Yes, I have sacrificed my nap time for stock time. And it has kept me quite busy as time do not wait for you. In stock trading, every second counts, especially if one is day trading or even swing trading, which is what I am 'somewhat' doing. Haha...you must be thinking I'm not taking it seriously. Well, I'll just move on to food topic for now---side way glance.
Truthfully, I have been swing trading on natural gas...and guess what, winter has been turning its back on me. What can I do, I am talking about mother nature here....she's is going against the odds this winter. My heart is bleeding, but well, mother nature is not planning to sooth me, I can only turn to food.
So, this Thanksgiving, I am going all out. What I mean is making everything from scratch. I started with dessert, apple pie. But I don't really like the usual American apple pie, plus I'm not a big fan of cinnamon. So, I opt for French style apple pie---apple galette, a favorite in my family (picture below).
Next, I prep my meat. I planned to make rolled pork with olive spread inside. So, I bought a whole 'loaf' of pork loin. Yes, the entire 'loaf' was a little over 1 foot long. I made a brine with salt and brown sugar, sliced open the pork loin by going around in a spiral form so that it was a thin piece of meat that spread about 1'x1"x 10". Soaked the meat in the brine overnight, so it'll be ready the following day for roasting.
Then, I prepared the bread. As usual, instead of buns, I prefer french loaf. Of course, I used started to make it. I often make it, so making this wasn't a big hassle. The only issue I have was the time it takes to rise especially now in the winter. It tends to take longer than usual to rise, which also increase the sourness in the bread (since I used sourdough starter). This is of course not a problem, since my family loves sourdough bread. But, I find it hard to balance the acidity and the rise of the bread (haha, I still have ways to go in making sourdough bread). Anyway, the bread did come out nicely.
I also went ahead to finish up the cranberry sauce. One, it is easy to make and second, I prefer eating it cold. I like to keep the cranberry sauce on the sour side. In fact, I even added granny smith apple to perk up the sourness. This was the last thing I did before turning in for bed, ready for Thanksgiving day.
See, my cranberry sauce all served up. Nothing spectacular, it is really the simplest one to make among the other dishes I had.
On Thanksgiving day, I first baked the potatoes to make potato salad (japanese style). Since, we are asian family, I often kept some of the dishes asian style like this one. What is the difference? Well---looking at the name, 'salad' makes the difference with normal mash potatoes. In japanese style potato salad, it has sliced cucumbers and onions mixed in the mash potatoes. I also added carrots in the mash potatoes, making it orangy in color as noted in the above picture.
Then I moved on to make the soup. In most asian meals, they are often accompanied with soups. So, being the asian family we are, I had to include soup in our Thanksgiving meal. And to keep with the western theme, I didn't make wonton soup or eggdrop soup. I decided to make shrimp bisque. Although this is not a typical Thanksgiving dish, well, it is good anyway.
Next, I moved on to the meat. I took the meat from the brine and left it to dry while I was making the soup and also making the olive paste to go inside the meat before rolling it. Actually, instead of calling it olive paste, I just make olive tapanade. Whatever leftover of this olive tapanade can be eaten with crackers or bread later.
I left the meat to dry about 1 hour. Pat dry again in case it is still wet. Spread the olive tapanade on the meat evenly, and then rolled it up. Tied it with cooking twine and pan fried it in a dutch oven if you have one, or in a pot that can go inside the oven. Once it is browned on all sides, add a splash of alcohol into the meat and covered the pot. I used sake, since I don't have white wine handy. I could have used red wine, but I just decided with sake. Then put the entire pot into the over covered for 40 min at 375F. After the 40 min, uncovered, increased temperature to 425F and basque the pork with the juice and cranberry sauce for another 15 min. Walla, I have my roast rolled pork.
As a last minute decision, I also made two traditional Thanksgiving dishes---brussel sprouts and baked sweet potatoes.
Both dishes are easy to make, recipes are from the internet I found. So, by 6 pm, I have my Thanksgiving meal ready.
And today, I thinking of chinese again. As asian family, I lean towards asian meals, though my kids (born here in the States) do not often like it. Oh well, the person cooking is the Queen!
Today, the day after Thanksgiving, my natural gas stock is not looking good...weather outside is cold but not frigid cold. I am trying to sooth my heart with food, which is why I am thinking 'chinese' today. Soul food to keep my bleeding heart happy.
Happy Holiday everyone!!!
