Our Thanksgiving

I love having fresh flowers in my house, and I thought Thanksgiving was a good reason to get some!  Aren't they lovely? 

We had a nice Thanksgiving this year, even if we couldn't make many of our favorite Thanksgiving foods.  In a way, it was such a blessing.  Instead of spending all day in a hot kitchen, I played with my children.  Instead of being stuffed to the point of needing to unbutton my pants after dinner (Oh, don't act like you have never been there!), I ate a wonderful and satisfying meal with my family and friends and spent the rest of the evening playing a game, drinking coffee, and laughing a lot!

This year I brined my turkey.  We are high class here, brining the turkey in a good ol' Thermos cooler.

I decided to keep the brine simple since it was my first one.  I just used water, salt, onion, garlic, green peppercorns, and thyme.  I was really happy with the way it turned out, and I think I'll be doing a brined bird again.

With the turkey, I served mashed potatoes, gravy, roasted carrots, and roasted asparagus.  A friend who ate with us brought cranberry sauce and pumpkin custard.  It was such a wonderful meal.  It was rich and comforting without being heavy.  I've posted before about roasting my asparagus, but I've never roasted carrots before.  I used the recipe that was on the Pioneer Woman blog last week, and these carrots were super.  You should definitely make them!

For all the culinary delights of the meal, the best one was also the most simple.  To top the pumpkin custard, I planned to make some whipped cream.  At the last minute, I decided to sweeten the cream with pure maple syrup instead of plain sugar.  The maple cream was amazing.  We all enjoyed it on the custard, but where it really shined was in coffee!  Somehow, these two simple and pure ingredients, when whipped together and added to coffee, turn the coffee rich, decadent, and amazingly creamy. 

Finally, I thought I'd share a picture of my table.  I am not the most creative when it comes to decorating a table, but I thought it ended up looking nice.