Tag Archives: turkey cupcakes

KALE AND APPLE SALAD WITH BACON AND CANDIED PECANS

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I’m finally recovered enough from Thanksgiving to post some turkey photos and a great salad recipe that debuted at our Thanksgiving dinner.

I decorated the grownups’ table with several estate sale finds — the glass pumpkins, the centerpiece bowl, the mirrored runner, and the candelabra all came from estate sales and thrift shops:

The kids’ table had an herb-filled turkey basket as a centerpiece:

My mother-in-law gave me this unusual driftwood turkey to add to my collection of Thanksgiving decorations, which I filled with an assortment of succulents:

One of my favorite turkeys is this vintage hand-crafted one that I found on ebay last year:

There was, of course, turkey food.  There was a turkey veggie platter that I brought to my son’s friend’s house (nailed it, right?):

And a turkey-decorated caramelized pear cheesecake (my daughter won a gift certificate for $1000 worth of school supplies for this design, which we donated to a local underserved elementary):

Can’t forget the turkey cupcakes:

And finally, the real deal turkey, prepared by my husband:

Although most of the food at our Thanksgiving dinner was traditional, I tried out a new kale salad on the family.  The original recipe came from Food & Wine Magazine, but I made several changes.  It is a beautiful and delicious salad — a knockout, really — that the family loved, and which will definitely reappear during the holidays.

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KALE AND APPLE SALAD WITH BACON AND CANDIED PECANS
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Recipe type: Salad
 
Ingredients
  • 2 cups pecans
  • ½ cup confectioners' sugar
  • ½ teaspoon cayenne
  • 1-1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
  • 6 slices thick-cut bacon, cut into ½" dice
  • ¼ cup olive oil
  • ¼ cup white wine vinegar
  • 2 tablespoons caper brine (from a jar of capers)
  • 3 tablespoons maple syrup
  • Salt and pepper, to taste
  • 2 Granny Smith Apples, cut into matchsticks
  • ½ small head of red cabbage, cored and thinly sliced
  • 1 large bunch kale, stems removed, and thinly sliced
  • 2 ounces shaved parmesan cheese
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a small bowl, cover pecans with water, then drain in a colander. In a medium bowl, whisk together the confectioners' sugar, cayenne, and 1-1/2 teaspoons salt. Add the pecans and toss to coat the pecans. Transfer to colander and shake off any excess coating. Arrange the pecans on a parchment-lined baking sheet and bake for 10-12 minutes, until the sugar is lightly caramelized and the pecans are golden brown. Remove from oven and set aside.
  2. Place the bacon in a nonstick skillet over medium heat and cook, stirring frequently, until bacon is crisp. Strain the pan drippings into a medium bowl, and transfer bacon to a paper towel-lined plate. Add the olive oil, vinegar, caper brine, and maple syrup to the bacon drippings and whisk to combine. Season with salt and pepper.
  3. Place the kale in a large salad bowl. Add the apples, cabbage, parmesan cheese, bacon, and pecans, and toss to combine. Pour dressing over salad and toss again.

 Kale and Apple Salad with Bacon and Candied Pecans

MARTHA STEWART TURKEY CUPCAKES — IMPROVED

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Once every decade or so, I like to make Turkey Cupcakes for Thanksgiving.  The original idea came from Martha Stewart:

Martha Stewart’s Turkey Cupcakes

 Adorable, right?  But what Martha doesn’t tell you, is that there is no way in hell you can make these cupcakes without a team of food stylists, and even then I’m not so sure.  The gummy fish are too heavy to stand up as tail feathers, and just about as soon as you stick them in they start falling out, taking half the cupcake with them.  I found another blogger who experienced similar frustration.  She wrote:  “What they don’t tell you is that you can’t just “stick” a fish into a marshmallow and expect it to stick. I used my kitchen scissors and made a little snip and then inserted the gummy fish. Well, then they started falling out after a few minutes, so I stuck a toothpick up and through it to hold it in place and that worked much better. You need to do the same thing running a toothpick up and through the fish for the feathers or else they’ll fall out, too, and completely ruin one side of your cupcake breaking apart your cupcake.”

So I came up with an IMPROVED Turkey Cupcake — one that you can make at home WITHOUT a team of food stylists AND transport without the whole thing falling apart.  Using a pastry brush, brush melted chocolate onto the top half of pretzel sticks, roll them in jimmies, and VOILA — tailfeathers!  I set them on a baking sheet lined with waxed paper and let the chocolate harden in the refrigerator for about 10 minutes.  The hardest part about making the tailfeathers is keeping the kids from eating them.

I also used candy corn for the nose instead of gummy fish.  Use any cupcake recipe you want.  You can use any frosting you like too, although I think chocolate is the turkiest.  This morning I’m dropping off a rafter of turkeys for my son’s class.  I didn’t know that a group of turkeys was called a rafter — learn something new every day!  I wish I could be there to see the kids’ faces — but if I were, my son would be staring at the floor pretending he didn’t know me and wishing that the earth would open up and swallow me whole.  And then he’d grab a cupcake. . . .

 A rafter of turkeys

What’s the best way to stuff a turkey?
Serve him lots of pizza and ice cream!