Happy Turkey Day!
Fitz and Field supervise the turkey at the YL Ranch in 2005.
Thanksgiving is a day for family; it’s also a day for friends, and let’s not forget that it’s a day for food. Having grown up in a southern household, Thanksgiving was a day of excess when it came to food. My mother believed in turkey dressing (not stuffing) and gravy. She took great pride in crafting both with great skill. She also believed in the power of sage, and I must say that despite the occasional “oopsie” when it came to adding sage, she made a mean turkey dressing. In most recent years, I’ve made some of that dressing, either for “just us” or for whatever group we joined up with for Thanksgiving. It doesn’t look like that’s in the cards this year, and I’ll admit that’s largely by a conscious choice to steer clear of some turkey day tradition this year, as I’m not sure I’m quite emotionally up to it.
The dough tried to escaping the proofing jar while we weren’t looking.
We’re baking rolls to take along to our Thanksgiving meal this year, so the house is alive with the aromas of yeast and rising bread, so there’s that. Apparently taking time off from bread making served us well, as Amanda has quite outdone herself in crafting these fine specimens. We baked a “backup” batch last night, but the baking temperature was a bit high, and we were concerned they might get a tad too brown before getting done when finishing them today. So, we rolled out of bed at a bright, shiny 6:13 to start a fresh batch for today. Those little yeasties sure are being energetic! While we were upstairs on the phone with Fitz to wish her a joyous Thanksgiving, the dough nearly burst through the top of the proofing jar!
While I’m glad that I finished up organic chemistry over the summer, thus ensuring that next summer will be all mine, I truly missed getting to spend some time back home in North Carolina over the summer. I’m looking forward to wrapping up the last couple weeks of school and spending some time there over Christmas break. My roots are drying and need some mountain water to get them back into shape. With any luck, we’ll have some cooperative weather, and Amanda and I can take a hike up to Mount LeConte or some other Smoky Mountain vista.
It’s still tough, emotionally, to be back home, having lost all my family, but there are still a lot of fond memories to relive and places to re-see. There will always be mountains to climb, streams to cross, and trees to lean against.
Milk bread rolls proofed and ready to bake
Golden brown and delicious
Hard to argue with some fresh melted butter brushed on!
