Giving thanks & Thanksgiving Favorites

image via pinterest

Every year my sister in law and I trade off Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays.  One year we celebrate Thanksgiving at their home in the bay area and the next year here at our home on the Central Coast.  I do love to cook (however I do not bake!) so I am looking forward to having about 25 friends and family for Thanksgiving dinner.  Hopefully the weather will be nice.  We love to set up one table outside in front of the fireplace.

On Thanksgiving we like to serve primarily traditional fare. I always brine my turkey over night in a big garbage bag in the refrigerator.  I have tried different brines and they all come out about the same.  My favorite turkey recipe is Roast Turkey with Herb and Shitake Mushroom Gravy.  http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Roast-Turkey-with-Herb-Rub-and-Shiitake-Mushroom-Gravy-801. 

image via Bon Apetit

We always make two dressings an oyster and a cornbread.  My family loves heat.  Here is the Cajun Cornbread recipe that I have made for years.  I do not make my own cornbread but rather use unflavored cornbread stuffing mix.

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Cajun-Corn-Bread-Stuffing-5009

image via bon appétit

 

The other dressing that I serve alongside the turkey is Bon Appétit’s Northern California Oyster Stuffing.  It has a California slant as it is made with sourdough bread

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Northern-California-Oyster-Stuffing-5011

 

As I mentioned in my last post one of the best parts of blogging are the wonderful people you meet.  In the last few days the fabulous Katie Denham from Katie-d-i-d blog posted pictures of our lake house patio on her lovely blog.  You can read her blog here  http://katie-d-i-d.blogspot.com/ .  Katie has such a fresh young approach to design and her blog is always full of inspiration.

T&G interiors (thanks ladies) penned by the talented  Julie Taylor and Dani Greenwalt wrote a wonderful post about the power of blogging friendships here http://tginteriors.blogspot.com/.  They recently did an interesting post on Providence LTD Design and starting a business that was very informative.

Today I opened up my mail to find that Kelley (at Talk of the House) nominated my blog for the Liebster Award for a small up and coming blog. She has a wonderful blog that you can read here: http://www.talkofthehouse.com/talking-about/ Thanks Kelley!  Since it is such a busy time of the year for all of us I am going to forgo the question part of the award (I hope you don’t mind Kelley).  I am honored to have been selected and honored to pass it along to a couple of “up and coming bloggers”.

Maria pens the wonderful Swedish Design Blog below.  It is packed with wonderful images and ideas for the Swedish home.

 

Heather Lindstrom is a school psychologist for children with emotional disabilities  who writes the blog Style MindChic http://stylemindchic.blogspot.com/. Not only is she making the world a better place for these children she also has great style and fabulous fashion sense.

Congratulations Ladies!  Thanks for inspiring us!!