I trust that everyone had a great Thanksgiving! It is such a wonderful holiday – all about being together, with great food. What could be better? No worrying about presents or decorations, the focus is on food. With the major snowstorm we had all day on Wednesday, our electricity kept blinking, but still going, so the bread got baked without a hitch. I make my grandmother’s recipe for Polish bread every holiday.
This year, unfortunately I forgot to bring the recipe, but Zach’s girlfriend is from Poland and her family makes a similar bread recipe! Together, from our collective memories, we pieced together the ingredients and process and it turned out great! (Lucky!!!) Our other son, his girlfriend and her father all arrived safely early afternoon on Thanksgiving, and Agata made us another guest outside!
So I have a question for all of you. Knowing that hydrogenated vegetable oil is not good for you, as it essentially never leaves your body, this year I decided to use lard in my pie crust recipe. I had to special order it from our little local grocery store. I made the dough the day before so it was fully chilled. It handled absolutely beautifully in rolling it out. I then even had time to chill the formed crust again before baking. However, my beautiful crimped sides all fell during baking. 
You can see that here. What did I do wrong? Should I have used half lard and half butter? 
But here you can see how flakey it was on the pecan pie. Yum!
Meanwhile, the fresh pumpkin extracted with the hammer and screwdriver produced the BEST pumpkin pie – epic – as our oldest said!
Then the next thing I want to ask you is what do you do for your green vegetable at the big meal? In my book and at our last two Thanksgiving celebrations, I did this Brussels sprouts recipe with a fish sauce – from Momofuku and published at Food 52. My husband and I liked this but as my friend Judy said, it’s an acquired taste. So my boys vetoed that recipe out of the meal this year. I replaced it with sugar snap peas (blanched for one minute) with red pepper strips tossed with a sherry vinaigrette and topped with nitrate-free, all natural bacon bits.
My theory was that this would be a great refreshing dish, a counterpoint to the richness of the dressing, turkey and gravy with the crunch of the just blanched snap peas, and the sherry vinaigrette would be a nice contrast to the maple glazed sweet potatoes. A cool, salad-like dish to be clean and different on the plate, right?
Wrong. I hated it. To me, it broke up the whole warmth of the entire meal. So what do you do? Please share!
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What fun. I really enjoyed reading this post, Mary. I agree pumpkin pie made with fresh pumpkin tastes so much better.
My family likes peas with the turkey, so that is what I make and sneak in a little onion for flavor.
Jovina Coughlin recently posted…My Family’s Favorite Thanksgiving Pies
Peas with onions – maybe pearl onions? That’s a great idea, Jovina!! I also just heard today that someone does peas 3 ways – sugar snap peas, snow peas and regular peas with a crushed almond type of sauce. I’ll have to get the skinny on that one too.
I love that Polish bread which has such a smooth crumb and beautiful crust. Wish I could have a bite of your gorgeous pie. The crust made with lard looks particularly tempting, Mary.
Angie@Angie’s Recipes recently posted…Lamb’s Lettuce Salad with Belgian Endive, Grapes and Goat Cheese
Thanks Angie – you’re sweet!!
That’s the happiest snowman I’ve seen in a very long time. My mother used to make half lard, half shortening in her pie crusts. If I can find lard I make crusts with half lard and half butter. That pecan pie is outstanding.
I’ll tell you what our family’s decision was about a green salad for Thanksgiving. Nobody wanted to waste space on salad. 🙂
Maureen | Orgasmic Chef recently posted…Spinach, Fresh Cherries, Walnuts and Blue Cheese Salad
Well Maureen – that’s certainly one way to handle the vegetable aspect!! Thanks for the tip on the crust!
I use both butter and lard or shortening. Ratio I like to use for a double crust pie is 6 oz butter and 2.5 oz lard or shortening and it seems to always work. Your pecan pie looks wonderful the crust is so flaky.
Thanks Suzanne – so I used 2/3 cup of lard for two 9″ crusts. I’ll have to check the ounces on that but I think you’re using more. I’ll keep experimenting!!
That pie looks mouthwatering. I recently learned the secret to a great pie crust – Half butter , half leaf lard. Exquisite crusts with the combo is a guarantee.
Ansh recently posted…Pumpkin Roll – Let’s do pumpkin a little differently!
Thank you – but what is leaf lard?
I researched leaf lard – very cool – I’ll have to find some of that – maybe at farmer’s markets? Where do you buy your Ansh?
Beautiful photos. That bread is unreal. The pies look sooooo good and I love the snowman! Looks like you guys had some good eating!
Thanks Amanda!!! Hope you had some good eating too!!
Nice post. I think you had a very happy holiday.
Lilith, I think that’s an understatement!
Mary,
My mother has always made pie crusts with lard (the kind that comes in a box like butter). My grandmother taught her how to do it. When I asked her about your crust, she said that she always folds the overhang back on itself so it rests on the rim of the pie pan and then crimps it. She also said that that was what the rim is for. Hope that helps and happy belated birthday!
Anne Maxfield recently posted…Roasted Broccoli Soup
ohh – that’s a good idea, Anne, thanks!!! I did have it standing up in the air. Let’s get together after the holidays upstate!