Stuffing for All

Giving Thanks

Thanksgiving in 2019 was wonderful. I had friends and family all around, and was cooking up a storm. (My son helped + I just love working with him in the kitchen.) Enjoyed it all and felt very grateful for my loving spouse, my great son, wonderful (new and old) friends, healthy pets, good food, and a home to shelter us.

I do not celebrate the American holiday, which is so fraught with historical issues. What I celebrate, something which I think is a great thing to do, is a couple of days to give thanks for all that we have and for those around us. So on one day it is a meal with family, on the next day it is a meal with and for friends and neighbors.

What? Me Stressed?

Did I stress at all? Well, yes for about fifteen minutes as I realized the dinner and brunch I was making had five very different eating requirements.

• One person is on an oxalate and gluten free diet, and is vegetarian.
• Another is “just” gluten free.
• The third is on a purine free diet, is lactose intolerant, and loves meat.
• The fourth is diabetic.
• Then there is a contingent, like me, with no limits on types of food.

Whew! What to do with this complexity of diets? I did the best I could, but was not perfect. I will continue to improve and have a goal to get all the variations right so everyone can eat a meal free from what they need to avoid.

Dinner Menu

So what I made to serve everyone was a series of food I thought would provide everyone options for their diet.

• Soup: “Creamed” butternut squash and sweet potato soup, mixed with browned sage butter, garnished with fresh herbs (sage, thyme, oregano, parsley) and pumpkin seeds.
• Meat: Spiral (half) ham with a honey mustard glaze (that we will be eating for days!)
• Veggie dish: Stuffed mushrooms with dried fruit (cranberries, papaya, raisons), fresh herbs, diced Shiitake mushroom stems and roughly chopped Marcona almonds. Topped with just a bit of cheddar + truffles cheese.
• Veggie dish: Twice baked red lentils and sweet potato, with orange zest and juice.
• Veggie dish: Braised red cabbage with vinegar and chunks of apple.
• Bread stuffing and Chicken gravy
• Salad: A fruit salad with Cranberry/Pear balsamic vinegar, honey and fresh chopped mint from the garden.
• Dessert: Chocolate covered almonds with a bit of salt and sugar.

Changes to Serve Everyone

The menu above mostly worked. Changes I made to the basic recipes:

• Creamed soup has milk products so I did not use cream but broth and relied on the smoothness of the squash and sweet potato to supply the right mouthfeel, adding browned butter helped. Sweet potatoes however have oxalates.
• The stuffed vegan mushrooms did not have any bread product just the fruit, mushrooms, Marcona almonds, herbs and and cheese. I made a few without the high oxalate almonds and set those aside.
• Turkey has high levels of purines so I bought and cooked a medium purine level ham, after checking with the purine-free person that this would be ok.
• Stuffing has bread and thus gluten, so I made three different types of stuffing with the same basic ingredients: gluten free vegetarian, gluten free with meat, and gluten-based with meat. I was unsure of the gluten-free stuffing so made regular just in case. However they each tasted just fine. The stuffings had bread, dried cranberries, chestnuts, and lots of fresh herbs, butter and broth.
• Gravy has flour, so I made all the gravy gluten free, no milk (used brandy), and had two gravies: one with chicken broth and the other with veggie broth + faux chicken powder.
• Lentils have purines so I reduced the amount of lentils I would use in the Sweet potato dish. (Thinking now, I should have skipped the lentils for one serving, sorry about that.) The nuts could be removed easily since they were placed on top and not incorporated into the dish.
• Because nuts have oxalates, I provided both the chocolate almonds and a fruit salad for dessert.

All I can say is thank goodness no one had a nut allergy!

Making the Meal

Basic Cooking Steps

Foraging: So I found some good gluten free bread in the freezer at the El Cerrito Natural Grocery store, a loaf of sourdough bread, Marcona almonds, chestnuts, walnuts, dried fruit, and bittersweet chocolate chips. I also bought the ham, 2 sweet Italian sausage links and 2 hot Italian sausage links. From Monterey Market I bought oranges and other fruit, white onions, large white button mushrooms, celery, multi-colored carrots with green tops, chestnuts, regular almonds, red cabbage, apples, and cheese. From my pantry I had dried shitake mushroom stems, and all the dried herbs, seasonings, and such. From my yard I had parsley, oregano, thyme, rosemary, and sage. From my freezer I had the veggie and chicken broths.

Two Days Before: I had all the sausage in the fridge defrosting, along with the half ham. I also took the chicken and veggie stock out of the freezer and into the fridge to defrost.

Prepared Stuffing Bread: First, I cut the bread into cubes (and did not remove the crust), placing it directly on a baking sheet. Then I went in the backyard and cut some sage, oregano, thyme and just a bit of rosemary and parsley. Chopped them up and sprinkled on the bread. I finished with a quick spray of olive oil and seasonings, and popped the pan into the oven at 200F for one hour. Took it out and flipped the bread over, seasoned the bread with a bit of salt but mostly pepper on the other side, rotated the pan and put it back into the oven for a bit over an hour (honestly I forgot they were in there). When it came out, I scraped everything into a large bowl and let it cool down and remain out on the counter for 1.5 days so that it was thoroughly dried. When I was done I had one bowl of gluten free bread, and one bowl of sourdough bread.

Day Before: I cleaned the larger white button mushrooms and scooped a bit out from some of the fuller ones so there was room for goodies. I set them out on the counter to dry so that the food would not be soggy as stuffed mushrooms are often. Midday I flipped them over so all sides had opportunity to dry out.

I also baked the squash and all the sweet potatoes (for the soup and veggie dish) and lentils. By the end of the day I had scooped out the squash and sweet potatoes for the soup into a bowl. I also had scooped the veggie sweet potatoes, saving the skins, and mixed with the orange lentils in another bowl.

Morning Preparing Veggies/Herbs: The morning of cooking, for stuffing I diced chopped white onion, roughly chopped chestnuts, thinly sliced celery + leaves, and matchsticked the carrots. I pulled out the dried cranberries, and chopped up the carrot greens along with fresh herbs. For the mushrooms I cut the dried fruit (using shears, it is easier), diced the Shitake mushroom stems, grated the cheese and chopped the herbs. For cooking these foods I pulled out 3 containers of chicken stock (for the soup, gravy and stuffing) to reach room temperature.

Cooking: Ham was wrapped in parchment and then foil. After pouring a honey-mustard mixture over it, I placed it into a 350F oven. I put the various stuffings in three different looking containers, so I could tell them apart, and placed them into the oven next to the meat. I added the mixture for the lentils and sweet potatoes back into their skins, topped with sweet walnuts as a garnish; placed on a baking quarter sheet and added to the bottom rack. Then I stuffed and added the mushrooms. Everything was in the oven and heating up.

Meanwhile, my son was cutting up and mixing the fruit (bananas, tangerine, apples, blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, pomegranate seeds, and kiwi fruit) with a honey + cranberry/pear balsamic dressing. And his girlfriend was making the chocolate covered almonds. My spouse was trying to keep up with all the dirty dishes we were making (she did 3 dishwasher loads that day, and lots of hand washed equipment too!)

Stuffing Options

Dried bread cubes, fresh herbs, salt and especially pepper, add in celery, carrots, onions, dried cranberries and chestnuts. Mix by adding sage infused browned butter and chicken (or veggie) stock. Then mix well until all the bread is wet and place in the oven to warm.

Vegetarian, Gluten-free, no Oxalates

Use gluten-free bread, and mock chicken broth (veggie broth + faux chicken bullion powder).

• This powder can be found in the bulk section at health food stores, Whole Foods, etc.
• I sometimes add this powder to a regular chicken broth if it tastes too bland and not enough like chicken. Works great to up the flavor of gravy too, when needed.

Only Gluten Free

Used the same gluten free bread and added all the veggies, herbs, fruits and nuts as above. What I did was to add some cooked Italian hot and Italian sweet sausage to the mixture.

Meat loving but Purine Free

I used Sourdough bread, the limited Italian pork sausage, and followed the same recipe.

Chicken Gravy Options

Since I had cooked ham, I asked and was told, no one wanted ham gravy. I went with two options, a veggie and chicken based gravy.

• Fond: There is no fond with which to make the roux.
• Roux: I used 1.5oz butter and 1.5oz gluten free flour (1+1 GF All Purpose) and placed into a hot skillet with some salt and pepper mixing until it got the right color I was looking for and started to smell nutty. Then added broth, some brandy, and seasoning while mixing.
• Vegetarian: I used a veggie broth and used a faux chicken powder. I added it to the broth until it tasted about right. This was set aside.
• Meat Based: I used a chicken broth made partially from chicken bone broth so it was a bit gelatinized. I did add some of the chicken faux powder to up the taste a bit and a bit of water.

Leftovers

Mushrooms were all eaten. The most common statement was they had never thought of using fruit in the stuffed mushrooms and that it tasted unusually good without all the bread crumbs that are standard in this dish.

The soup was all eaten up by the next day, as was the twice baked sweet potatoes. Both were well received, but the soup needed a bit more salt (my failing, I tend to undersalt.)

I tried to use it all up, but there was plenty of stuffing left. Uncooked stuffing can be frozen (1), but I prefer not to do so as I think it tastes better without freezing. As a result, I had to get creative in making leftovers. We did stuffing based pancakes the next day, layered on top with thinly sliced ham and covered with sunny side up eggs. Sprinkled with fresh herbs and cheese of course. You could use stuffing in a waffle form too if you want.

Once the holiday was over, I mixed all of the stuffings together and had just one dish to worry about eating. There is also plenty of ham for us to have sandwiches for the next week. Or two.

Last Sunday Night Thinking

So tomorrow I go back to work taking a ham sandwich with me. Not much else is left since my spouse finished the dressing tonight. Ham is okay to feed dogs in moderation, too high in sodium and fat otherwise, so I am giving just a little bit as a treat to the dogs. To use up all the ham we are eating and sharing what is left with others. Everything else is gone and I have my fridge back.

I hope your day of thanks was a pleasant one full of love and gratitude. Really something we might want to strive for everyday.

—Patty

–**–

I was watching a cooking show and they had a series of very famous Chefs talking about all sorts of issues. One of them said that junk food was designed to entertain not sustain. I thought that was a very good description of the difference between junk food and real food.

Recipes: A tasty and easy Tex-Mex Stuffed Bell Pepper Salad. I also added all the recipes linked in this post – kept me busy over the weekend before I forgot what I did.

I was careful that the aluminum foil did not touch my food by wrapping everything first in parchment paper, and then using the foil to keep food wrapped tightly or tented. I do not like aluminum in my food and do not like the taste it can leave in some food. Chef Olive also feels this way, but probably has his scientific reasons for it.