Tuesday Ramblings

I've already gotten several emails asking for Christmas dinner suggestions. Of course if you're not all turkey'ed out by then, consider a turducken, or a brined or fried turkey. For me, I'll be doing my usual standing rib roast, I think. And if you've been following along, I had promised the Mister to get a turducken if he still wants it. He hasn't made up his mind yet but I have a feeling he's a bit turkey'ed out. But we'll see. So what was my point? Oh yeah, Christmas dinner suggestions.

My MIL has bought honey roasted ham a couple of times before but since none of us are huge ham fans (except for me in sandwich form), we don't have this too often. It's never crossed my mind to make ham (do people actually make ham??) but I suppose that's an option. It's an easy one too if you buy it.

We've also had Chinese roast duck too, and I love it when we do this! Less work for me and I just love Chinese roast duck! (Dagnammit, now I'm craving roast duck) We usually buy 2 ducks (sometimes 3 so there's leftovers for everyone). As far as trimmings, I make brown rice, a veggie dish, some char siu (Chinese BBQ pork), and King's Hawaiian Bread. Very easy, very delicious.

Now if you want to do something different and make a family event out of "making" Christmas dinner, how about making tamales? You can read all about the tamale's symbolism from Ed's (mmm-yoso) post here. I'm the only one that likes (loves!) tamales, so to go through the effort (aka sweat and pain) to make these and then be the only one to eat them wouldn't be worthwhile. I would be happy but no one else would be.

Or, how about some Chinese water dumplings (shui jiao)? Or even Chinese hot pot (or Japanese shabu shabu)?

Or how about a themed potluck? Kind of like Iron chef. A friend of mine was thinking of doing this last year but chickened out. She wanted to pick a "not-so-secret" ingredient and every family member had to make something using it. Sounds fun and certainly adventurous.

Those are all the things my poor brain can come up with for now. Feel free to add your suggestions.

Have a good week. Now go and eat well.