It’s been downright chilly around here lately. Granted, it’s not nearly as cold as it is in Boston, Chicago, or Minneapolis… But, it has been cold!
So, when I have been thinking about what to make for dinner each night, soup is constantly the first thing that comes to my mind. I guess that it’s handy that soup is the theme for this month’s Kitchen Bootcamp challenge!
If you’re hosting Thanksgiving dinner, hopefully you’ve already finalized your menu and are well on your way to a spectacular dinner! If not, you can always check out last week’s Friday Favorites for my collection of favorite Thanksgiving recipes.
Now that dinner’s taken care of, let’s talk about a fun snack for your guests to nibble on when they arrive. I always like to have a few bites and snacks available to keep everyone occupied while I’m cooking dinner and getting everything together.
Lately, one of my favorite snacks is roasted almonds. Almost everyone I know loves to munch on nuts (and they’re not so filling that they’ll spoil your dinner!), but I prefer to make my own than buy a can of pre-seasoned nuts. By roasting my own almonds, I have the opportunity to get a bit creative with fun flavors.
I have hosted Thanksgiving dinner at my house for the past couple years. This time around, I have the year off. Yellowdog (our yellow lab, in case you were wondering) has to remain “calm” and is not allowed to play with kids, other dogs, and relatives for the next few months until she has fully recovered from her knee surgery. So, that pretty much means that there will be no big get togethers at my house for a few months, either.
That doesn’t mean I won’t be cooking, though! I plan to make a side dish or two, and of course I’ll be taking some sort of dessert. I will also be traveling with my handy dandy meat thermometer, which I believe is the key to a perfect Thanksgiving turkey. Whether it’s my kitchen or my mom’s, there’s no better place to be on Thanksgiving day!
Sometimes I get so caught up in worrying about the main dish that I’m making for dinner that I tend to neglect the sides. Can you relate?
With Thanksgiving around the corner, you’ve probably already thought about the perfect recipe for a roast turkey and may have already settled on the perfect stuffing, too. But, if you’re much like me, you may have neglected to worry about what vegetables to make. Unfortunately, they don’t prepare and cook themselves.
So, this week, I thought I’d share my super simple recipe (if you can really call it a recipe) for Balsamic roasted vegetables. It’s my go to recipe for vegetables in the fall and winter (and once in a while the spring and summer, too!)… It’s easy to throw together and can just hang out in the oven while your other dishes are cooking/baking. Plus, it’s a favorite with my family and friends. In fact, my husband actually gets excited when he sees me prepping roasted vegetables. Who would have thought?
I always have to chuckle at those commercials where a family accuses a mother of being “roaster-phobic.” The solution is a chicken that comes prepped and…
