Taking Back Thursday

The Friday Newsletter insists on taking things one holiday at a time

As soon as Halloween ended, it started.

The last Trick-or-Treaters were still scurrying home, laden down with candy, but you could already spot the lights turning on, see the inflatables being inflated, and—if you listened very closely—I could swear you could hear the faint sound of Mariah Carey on the breeze.

Christmas was coming.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I know why Christmas has become a two-month season for many. From a retail perspective, you need to maximize the time that you can sell trees and lights and decorations—that big empty space left behind when the last twelve-foot skeleton is sold at Home Depot isn’t going to be filled with cranberry sauce.

I even get it from an individual perspective. Christmas music and Hallmark movies and peppermints mocha—it’s all very cheerful stuff, and who couldn’t use an extra pep in their step now that Daylight Savings Time is over and we live in perpetual darkness? Heck, I can’t fault anyone for wanting to listen to Christmas music early—I’m a middle-aged man who still routinely listens to pop-punk. I have no standing here.

But I can’t do it myself. I can’t rush into Christmas just yet, because I believe too deeply in Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving is my favorite day of the year—a day spent with family, but also a day where I get to spend all day cooking things I won’t have any other time of year, a day where I can transition from watching the Macy’s Parade to the National Dog Show to the Detroit Lions and not have to think about work for three more days afterwards.

The day after, we’ll launch Christmas. My eight-year-old son steadfastly maintains that Black Friday is his favorite day of the year, because it’s the day we put up the Christmas tree and outdoor lights, the day we hang our stockings, and—most important from his perspective—the day I’ll bust out this year’s holiday-themed Lego set. (It’s an Alpine village this year!) It’s all very special, but it wouldn’t be as special a day if we didn’t wait for it—if we didn’t give Thanksgiving its proper due first.

Friends, it is Friday yet again on The Action Cookbook Newsletter.

As with every Friday for more than 200 Fridays and running, my goal here is to present you with a hand-picked selection of ACBN-Certified Good Things—things I think just might make your weekend a little bit better.

The fourth Thursday in November is just a few days away, but in the meantime, I’ve got a delicious meal for the night before, an upgraded version of an ACBN-favorite cocktail, some terrific music, a book I couldn’t put down, lively discussion with The Internet’s Best Comment Section, pets, and more!

The weekend beckons, friends. Let’s dive on in.

7) Oh, right. It’s not Thanksgiving today.

I tend to do my Thanksgiving shopping on the Saturday beforehand. (That’s tomorrow.) I don’t want to be rushing through the grocery store at the last minute, and I need time to let my turkey thaw and dry-brine before cooking. The day before that (that’s today), I’ll compile a lengthy and detailed list of all the things I’ll need to procure to get my family’s favorite dishes on the table. I’ll be fully prepared, ready to take on the grocery store like a man on a mission.

Then, you know what happens every year?

I forget to shop for anything but Thanksgiving.

By Monday or Tuesday—if not sooner—I’ll realize that I didn’t plan on anything else, didn’t think about what to have for dinner any other night, and we’ll end up picking up pizza or something like that.

Well, I’m not going to let that happen this year.

We’re into Festive Dish Season, and I’m looking for dinners with a little bit of style. In the run-up to Thanksgiving, though, I don’t want anything too hearty.

That’s why today I’m just making a light salad.

[no one believes me]

Okay, fine. Maybe I’m throwing a whole charcuterie board into a bowl and calling it a salad. You can’t stop me, though. It is my God-given right as a Midwesterner to call anything I want a “salad”.

Charcuterie Board Salad

• arugula

• ripe red pears, sliced thin

• smoked gouda, sliced thin

• salami, sliced thin and cut into half-moons

• prosciutto, torn into strands

• dried cherries

• Marcona almonds

• Garlic Confit Sourdough Croutons (recipe below)

• Honey-Mustard Vinaigrette (recipe below)

Garlic Confit Sourdough Croutons

• sourdough bread, torn into chunks

• 3 heads of garlic, peeled

• 1/2 cup olive oil

• juice and zest of 1/2 lemon

Preheat the oven to 250F. Add the peeled garlic cloves to a small, oven-safe dish, and toss with the lemon juice and zest. Pour the oil over, arranging the cloves such that they’re fully submerged. Cover with foil, and bake for 2 hours; remove and allow to cool. Transfer the resulting garlic confit to an airtight container and refrigerate until using.¹

Take some of the garlic oil from the confit, toss with the chunks of sourdough, and spread them in a well-spaced layer on a foil-lined baking sheet; bake at 250 for 8-12 minutes, until well-crisped. (You can use the remaining garlic as a spread on the remaining sourdough, but note the footnote about storage.)

Honey-Mustard Vinaigrette

• 1 cup olive oil

• 1/2 cup red wine vinegar

• 2 tablespoons honey

• 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard

• heavy pinch salt

Whisk or blend until well-emulsified.

Toss the arugula with the dressing, and add to a bowl. Add small amounts of the salami, prosciutto and smoked gouda, and toss a little bit more. Add slices of pear, dried cherries and Marcona almonds, then top with the garlicky croutons.

Look at that. It’s so festive! It’s the perfect thing for a slightly-fancy Friday-before-Thanksgiving dinner, or a guests-have-arrived-the-night-before warmup.

7B) Okay, but let’s talk next Thursday’s menu.

I love hearing about other people’s Thanksgiving traditions. When I’m among Southerners, I’m fascinated to hear about cornbread dressing, mac & cheese, biscuits and the like—all things that I enjoy, but none of them Thanksgiving Foods to me.

That’s not to say that I’m right—it’s just, for a holiday as broadly-shared in this country as Thanksgiving, we all have different notions of what belongs on the big table.

For me, it’s this:

1. Turkey, spatchcocked and dry-brined for 48 hours, rubbed with herbed butter and cooked on a wire-rack-lined sheet pan on the gas grill. (I primarily do this to save oven space.)

2. Sausage and sage stuffing. I use this Real Simple recipe every year.

3. Mashed potatoes. I’ve shared this family-favorite recipe (about halfway down in that post) that’s basically a giant twice-baked potato before, but it’s a banger and the very definition of a Sometimes Food.

4. Green Bean Casserole, exactly as directed on the can of fried onions.

5. Hot Cranberry Sauce.

6. Rolls, pie, wine.

I want to know what your Thanksgiving menu is, though!

What are your gotta-have-it, it’s-not-Thanksgiving-without-it dishes?

7C) Hey, speaking of stuffing…

My good friend @TheGurglingCod—whom I had the pleasure of seeing again while visiting Clemson this past weekend—has launched a sausage-centric newsletter of his own, one that I’m quite enjoying so far:

Sausage Season

!

He’s been hitting the sausage content hard in the run-up to Thanksgiving, and I encourage you to give the newsletter a look—the man knows ground meats.

Week 10: Thanksgiving Grindset, part 2

6) The idiot grows up

Almost two years ago, I came up with a cocktail here that I named after my lovable-trainwreck of a dog, Olaf. It was a darn good cocktail called The Handsome Idiot.

COCKTAIL: The Handsome Idiot

Well, it’s been almost two years since we first brought Olaf home.

(We actually got him two days before Thanksgiving, which was a fun conversation with my parents. Hey, we’re all set for you to arrive! By the way, we have a big and emotionally-damaged rescue dog who got here yesterday!)

The big lad is still a goofball, but he’s calmed down significantly from the furry tornado that he was in 2021, when he was coming off a failed rescue placement after being found on the street a few weeks before. He’s never going to be the brightest or calmest dog on the block, but there’s no denying that he’s matured and mellowed.

In light of this—and his impending Gotcha Day—I decided to make a slightly-more-grown-up version of his namesake drink. This time, it’s The Dapper Doofus.

The Dapper Doofus

• 1-1/2 ounces rye whiskey

• 1/2 ounce Pierre Ferrand Dry Curaçao

• 1/2 ounce St-Germain elderflower liqueur

• 1/4 ounce Cynar

• 2 dashes Fee Brothers Aztec Chocolate Bitters

• Orange peel

Add the rye, dry curaçao, St-Germain, Cynar and bitters to an ice-filled mixing glass; stir until well-chilled. Strain into a coupe, and garnish with orange peel.

The original was terrific, but this is just a little more complex, a little more nuanced.

Now, if you’re not a nutcase about having a fully-stocked bar like I am, then you might blanch at a five-bottle cocktail. I’ll tell you, though—each of these ingredients is a heavy-hitter. Ferrand Dry Curaçao is, for my money, the best orange liqueur on the market, and I love using it in cocktails. Ditto St-Germain, which has a ton of uses and always brightens a drink up. The chocolate bitters play well in a Sea Serpent, among others drinks. The Cynar might be the thing you’re least likely to have on your bar, but it’s a pleasant bitter apertif to have around—useful in spritzes or anywhere else you’d use an Amaro.

I guess what I’m saying is—if you’re a cocktail drinker—there’s no reason for you not to make this.

5) A little music for the road

Are you driving somewhere for Thanksgiving? Don’t let the traffic get you too worked up. Pop on Vincent Neil Emerson’s The Golden Crystal Kingdom, and let the man’s voice take you away.

Reviews of the album often cite the East Texas-raised Emerson’s love of artists like Townes Van Zandt and Steve Earle, but I can’t listen to this song and not hear Willie Nelson specifically.

That’s not a complaint, not by any stretch, and the whole album’s terrific.

4) Alternatively, a book for the plane

Maybe you’re flying somewhere for the holiday? Well, I won’t get on an airplane without a hard-copy book in my bag—you never know when nothing’s going to happen and you might need it.

As I referenced last Friday, I’ve been in a crazy-busy stretch of travel myself lately—over the course of nine days this past week-plus, I flew from SDF to ORD to PIT to DCA to SDF to CLT to GSP to CLT to SDF to CLT to MSN to CLT to SDF.

(That’s way too many stops in Charlotte. Vile airport.)

It was exhausting, but I was grateful to have a paperback copy of a new-to-me classic to keep me company—Time And Again, Jack Finney’s much-loved 1970 time-travel epic.

I picked this one up off the recommendation of my friend

Michele Catalano

in the comments on this post several weeks ago:

What's your favorite book?

(My primary motivation in writing that post was always to let you all restock my reading queue, and my plan worked brilliantly.)

The book—which perhaps you’ve read, it’s been out 53 years, but I’m just getting to it now—is a beautifully-wrought story that’s much richer than a simple sci-fi gimmick. Advertising artist Si Morley is recruited by a mysterious man working for a secret government program, one that explores the potential for time-travel through self-hypnosis. Before long, Morley finds himself in the New York City of 1882, attempting to unravel a mystery and wrestling with the prospect of falling in love and altering history.

Now, two things you should know about me:

1. I am a sucker for 1880s history, especially in New York

2. I freakin’ love time travel stories.

This book could not possibly have been more up my alley, and I loved every bit of it. It’s the kind of book that makes that flight to Charlotte go just a little bit faster.

You can find all of my previous book recommendations at my Bookshop affliate shop.

3) An annual appreciation of the Thanksgiving movie

This will not be the first time that I have effused about Planes, Trains and Automobiles in the pages of this newsletter, and it will almost certainly not be the last, either.

I don’t care. I love this movie, and it is the definitive Thanksgiving movie.

It’s John Hughes’ finest work, and carries all the hallmarks of his other beloved films. It’s got Steve Martin and John Candy at their peak. It’s a perfect time capsule of 1980s ephemera—just the office scenes in the beginning alone are time-travel—and it’s got the one scene I think about literally every time I walk up to a rental car counter:

I once witnessed a man less charming than Steve Martin pull a similar routine at the Hartsfield-Jackson rental car center the Friday before The Masters Tournament. I’m sure it made him feel better, but I was behind him in line and very nice to the overworked staffer, and I got a fucking car before he did. (Be nice to service employees.)

Anyways, what really makes Planes, Trains and Automobiles sing for me isn’t the nostalgia or the creative profanity—it’s the fact that it’s largely a story about the difficulty of vulnerability in adult male friendships, and that’s a rare thing to find.

I love this movie so much.

2) It’s about the cones.

Alright, I’ve already asked you one question today, but I’ve got another—and, much like the book question a few weeks ago, this one is for entirely self-serving reasons.

My kids are finally getting to the age where they enjoy playing family games, and with guests in town for the holiday, there’s a good chance we’ll try to have a few rounds of play. Lately, we’ve been enjoying games like Monopoly (Mario edition, natch), Quirkle, Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza and Uno. I’m also liable to bring up Fluxx, Chickapig, Mille Bornes, and—if I can get anyone to play against me—Scrabble.

(I am very, very good at Scrabble.)

That said, I’m far from a board- or card-game expert, and I know many of you are more well-versed in these things than I am. So, with that, I ask you:

What’s a board/card game I should buy?

Bonus points if it’s sold in a manner that would allow me to order it today and have it before Thanksgiving.

1) Under the table and dreaming

This is a big time of year for our household animals.

There’s going to be a lot of food moving around, and a lot of opportunities for them to snatch a bit of turkey or—if you’re Olaf last year—a half-dozen large dinner rolls wrapped in plastic.

(I will now pause, hold out the microphone, and wait for one particular reader, friend and veterinarian to scold me about the dangers of feeding human food.)

(Assuming he’s shown up by now.)

Okay, as we were. First up in this week’s parade of pets, Cody S. has a view from on high:

I’m from South Carolina and my wife and I met at Clemson before moving up near Philly to be closer to her family.  We were back in Upstate this weekend to see some friends from school and meet up with my family!  It’s a lovely place, if you ever need any recommendations I’ve lived in basically every part of South Carolina.  

This seemed like a perfect excuse to send more pics of our cat Ashe so you’ve got some more ammunition for the pet queue! We still don’t know how she gets up there and she certainly doesn’t know how to get down. This normally ends with her crying until we grab a step stool to climb up and help her out. 

[Cletus from The Simpsons voice] I can call my ma while I’m up here! HEY MA, GET OFF THE DANG ROOF!

Great cat.

Next up, my good friend and FoodBro Ramzy Nasrallah has three pets who I know are seeing some great food come out of the kitchen:

L-R: Tyvis Meowell, Oshie Sanzenbacher, Javier Baez.

An all-star roster. Great pets.

Finally this week—my pet queue is entirely dry, please send me more—it seems like a good time to celebrate Olaf on the occasion of his gotchaversary. Here he is a few days after he came home with us, and him a couple weeks ago:

He’s got plenty of youthful energy still, but he’s (mercifully) lost that frantic panic in his eyes that he had when we got him, fresh off those multiple rescues. He’s still a goon, but he’s someone’s goon now. He’s our goon now.

That’ll do it for another week here at The Action Cookbook Newsletter, friends. Thank you, as always, for your readership and support. I hope you have a happy, safe and restful weekend.

—Scott Hines (@actioncookbook)

1. There is a small but non-zero risk of botulism growth when making garlic confit; the lemon juice helps counteract this, but it’s still safest to store only at refrigerator temperatures.