If you want me to leave, you can put your hands on my hot, tight little body and make me.

Spike ,'Get It Done'


Natter 62: The 62nd Natter  

Off-topic discussion. Wanna talk about corsets, duct tape, or physics? This is the place. Detailed discussion of any current-season TV must be whitefonted.


megan walker - Nov 27, 2008 7:05:49 am PST #3476 of 10002
"What kind of magical sunshine and lollipop world do you live in? Because you need to be medicated."-SFist

Happy Thanksgiving everybody (with a side of belated Happy Thanksgiving to the Canadians)!!

I am truly thankful for this community and all the moral and other support it provides throughout the year.

As I read through the food posts, I am struck by the terms. What is the stuffing/dressing, sauce/relish divide? It doesn't seem to be East/West.


DavidS - Nov 27, 2008 7:08:37 am PST #3477 of 10002
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."

At Chez Zmayhem I am listening to old British folk rock (surprisingly good Thanksgiving music since they don't celebrate turkey day, but it's all burnished and melancholy and hence autumnal). I just kicked JZ, Matilda and Emmett out the door to (a) get them out out of my way for a few minutes while I review recipes and (b) get a few extra items for today and (c) get the kids some fresh air before I can turn my attention to them after I get the turkey in the oven.

Found a mustard/vermouth/thyme sauce in Silver Palate I think I'll use on the brussel sprouts. Got extra dairy products to toss into the mashed potatoes to make them super rich. I'm wandering around the kitchen sniffing at the fresh sage and thyme, and a little bowl of mulling spice.

It's funny - I feel like I should be up and cooking already but since the pies are coming with EM, I don't really have to do much more than turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, gravy and brussel sprouts. While the turkey takes time (and lots of babying the way I do it) it's still too early, and the other stuff is also premature.

So I'm just in that meditative menu planning stage, reviewing the timing of everything.

Since Emmett's got the complete Friends box set, we'll probably watch some of their Thanksgiving episodes.


Theresa - Nov 27, 2008 7:10:47 am PST #3478 of 10002
"What would it take to get your daughter to stop tweeting about this?"

I'm in central US and we always say stuffing /sauce in my family, but I remember my great-grandfather saying dressing. I wonder how it does divide. Maybe like dinner/supper?


amych - Nov 27, 2008 7:14:03 am PST #3479 of 10002
Now let us crush something soft and watch it fountain blood. That is a girlish thing to want to do, yes?

Stuffing/dressing is basically north-south (with a good bit of the farm culture part of the midwest following the south, as tends to happen with foodways). Dinner/supper is a similar divide.

Sauce/relish, I dunno. I've always thought of it as a question of different recipes rather than different regions. Mine this year claims to be a chutney on the recipe, but I think that's just a matter of magazine publishers wanting to make it sound more exotic than cranberry sauce. As if.


dcp - Nov 27, 2008 7:15:05 am PST #3480 of 10002
The more I learn, the more I realize how little I know.

Stuffing is cooked in the bird, dressing is cooked separately.

Sauce is a pretty general term, but (to me) relish means some sort of pickle is involved.


megan walker - Nov 27, 2008 7:16:38 am PST #3481 of 10002
"What kind of magical sunshine and lollipop world do you live in? Because you need to be medicated."-SFist

For the record, we said stuffing/sauce. That's in Northern Connecticut. I think I knew people growing up who might have said dressing.

My great-grandfather being born in 1850 or so, I have no idea what he would have said. And of course, he didn't celebrate Thanksgiving and it wouldn't have been in English so I guess that's no help anyway. And it occurs to me now that I have no idea what language he spoke.


Consuela - Nov 27, 2008 7:16:59 am PST #3482 of 10002
We are Buffistas. This isn't our first apocalypse. -- Pix

I call cranberry sauce "sauce" but really it's a relish or a chutney, because it's not properly smooth, but lumpy.

And Happy Thanksgiving, Buffistas who are celebrating it!


megan walker - Nov 27, 2008 7:19:46 am PST #3483 of 10002
"What kind of magical sunshine and lollipop world do you live in? Because you need to be medicated."-SFist

Stuffing is cooked in the bird, dressing is cooked separately.

I wonder if now that most people know that it's not a good idea to actually stuff the turkey that will change? I doubt I will ever use dressing, even though it's been a side for years.


Sue - Nov 27, 2008 7:20:56 am PST #3484 of 10002
hip deep in pie

Stuffing here, all the way. Also our stuffing is only bread, butter, onions and summer savory, and nothing like sausage or oysters or nuts goes inside the bird.

I don't understand how sauce and relish can be attached to the same food.


Consuela - Nov 27, 2008 7:21:47 am PST #3485 of 10002
We are Buffistas. This isn't our first apocalypse. -- Pix

We keep cooking the stuffing inside the bird--the unsafe part is when you leave it in the bird after you take it out of the oven. So we remove it right away, and in my mumblety years of having turkey stuffing, nobody in my family's ever gotten sick from it. And stuffing cooked in the bird is far better than stuffing cooked in a pan, because the turkey juices flavor it so wonderfully.