AROUND THE KITCHEN TABLE: THANKSGIVING FAVORITES + 6-BOOK GIVEAWAY

 

KORINA MOSS: Happy November! Are you one of those people who jumps right from Halloween to Christmas? As much as I love the Christmas season, I am a sucker for Thanksgiving. It probably helps that I’m usually a guest at the Thanksgiving table rather than the cook. I love all the traditional Thanksgiving foods. My most oft requested contribution is my apple pie with crumb topping, a recipe handed down from my mother. It’s made with Macintosh apples bathed in cinnamon, brown sugar and butter with a brown sugar crumb topping. I like to eat it warm with a scoop of French vanilla ice cream.  

What’s your Thanksgiving must-have? Do you have a dish that your family insists you make? Or a dish you love to eat that absolutely must be on the Thanksgiving table?  Join our conversation in the comments and you will be entered to win a prize package of terrific mysteries. 

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LESLIE KARST: I’m an avowed cream hound, so this one’s a no-brainer: Creamed onions. Just like my grandmother used to make. Which ends up being a pain most years, because if you can locate them—a big “if”—fresh pearl onions are incredibly laborious and time-consuming to peel. 

 

 

 

And although the frozen kind work fine as well (and are so much easier to use), I can almost never find them in Hilo, Hawai‘i, where I now live during the holiday season. So I often make do with using regular white onions and then quartering them for the dish. Grammy would have tsked, but they still taste delicious!

 

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LESLIE BUDEWITZ:  Mr. Right and I are classic trailers, the much-younger siblings expected to travel for family gatherings at the holidays -- always fun, but that meant we didn't create a lot of traditions of our own. These days, we tend to stay home at Thanksgiving and travel at Christmas. We're mostly likely to buy a turkey breast. We've roasted it, rolled it, stuffed it -- what can I say? We like playing with our food. Broccolini or Delicata squash, or both. Mashed potatoes. Gravy because he loves it. Cranberry sauce because I love it. I make a pecan pie because we both love it. A bottle of pinot noir. 

And I almost always make Pumpkin Cranberry Muffins the next day, drawing on the flavors of the season. Looks like I've never shared the recipe here at the Kitchen. Hmm. I'd better change that sometime soon!  

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LUCY BURDETTE: If I'm hosting, I make the regulars, roast turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, pumpkin pie. I never cared that much about stuffing until I made a cornbread-sausage version for the 9th Key West mystery, A DEADLY FEAST. From time to time I've made the mashed rutabaga potato combination my mom used to serve, and also those creamed onions. My dad too was a huge fan of mince pie, with lots of hard sauce. A waste of dessert, I say!

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LIBBY KLEIN: I love Thanksgiving. As my family has grown over the years I find myself having to make two turkeys just to have leftovers! I always think my favorite side dish is the sweet potatoes, but there's something about that green bean casserole that I just can't get enough of. And I am a cranberry sauce girl! I put it on my turkey sandwiches. If you've not tried it you're missing out. The dish I have to make every year is a weird one because it was never meant to go with turkey. It's my Pineapple Stuffing. Yes, the same recipe that was hijacked by my friend Connie! It's the perfect side dish for ham. Everyone loves it. My husband can't get enough of it. I've seen my in-laws hide little dishes of it in the back of the fridge to ensure they get some before it's gone. I make it every year to please them. Thankfully, one of my best friends has come to the rescue and now brings a ham to Thanksgiving dinner. 

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MADDIE DAY:  Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday, and I host us, whichever sons and wives (and now a grandgirl) are around, our close family-by-choice (which now includes 3 grandkiddos), and several other regulars every year. Food, loved ones, and no gifts expected or required? It's my kind of celebration.

Because I host, I provide the turkey and gravy, my mother's bread stuffing, smashed potatoes, and pies (apple, pumpkin, and pecan), plus a pretty table, and the guests bring everything else. Here's one of my world-famous sky-high apple pies.

Oddly, it appears I have documented none of these fabulous dishes! So I can't add links. We now always spatchcock the Thanksgiving turkey, and here's how I made a spatchcocked chicken using the same procedure. 

But my mother's bread stuffing is my very favorite (well, tied with the pumpkin pie). There's something about the delicious smell in the morning of onions sauteing in lots of butter that makes me feel like I'm in another country, where home cooks everywhere (usually women) are preparing a big midday repast. Add celery, herbs like rosemary and thyme, chopped walnuts, loads of torn stale bread, and some simmering turkey stock (from the neck and innards you already took out and set to boil with an onion and the celery tops), and call it heaven.

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VMBURNS: One of the things I look forward to the most is cornbread dressing. Growing up, my mom rarely made dressing any other time. I think it's because its very time consuming. She would start cooking cornbread days in advance (it needs time to dry out). Then, on Thanksgiving morning, she would start. The house smelled amazing. I never learned to make my mom's cornbread dressing (my mom didn't measure anything), but my sister did. A few years ago, I went to my sister's house for Thanksgiving and watched (and took notes) while she made it. It was tedious and took longer than normal while we measured and documented the process so I could include it in Steal Away, the third book in my RJ Franklin Mysteries. Even though I can make this recipe whenever I want, I still don't make it until Thanksgiving. 

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MOLLY MACRAE: I’ve always loved Thanksgiving and have great memories of big and small family gatherings—turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy with giblets, lima beans, cranberry sauce, watermelon pickles, olives! Interesting, though, I don’t remember dessert. Pie, probably, but who knows?

I’ve been doing the dinner with all the usual trimmings, for whichever part of the family is around, since 1983. In 2003 I added roasted sweet potato spears with molasses horseradish to the lineup. That first time of making them I got caught up talking and laughing on the phone with my sister Jenny and I roasted the potatoes quite a bit longer than the recipe called for. The partially caramelized spears that resulted were a revelation! Darker than the picture in the magazine, but with a terrific, dark flavor, and I’ve made them that way ever since. These sweet potato spears will make you stand up and cheer!

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PEG COCHRAN:  I've hosted Thanksgiving for years.  Some years we were a huge bunch--my in-laws, hubby's sister and brother-in-law, his aunt, my sister and niece, my parents and my two daughters.  Our table has dwindled over the years and I've got my fingers crossed that this year my younger daughter and her husband will come and bring our newest grandbaby--Oscar!  We always have turkey, never ham.  I make stuffing but it's actually dressing since I don't stuff the turkey. Green bean casserole is a must (with bechamel sauce no cream of something soup), sweet potatoes topped with marshmallows, gravy and mashed potatoes.  I have to have mashed potatoes!  I absolutely love them and with gravy they are heavenly.  And of course cranberry sauce! Ever since I wrote my Cranberry Cove Series (#9 out now!) I have been trying all things cranberry.  One year I made this divine Cranberry Fig Compote that put a different spin on the usual recipe.

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MAYA CORRIGAN: We were the designated Thanksgiving dinner hosts for decades. Family members had different ideas about how cranberries should be served, but everyone agreed that the stuffing/dressing was terrific. Our foolproof recipe is based on Pepperidge Farm Herb Stuffing mix. We modified the recipe that comes with the mix, filled the turkey cavity with as much stuffing as could fit, and served the rest as a side dish of dressing. 

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CLEO COYLE: For us, it's not Thanksgiving without the turkey! Marc and I not only love the main event, we look forward to all the leftovers: turkey sandwiches, turkey pot pie, turkey salad, turkey stroganoff, which is why we take care to cook that Thanksgiving bird just right. Getting that skin golden brown and nice and crispy while keeping the meat moist is a technique we've honed over the years. We shared our recipe and tips a few years ago, and we're happy to share them again for anyone curious about how we make our Thanksgiving bird. 

Click here or on the image below to see our blog post (with mini videos) on The Secret to Crispy-Skinned Roast Turkey, and happy Thanksgiving month, everyone! 

Click here to see Cleo's recipe post (with mini videos)
on the "Secret to Crispy-Skinned Roast Turkey
with Herb Butter"

GIVEAWAY!

Readers: Do you have a dish that your family insists you make? Or a dish you love to eat that absolutely must be on the Thanksgiving table?  Join our conversation in the comments and you will be entered to win a prize package of some terrific mysteries. Be sure to include your email address so we may contact the winner.

Join the conversation!

Comment below to win these 6 great mysteries!

Include your email address so we may contact the winner.

Giveaway Prize Package:

SILENT NIGHTS ARE MURDER by Libby Klein

MURDER UNCORKED by Maddie Day 

FONDUE OR DIE by Korina Moss

STEAL AWAY by V. M. Burns 

HONEY ROASTED by Cleo Coyle

COME SHELL OR HIGH WATER by Molly MacRae

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Wednesday, November 6