“Can we do a full Thanksgiving dinner with what we raise in our yard?” was the question I asked my family a few weeks ago. ”Uh yeah we probably could but I haven’t seen any turkeys running around out there and the cranberry bog seems a bit sparse this year” was the decidedly unenthusiastic response. With a bit of encouragement and a few outside ingredients like oil and spices, we decided to give it a try.
Menu
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Roast rooster
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Mashed potatoes
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Kale salad
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Pickled beets
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Oat cakes with goat cheese
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Pumpkin pie
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Plum crisp
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Plum wine
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Apple cider
“You really want to eat turkey and not chicken!”
Here is a luscious recipe for a rooster or a chicken done laying. Cooking slowly with fresh herbs makes for a tender bird.
These potatoes are good mashed or roasted with fresh rosemary.
My family loves a massaged kale salad with fresh kale, chopped apple, cider vinegar, olive oil, onion and toasted nuts. (The nuts and olive oil are not from the yard but really make the salad much tastier.)
These zesty pickled beets can be made ahead using this recipe.
The goat cheese has been in the freezer for a while but hopefully will still taste good.
I grew just enough oats this year to have some for breakfast and make some cakes.
My neighbor grew pumpkins this year and gave me a lovely one. I am also using some of the squash I grew, frozen goat milk and eggs from the girls. Most pie spices and sugar cane are from warm climates so these I did not grow! Here is an old family recipe.
Here is how to make delightful things with plums; frozen fruit work well for most of the recipes.
The wine should age longer as it still tastes pretty sweet but what’s a feast without some wine? We may still go for some turkey and cranberries but it’s fun use as many things as possible that we have grown.
Whatever you choose to cook this year a very happy Thanksgiving to you and your family from Urban Farm Hub.
I’m curious about your oats experiment. What variety did you grow? How many sq ft and what was the yield? Was it hard to thresh and winnow? Do you think it’s worth the effort?
Hello,
I got the seed from Uprising Organics in Bellingham, http://www.uprisingorganics.com/. I wanted to see how it would grow before doing very much so just did one 4×8 raised bed. It grew very well but as most of the plant is stalk and leaves the yield for the amount of space it takes is not very high. It is labor intensive to thresh and winnow as well. Hmm, on the question of whether or not it’s worth the effort that’s a hard one to answer. It is a lot of work but I found it really interesting and am planning on doing more next year; the whole grow what you eat thing I find really enticing. Let me know how it goes and good luck!