Friday, November 26, 2004

The morning after.....

Ughhh....You ever wake up in the morning and wonder how you were ever able to stuff that much food in your body the previous day?

We had a small Thanksgiving get-together. The 4 of us, plus my mother. We were not going to go overboard with an abundance of food since the group was going to be small. Well, the theory was good, but the application of it was not. Looks like we will be eating leftovers well into 2005.

I do want to say that this was one of the least stressful holidays I have ever been a part of. I was able to enjoy the day with my family as was my wife. We spent a couple hours early in the morning getting everything preped and then after that we were able to sit back and enjoy each others company.

Normally, I am annoyed with how warm the house gets on these big Holiday's. Not this year. A couple of years ago we cooked our turkey in a roaster and found that this was the ideal plan. It required less cooking time, plus the roaster could be placed out in the garage or on the deck. No 8+ hours of oven heat :)

Then, I found a solution for one of the other things I dread having to do. Mashed Potatoes. I cannot image a feast without them, so the thought of just not making them is rather ludicrous. The peeling - I hate. The boiling them on the stove for an hour - I hate. This year, I found the secret. Are you ready? You really want me to share it? When I read the idea, I about fell over because I could not believe that I had been so foolish over the years. This secret involved NO PEELING. It also does not require the oven to be turned on. Here it is - use a fork to poke some holes in your potatoes. Place 2-3 of them in the microwave and fire that thing up for 4-5 minutes. When its finished, rotate them and set it for another 4-5 minutes. Once they are done, remove the potatoes and start cooking another set. While those are cooking, slice one of the cooked potatoes in half - the long way. Using a pot-holder to hold one half of the cut potato, use a spoon to scoop out the inside of the potato. Throw away the peel. Repeat until you have the desired amount of potatoes.

When I first read that idea, I did that thing where you bang your hand on your forehead and repeat, "Stupid, Stupid, Stupid!!!" I have had a microwave for at least 20 years of my life. And in those 20 years, I have made baked potatoes in them on numerous occasions. How this idea never popped into my head, I will never know.

For those of you who do not care to microwave them - If you have your oven going for other dishes, simply place the potatoes in the oven and cook them this way. Either way will work and you will not have all that steamy, starchy, potato pan when you are finished.




Hope your Thanksgiving was as enjoyable as ours.


-God Bless!!!

1 Comments:

At 2:28 PM, Blogger wanda said...

You know there are instant mashed potatoes? It takes about 10 minutes and if you add plenty of milk & butter they taste great. I can't remember the last time I made 'real' taters, mashed taters.

 

Post a Comment

<< Home