I Wish..

I had taken more pictures of our thanks giving celebration and not just of the food as spectacular as it was but more so to capture the relaxation and happiness on every ones faces. The day went very well and we were delighted to have Mr and Mrs Mancuso joining us for the first time. Guy and Carin are the parents of Lindsey Mancuso who was married to Maura's brother Ace earlier this year, It was a pleasure having you both. The wedding was actually my very first blog post and you can look it up to see pictures of that amazing day in San Diego.

This year I was in charge of the turkey and also decided to make some bread and dinner rolls using the no knead bread recipe I have been using lately. This time I was trying to emulate a certain bread we used to sell at work for this time of year. I started off with the basic recipe and added loads of mixed nuts and dried cranberries, some cinnamon and topped with brown sugar for a crunchy crust. When the bread finally came out of the oven it must have weighed at least three pounds. You can see in the picture below that it's packed with fruit and nuts and tasted pretty darn good along with some butter I mixed with orange oil and zest. It was chewy and hearty  and very like its competitor which sells for $$$. The dinner rolls were another simple dough recipe but I added some fresh rosemary to them. All of the other sides and appetizers which were generously brought by the rest of the family were excellent and by night time I was truly beat and while I waddled off to bed, Maura decided to hit the mall for the sales. That turned out not to be such a good idea, way too crazy and much more sane early Friday morning.

I do feel a little bad that I did miss out on a lot of opportunity to take some snaps but I know for sure that I'll never forget this years thanks giving, with or without pictures. Thanks to everyone who made such an amazing display of food and I hope everyone had as much fun as I did.

Roll on Christmas, this time I'll be ready with that camera.....