Running with Blinders: Thanksgiving!

Yes, I'm a little late on posting about Thanksgiving. What can I say...I'm a busy girl, and every time I sit down at the computer to work on the blog, Lily comes over and starts banging on the keys, asking to "play a game," which means watch stupid kids videos on YouTube. So, I don't get around to it while she is awake, and while she's sleeping, I tend to use that time to work out or run, read a book, or (rarely) sleep myself.

But here it is!! Julie and Dave's Awesome Thanksgiving Feast. Lily spent the holiday weekend with her dad, and although I missed her, I was totally thrilled to have four whole days to do whatever the heck I wanted. On Thursday, that meant preparing all sorts of delicious food with Dave, my partner-in-yummy-crime.

The main event was a roast duck, which we were lucky to procure with a friend of Dave's who happens to own two restaurants out in Southern Pines. Here's our little 6 lb duckling swimming in some brine, which not only lends flavor, but leads to a crispy, brown skin.

After much googling, we learned that a proper roasted duck involves long, slow temps, lots of flipping, and scoring the skin to allow all the lovely rendered fat to escape. I'll give you a quick picture montage of the progression. Here she is, ready to go into the oven:

After the first hour:

The second hour:

Third:

And after the fourth hour, crispy, brown, rich and delicious. Why have I never roasted a duck before? I don't know!! It's easy - sure it takes time, but other than that, not much work involved. And it was so good, Dave and I couldn't stop talking about it.

We added to the duck the following: Cauliflower and Parsnip Puree (fantastic!), Balsamic Brussels Sprouts with Pancetta and Seasoned Bread Crumbs (also fantastic!), Brown Bread Stuffing with Apples, Chestnuts, and Sausauge (yes, this too!), and homemade cranberry sauce (I don't know why anyone eats the canned stuff, other than nostalgia).

I realize that Cauliflower and Parsnip Puree sounds pretty boring, but trust me, it was Awesome with a capital "A," and easy enough to make for a regular dinner.

Here we are attempting to take a photo with the time-delay feature on my camera.... it took a few tries and this is the best we could do before commencing stuffing our faces.

Now for the rest of the weekend. As I pondered what Dave and I could do with 4 whole days without Lily, I (for some reason) thought - "ooh, let's put together a puzzle!" So I ordered this 1,500 piece puzzle. 1,500 pieces is a lot of pieces!! We started by sorting it out....

And after about 2-3 hours and several glasses of wine, this is how far we got!!! You guys, it is harder than it looks.

Anyway, Dave has since abandoned the project, but I have kept at it and made significant progress. Amazingly, I have managed to keep the Lily tornado from completely destroying it thus far. I'll post a picture of my ongoing struggle later (I know, try to contain your excitement!!)

On Saturday, we went to the Bell Tree Tavern in Southern Pines, a bar which, inexplicably her in NC, is known as the Ohio State bar, and it was all decked out and full of Buckeyes for the game. We got started with some Bloody Mary's and hoped for the best.

Of course you know our poor Buckeyes didn't win, but at least it was a close game. I hadn't been able to watch an entire game from start to season all year, so it was fun to get out for it.

Finally, on Sunday I got Lily back, and we put up our Christmas tree!!! It isn't much of a tree, but as my Mom said, it probably didn't seem small to Lily. We had fun pulling out my little collection of ornaments and hanging them on the tree.