Our turkey after a couple of hours in the smoker

Ah, Canadian Thanksgiving! That festive time of year again. It’s so much more than just fodder for jokes on How I Met Your Mother.

It’s pretty much like American Thanksgiving, except we do it on a weekend in October instead of on a Thursday in November, thereby actually aligning with the harvest for which we are thankful while not screwing up the work week. If we’re lucky, it might even be unseasonably warm so I can spend hours fussing over a smoker in nothing more than a t-shirt and a hoody (on top, anyway).

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This is my take on a recipe from Risotto by Jenny Stacey & Kathryn Hawkins. It’s a book just chock full of great risotto dishes that I bought for my wife Penny a few years ago when she first got the bug for consuming creamy little grains of arborio rice. She learned well from it, but since her maternity leave ended 4 years ago this family has been sorrowfully lacking with regard to risotto dishes.

For my first attempt at this Italian classic, I chose a Leek & Artichoke Ham Risotto dish that looked great and sounded appetizing, without being too difficult. Indeed, the biggest asset you’ll require making this dish is patience as you slowly add liquid and wait for it to absorb. You’ll also need a hearty supply of tasting spoons as you will need to check often that your rice has reached the right consistency – tender, but not mushy (overdone). If your rice is underdone, it’ll be crunchy, and Chef Ramsay will call you a donkey and kick you out of his kitchen (and nobody wants that).
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I got the idea for this dish when I saw this on The F-Word one day: Herb crusted fillet of brill with minted jersey royals recipe.

I thought it was a great idea for a dish, but there was a couple of problems: 1) it’s pretty hard to get Cornish brill in this part of Canada, and 2) after a recent trip to the UK where mint seemed to be have been snuck into everything from cheese to peas, my family is decidedly anti-mint these days.

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Row upon row of the finished product

What can I say – my wife, Penny, has always been a bit of a canning freak. I think we actually bought our house primarily because she fell in love with the cold cellar. Oh yeah, did I mention she books off holiday time for the tomato harvest?

Well, last weekend, we got to do an extra round of canning when we found out our friend Jess (otherwise known as Suzy F*%@$~g Homemaker) had a share in a local CSA farm that could get us some decent organic tomatillos, the key ingredient in one of our favourite condiments, salsa verde.

Many folks mistake tomatillos as a green tomato, but they’re actually related to the cape gooseberry (physalis peruviana). They really help give an authentic Mexican flavour to everything they touch, especially when used with chilies & fresh cilantro. Puts me in the mood for Dos Equis, mariachi and a burrito just thinking about it.
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My sister Meg popped in for a visit last week, so I figured I’d make a feast in her honour. It’s a pretty big deal, since she lives in London, England & has a 1-yr-old son we don’t get to see nearly often enough.

Meg’s a vegetarian, and she has also made the choice to cut out mushrooms from her diet. Let’s face it, she’s a fussy eater.

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