in North Carolina, we have found that they have to be special ordered from the meat department of our grocery store or procured from a butcher.  And the size of turkey thighs can vary wildly.  One large thigh is usually sufficient for two or more meals.

Hey, before we get to the recipe, let me give you some of the holiday recipes I rely on year after year.

• This cranberry sauce.  Tip: cut the sugar in half.  You won't miss it.  Also, I've substituted honey with great results.  
• This butternut squash salad.  I usually serve this with balsamic vinaigrette, substitute pecans for walnuts because I am allergic to them, and skip the cheese.  
• These green beans in fig vinaigrette.  To be honest, I make this throughout the year.

Roasted Turkey Thighs
Serves 4 or more

2 to 2-1/2 pounds bone-in, skin-on turkey thighs
3 tablespoons melted butter, ghee, or good quality olive oil
2 fresh sage leaves, torn into small pieces
1 teaspoon sea salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon + more poultry seasoning
​1/2 cup water

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2. Brush 9-inch x 13-inch pan with neutral oil such as grapeseed.  This is an insurance policy. 
3. Pat the turkey thighs dry and place in the pan skin side down.
4. Mix together the butter (or ghee or oil), sage, salt, black pepper, and one teaspoon of poultry seasoning in a shallow bowl.
5. Using a pastry brush or your hands, rub the sage mixture all over the turkey thighs, including under the skin.
6. Place the turkey thighs skin side up.  Take 1-2 teaspoons of poultry seasoning and sprinkle evenly over each thigh.
7. Pour ½ cup water in the bottom of the pan.  Cover the pan with foil.  Roast the turkey thighs for 30 minutes.  Baste.
8. Roast for 20 minutes.  Baste.  Remove foil carefully and set it aside..
9. Roast for another 20-25 minutes until the skin is golden brown and the internal temperature measures 165 degrees.
10. Remove the turkey thighs from the over, cover with the foil, and let them rest for 10-15 minutes.
11. Carve into serving pieces or slice.  Spoon the pan drippings over the thighs.  Serve.

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You may remember that some months ago I got on a kick of throwing a bunch of ingredients in a pan and calling the recipe a mishmash.  There was Spring Vegetable Mishmash and also Salmon Mishmash.  The last of the summer tomatoes brought on the End of Summer Chicken Mishmash.

Actually, no, that's not what brought about this particular mishmash recipe.  What happened was that Brian and I were house hunting across the country and staying in a rental apartment with a kitchen.  The kitchen had the basic necessities of a skillet, a knife, a cutting board, and spatula.  So resourcefulness kicked in as I thought about what we could make easily that would be deeply satisfying and also meet our nutritional needs.  The nearly last of summer cherry tomatoes plus my love of spinach and garlic plus some nice chicken breasts became a hearty dinner one night. 

And boy did we need something nourishing and hearty.  Brian got on the plane with a cold and two days later I had the cold, a doozy that knocked us out.    We still went house hunting and made an offer on a house while hopped up on cold medicine.  Please note, I do not recommend extremely large purchases while under the influence of Nyquil.

End of Summer Chicken Mishmash
(or Rental Apartment Chicken Mishmash)
Serves 4

1 to 1.25 pounds of chicken breast or chicken cutlets cut into 1-inch cubes
2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 large yellow onion, diced
pinch of red pepper flakes
4-6 cloves of garlic, peeled and minced
2-4 cups of raw spinach, roughly chopped
1 to 1.5 cups of cherry tomatoes, halved (or if very large then quartered)
Sea Salt
Freshly ground black pepper
Cooked brown or white rice to accompany.

Heat the olive oil over medium heat in a 12-inch skillet until it shimmers.  Add the chicken and cook until light brown on one side, about three to four minutes.  Season with salt and pepper.  Turn the chicken cubes over and cook two to three minutes longer.  Remove the chicken from the pan.  If it looks like the pan is dry, swirl in some more olive oil.  Add the onion and cook over medium heat until it starts to turn light brown, stirring often to avoid burning.  This step can take up to 10 minutes.  Stir in the garlic and cook for one minute.  Add the tomatoes, season with a pinch or two of salt and pepper, and cook until they are starting to break down, about five minutes.  Add the spinach and cook until it starts to wilt.  Add the chicken to reheat it.

To serve, spoon rice into four bowls and then divide the chicken mishmash between the four bowls.  Serve warm.

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