Thanksgiving Sandwich

Dear Thanksgiving,

I love you so much.  I'm so sorry I started eyeballing Christmas decorations early this year.

I know that the last leftovers of our feast are almost totally depleted, but I'm not ready to let you go yet.

I'll never let go.

Love,


Ashley


That's why I made this turktastic sandwich with what remained of my leftovers today!  Some of you may remember me rambling on and on about it...it basically involves bread, butter, dijon, stuffing, turkey, cranberry sauce, a skillet and a whole lot of love.  This is the sandwich I've pined for since last December, and it tasted like a sweet slice of heaven topped with a dollop of dreams come true.

You thought your leftover turkey was dried out and gross and only fit for soup?  Wrong!  You thought nobody wanted that last couple tablespoons of cranberry sauce?  Think again!

Make this sandwich immediately.  If you're all out of leftovers...I am so sorry because this must be torture.

Christmas Cookie Ideas

That time of year is officially here!  Christmas cookie time.

I love nothing more during this time of year (even more than the rest of the year) to have people over and feed them, visit friends and bring treats, and creating a crazy decadent Christmas spread with plenty of cookies.

There are always the usual suspects...in my family that means:

Frosted Cut-Out Sugar Cookies
Hershey's Kiss Peanut Butter Cookies
Russian Tea Balls
Chocolate Crinkles

Now, I'd like to submit to you some of my favorite cookie recipes, a little out-of-the-ordinary, a little off the beaten path, but very Christmas appropriate.  Of course, I'll be baking up a lot of the regular favorites I listed above, and more...but the truth is I'm still recovering from Thanksgiving cooking and haven't eaten anything but leftovers all week!  So here you go, without further ado:

Peanut Butter Nutella Swirls

Mini Black and White Cookies

Italian Chocolate Spice Cookies

Chocolate Mint Cookies

Reeses Peanut Butter Cup Cookies

Try them out this year with your family...they're pretty much a guaranteed hit!

Full on Thanksgiving Spectacular

So I'm still recovering from a very full weekend of cooking, baking, cooking, eating, cooking, a little more baking, some light puppy wrangling, and entertaining.  As I said, yesterday, after work, I fixed our very own little Thanksgiving feast.

I mentioned pumpkin pie yesterday.  Besides that, we had the turkey of course, mashed potatoes, stuffing, cranberry sauce, green beans, sweet potatoes, and rolls.  It was crazy, crazy good.  I was working pretty much nonstop from the time I got off work (ironically) to about 6pm when we sat down to dinner.

Cricket also got a little plate of turkey, mashed potatoes, and stuffing.  She loved it, but we may have created a monster.  Now she just sits next to us while we eat, looking cute.  She knows that sitting is one of the tricks for which she gets a treat, so she tries to sit for us whenever she wants something.  It's funny because we have hardwood floors, so her fuzzy little butt slips back little by little and she keeps having to back the sit up.  It's super cute, but maybe one of those things you just have to see for yourself.

So let's start with the all-important bird.

Pumpkin Pie

So...I made Thanksgiving dinner after all!

I wasn't going to, since I had to work and all, but I was sitting at work and just thinking about how sad I would be coming late to a Thanksgiving dinner when everyone else has already eaten and just picking at someone else's leftovers...really, I can't imagine a sadder state of affairs on Thanksgiving, so.  I decided to just do it myself!

I'll get to the whole meal soon, but let's start with my personal favorite part of this and every meal...dessert.

Mini Pumpkin Donuts with Cinnamon Maple Glaze

Make donuts?  Yeah, I totally did that, no big deal.

These donuts are the result of a complex emotional struggle that brought me to this point.  It all started last year around Christmas.  Jim and I stopped in DC on our way to his parents house to visit friends.  There, we found ourselves starving for lunch and decided to go into a Cosi.  Now I know that they're a chain and therefore unforgivably lame to the world of food bloggers, but oh well.  I had the most delicious sandwich I'd ever eaten in my life there.

It like the whole Thanksgiving meal in a sandwich.  There was Turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, and cranberry sauce all on this toasted thin bread.  If that doesn't sound delicious to you...I don't even know what to say to you.  Get out of here.

Broccoli Cheddar Chicken

The way to a man's heart is through his stomach, right?

What they don't tell you is that the way to a lady's heart is through her food.  Basically, if you eat what I make for you...I like you.  Pretty simple, huh?

Chocolate Mint Cookies

Let me just begin by saying that I know everyone says this.

But this year the Christmas stuff went up the day after Halloween.

I have mixed emotions about this.  I love Halloween.  I love Christmas.  Where does Thanksgiving fit in?

Green Monster Smoothie

Have you ever experienced that phenomenon that something you once looked at and thought "yuck"... the more you see it, the more it grows on you?  Until one day you just snap and cut bangs, put on your shirt dress and skinny jeans with ugg boots and go out to buy leg warmers.  I've been there.  Leg warmers are so cute.  And who wouldn't want these $80 boot socks?

Socks for $80?!?!?!  Yeah, I know, I know.  Hey, it's not like I own them.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

 

So I have been so crazy busy lately you wouldn't even believe it.  

Work has been hectic.

I've been baking like a mad woman.

I've been trying to work out a lot more.

I just made two cookie varieties and jayhawk pie for a tailgate on Saturday.  So exciting.

Anyway, the point of all this is that I've been neglecting my blog.  Poor little neglectstravaganza.  I wanted to share a couple things with you, though.