Pre-Thanksgiving Day Turkey Brining Ruminations

Update on Husband: For two weeks in a row, Husband's blood numbers have increased, which is a very good thing. He just had his blood drawn yesterday and we should hear the results today. If the levels are up again, he has decided he will start attending church on Sundays once again. I am very excited about that, although I had lots of practice getting all the kids ready and going by myself when he was a bishop. It will be very nice to sit next to him.

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You know how life gets all busy and crazy and you have a million things to remember to do, so you're happy to simply remember at least some of them, but that prevents you from thinking very deeply because living on the surface is just about all you have the energy and time for?

I feel almost frantic these days, and it isn't one of those feelings I enjoy. I mentioned that before in this blog. I like to have time to sit and ponder things a bit, and I don't like being so busy with a to-do list that I can never catch up.

The good news is this: I have made great inroads to completing the arrangement of Silent Night for piano, cello, two violins, and a flute. I went over to my parents' house on Monday morning, and my dad gave me a crash course in Finale, a music writing software program. He also let me borrow his laptop that has Finale on it so I could come home and carefully and slowly insert notes for each instrument and hear how things sound all together.

Today, I brine the turkey. Fortunately, once it's in the brine bath I don't have to do anything -- just let it sit and soak up salt and water. It's nice when things get done and you don't even have to be there to keep them going. I won't cook an un-brined turkey anymore. Once I found out how juicy and flavorful turkey breast tastes after 24 hours in a salt bath with vegetables and seasonings, I was spoiled. I use a big cooler, an entire box of Kosher salt, some raw carrots, onion wedges, celery leaves, pepper, and other seasonings. It works wonders. You can't do the table presentation of a marvelously golden-brown turkey surrounded by stuffing and garnishes, but wonderfully golden-brown turkey usually means the breast meat is dry. I'll take taste over presentation when it comes to turkey. You're going to have a lot of it (I bought a 20 pound turkey this year), so it had better be fit for eating day after day.

This year, there will be pictures of Thanksgiving and family. I finally have the batteries (no battery charger, yet, but the batteries I got are fully charged) for the camera, so I can take pictures of everything.