This year, I was not in the moo to make a turkey. I've done it most years and for the most part, I'm pretty good at it. Except for that one time I cooked for my parents and that was the year I overcooked the damned bird. A week or so later when my in-laws came over for dinner, I made turkey for them and it came out fucking perfect.
But, with no guests this year and no traveling this year, I decided to skip the turkey and trimmings and go with something different. This year, I'm making da bin lo or 打邊爐 or Cantonese Hot Pot.
It's something that I have had growing up as a kid, but never made for myself. Despite it being terribly easy, as long as you have an Asia grocery store near by. I am lucky enough to have just such a store nearby.
It's a communal meal, where everyone cooks their food in a bubbling boiling cauldron of broth. The food is typically thinly sliced meats, fish balls, mushrooms, tofu and assorted veggies. At my home, we just started with plain old boiling water as opposed to broth. All the ingredients cooking in there end up making a very nice broth by the end of the meal. Combine that broth with some noodles and it's the perfect capstone to the meal.
We're going to include beef, lamb, pork, fish balls, tofu puffs, tofu skin, enoki mushrooms, napa cabbage, sliced turnips and carrots and finally some rice vermicelli. Of course, we'll also prepare a nice selection of sauces something as simple as soy sauce with garlic to spicy sesame paste. Both prep, cooking and clean up is going to be pretty easy.
I think it'll be a good meal and I expect to be pretty full.
The original plan was to go over to mom and dad's, and let mom cook. It's a wait-and-see game, trying to self quarantine while still having to go into the wide world to work. If we stay home it's gonna be ordering Thai food.
For thirty years, or so, it's always been big family dinner at Aunt Maggie's, The Mrs' sister. 30 or so people all gathered around Maggie's house.
Well Maggie passed and the house has sold, and everybody is kinda scattered.
Maggie was the one that held the family together.
No idea what we're gonna do.
Probably should ask.
Were it up to me, we'd go down to Denver and help out in a soup kitchen or see if they still do the Daddy Bruce feed.
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“Don't just embrace the crazy, sidle up next to it and lick its ear.” ― Jim Wright.
OMG, Daddy Bruce!* That's still happening as far as I know. Bruce Jr. died not long ago, but I think it's entrenched enough to be happening still.
As for us, we're doing basic Thanksgiving stuff like we always do. Turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy, Brussels sprouts, cranberry relish, etc.
I took over Thanksgiving for my family in 1993 after my dad died and my mom told me she wasn't up to it herself. So I started hosting Thanksgivings for my family and friends and people who had nowhere else to go. Those got up to 30 people sometimes. But we're not young like that anymore, so we don't know Thanksgiving orphans anymore. Now it's just us and I make way too much food and then I do clever things with leftovers for a while.
(If it were any other time, I'd make you come over. And please hit me up if you're in the area and want takeout.)
*
For foreigners: Daddy Bruce Randolph was a saint and a BBQ master who decided, way back in the day, to provide a free Thanksgiving meal for anyone who showed up. So he laid out tons and tons of cash out of pocket to make that happen, and it's been going ever since. Their motto back in the day was "God loves you, and so does Daddy Bruce." Daddy Bruce died some time ago, but his son, Bruce Randolph Jr. (spitting image of his father) kept it going until he died too, and people who remember are, as far as I know, keeping it going. We have at least one street and a school in Denver named after Daddy Bruce, because God loves Daddy Bruce, and so do we.
We usually go to a local bar - three courses for $20, can't beat it - but they're not doing Thanksgiving dinner this year, so I think we're making something here. I think we'll do a turkey breast, stuffing, sweet potatoes, and pie.
My usual turkey time days involve(d) going to a local chain sub shop and ordering their awesome turkey samwich. It's basically Thanksgiving on a roll. But this year with the covid running around, I'm ascared it's not safe enough to do that. So instead, I'm going to try something on my own, similar, but not the same. Imma try some Thanksgiving turkey burgers, that's p much Thanksgiving on a bun. I found some easy looking recipes, so I'm hopeful it'll turn out at least edible.
I usually take the kids down to Jake's steakhouse for the Thanksgiving buffet. They have a massive amount of food, including snowcrab and shrimp. Last year, I put myself in a self-induced crab-coma. But, this year that's not an option, I think we'll just order take out.
Last year, I put myself in a self-induced crab-coma.
Mmm ... self-induced crab-coma ...
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"You said don't shoot him, right? Well I didn't; I choked... look, Easy - if you ain't want him dead, why you leave him with me?"
~ M. Alexander
Thanksgiving 2020
crab!
...........
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