African Sweet Potato and Peanut Soup

This recipe originally made its debut during the 2011 Turducken Extravaganza (about which, more later). We were in desperate need of a sweet potato recipe, but I was unwilling to do the same-old sweet potato casserole, complete with brown sugar or marshmallows. Now, don't get me wrong, I love sweet potato casserole, but with the thousands of courses and pot luck dishes we had that night, the casserole would have been lost in the shuffle. So we needed a new way to put the traditional ingredient in the Thanksgiving dinner.

And soup was the perfect answer. It started off the meal with a neo-traditional punch (there's a great smokiness to this recipe. Not hot, but a nice warmth) and it let everyone in the room know we meant business. And it was gobbled up. Literally. The soup went in about 5 minutes flat, an indication of a crowd pleaser if ever there was one.

Now, I prefer this soup with a nice hearty garnish of cilantro/coriander, but I know how some people feel about the stuff. Taking that into consideration, the soup does just fine with a garnish of peanuts, giving it a great texture.

Also, don't worry if you can't find unsalted dry roasted peanuts. The first time I made this recipe, I searched high and low for them in vain. I eventually relented and bought some salted peanuts, fearing that my soup would resemble a salt lick. But never fear! As long as you decrease the salt you add alongside the vegetables when cooking, your soup should remain thankfully un-salt licked.

Serves 6

Ingredients
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 large onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger root
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 1/2 teaspoons ground coriander
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 pinch ground cloves
3 medium tomatoes, chopped
2 pounds sweet potatoes, peeled and chopped (feel free to add more if you want a more sweet potato taste to the soup)
1 carrot, peeled and chopped
4 1/2 cups water
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup chopped, unsalted dry-roasted peanuts (plus more for garnish)
1 pinch cayenne pepper
3 tablespoons creamy peanut butter
1 bunch chopped fresh cilantro

Method
Heat the oil in a large saucepan over medium-high heat. Saute the onion 10 minutes, until lightly browned. Mix in the garlic, ginger, cumin, coriander, cinnamon, and cloves. Stir in the tomatoes, sweet potatoes, and carrot, and continue to cook and stir about 5 minutes.

Pour water into the saucepan, and season the mixture with salt. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer 30 minutes.

Remove the soup mixture from heat. In a food processor or blender, blend the soup and peanuts until almost smooth. Season with cayenne pepper. Return to the saucepan. Whisk in the peanut butter, and cook until heated through.

Serve warm topped with fresh cilantro and some chopped peanuts.

Blue Cornbread

There are a few things that I've brought with me from my home state of Arizona. A tortilla press. A precious bag of ground chiles of various heats. And a full bag of blue cornmeal, pride of Arizona farmers. The English seem not have realized  but corn in America comes in a variety of shapes, sizes, and, most importantly, colors (yes, yes, beyond the various shades of "yellow" and "white"). Any harvest festival will feature the ubiquitous "Indian corn", which features a fabulous variety of dark purples and reds. But there is also the famous "blue corn", found almost exclusively in Arizona and New Mexico, which is so dark on the cob that it almost looks purple to the naked eye. When ground into meal it gives tortillas and breads a wonderfully nutty quality, a bit more earthy than any other kind of cornmeal I've ever experienced.

I don't use my blue cornmeal often (although I technically I need to before its "sell by" date), but Thanksgiving is the perfect excuse to show the Brits a thing or two about American corn. And what better  way than with cornbread, another typically American concoction? Like biscuits, there are about a thousand and one recipes for cornbread, some involving actual corn kernels, some just sticking to the meal itself. I decided to pick one that emphasized just the cornmeal. Once the Brits decided that the blue coloring in the bread WASN'T mold, it went down a treat. Of course, there's no real reason for blue cornmeal in this recipe, plain ol' yellow cornmeal will work just as well. But, if you do happen to have some of the blue stuff lying around, why not use it?

Ingredients

5 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled
2 cups cornmeal (preferably stone-ground and most preferably blue)
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/4 cups well-shaken buttermilk (not powdered)
1 large egg

Method

Preheat oven to 425°F with rack in middle.

Whisk together cornmeal, salt, baking powder, and baking soda in a large bowl.

Whisk together buttermilk, egg, and melted butter in another bowl, then stir into flour mixture until just combined.

Scoop batter into a well-oiled loaf or cake tin (mine was 9" diameter). Bake until puffed and golden-brown and a wooden pick inserted into center comes out clean, about 20 minutes. Let cool in tin for about 10-15 minutes. Turn out onto a rack to cool. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Cheddar, Bacon, and Chive Biscuits

Biscuits. More importantly, American biscuits. Savory, cheesy, bacon-y biscuits. The perfect bread product to accompany Thanksgiving dinner. Now, most Americans have "views" when it comes to what constitutes the perfect biscuit. Buttermilk? Milk? Knead? No-knead? There are a variety of choices when it comes to these treats. I don't have a particular preference as it stands, but I know I've done something right when I can't stop eating them.

I picked this recipe out of the multitude on epicurious.com because of the no-fail combination of cheese and bacon. Oh, and the 11,000 reviews which insisted that these were "literally" the best biscuits out there. And who am I to doubt? It can't be denied, they were warm gooey things, with a nice hint of cheese and bacon. But I am not one for subtlety. If I were to make these again, I'd ramp up the cheddar and bacon- make these things oozing with flavors. Also, as they weren't "formed" biscuits (i.e. made with a cookie or biscuit cutter), they were a bit unrefined. Now this has absolutely nothing to do with taste. But if you're presenting these to a crowd, the nice rounded "formed" biscuits do have a nice aesthetic appeal. Hey, call me a snob. But it's true.

Ingredients

6 thick-cut bacon slices
3 3/4 cups bread flour
1 1/2 tablespoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/4 teaspoons salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) chilled unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch cubes, plus melted butter for brushing
2 1/2 cups (packed) coarsely grated sharp cheddar cheese (about 12 ounces)
1/3 cup chopped fresh chives
1 3/4 cups chilled buttermilk

Method

Position rack just above center of oven and preheat to 425°F. Line heavy large baking sheet with parchment paper. Cook bacon in heavy large skillet over medium heat until crisp and brown. Transfer bacon to paper towels to drain, then chop coarsely.

Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in processor; blend 5 seconds. Add butter cubes. Blend until coarse meal forms, about 30 seconds. Transfer flour mixture to large bowl. Add cheddar cheese, fresh chives, and chopped bacon; toss to blend. Gradually add buttermilk, stirring to moisten evenly (batter will feel sticky).

Using lightly floured hands, drop generous 1/2 cup batter for each biscuit onto prepared baking sheet, spacing batter mounds about 2 inches apart.

Bake biscuits until golden and tester inserted into center comes out clean, 18 to 20 minutes. Brush biscuits lightly with melted butter. Let cool 10 minutes. Serve biscuits warm or at room temperature with honey, if desired.

Sage Parmesan Crackers

Everyone likes to have at least one "crowd pleaser" recipe in their collection. And if that recipe happens to be the easiest thing in the world? So much the better. These sage crackers were a spur of the moment decision a few years back, taken from Mark Bittman's gloriously helpful "101 Head Starts to the Day" (the NY Times has apparently been helming the culinary delights of Thanksgiving for years). I wasn't quite sure what to expect of them, as they were honestly too simple to be trusted. But when they disappeared out from under me, I realized I had a goldmine on my hands. Now they're trotted out every Thanksgiving. I've also taken to doubling the recipe, because of the thin crumbly nature of the crackers, they tend to yield a fairly small amount once cut into squares. They also may provoke moments of panic when you realize there's no physical way to "roll these out" as Bittman suggests. I've taken to literally patting them into shape on the baking sheet and cutting them afterwards. It saved me a mountain of frustrated rolling and allowed me to enjoy these little sage-y parcels even more.

Ingredients
1 cup flour
1 tsp salt
1/2 cup grated Parmesan
4 tbsp cold butter
1/4 cup cream
2 tbsp finely chopped sage.

Method

Preheat over to 400 F. 

Mix 1 cup flour, 1 teaspoon salt, 1/2 cup Parmesan and 4 tablespoons cold butter either in a large bowl or in a food processor. Add 1/4 cup cream and 1 tablespoon finely chopped sage.

When just combined, roll as thinly as possible (or simply pat into the baking sheet), score into squares, sprinkle with salt and bake at 400 degrees until golden.

Let cool, then break into pieces.

Cranberry-Quince Chutney

Cranberry sauce. You can't have Thanksgiving without it. Although a (small) part of me holds a fond remembrance for the canned sauce (you know, the one that held the "can" shape), there is something true and good about making your own. And thankfully, unlike pumpkin, England embraces the cranberry (as they also feature cranberry sauce as part of their traditional Christmas meal) which makes it relatively easy to find in the markets around this time of year.

Along these lines though, I can't help but yield to the experimentalist when it comes to cranberry sauce. Every food website even marginally connected with the US right now features at least 10 recipes for varieties on the sauce. Thick, thin, spicy, sweet, you can find almost any ingredient or style you could imagine. After spending way too many hours on the internet scrolling through versions of the "world's best cranberry sauce", I ended up going with the recipe found in my ancient copy of the Thanksgiving 2009 issue of Food & Wine. This was perhaps the last physical copy of a recipe magazine I ever purchased, but it has proved its use for two years now and I can't fault it yet. Although I would never make a quince cranberry sauce in the US (good luck trying to find them in Arizona), England also seems to be busting out all over with the fruits currently, making tracking down ingredients a cinch. It did make an absolute vat-full of sauce however, so if you're NOT planning on feeding 30 people at your next Thanksgiving, you might want to think about halving the recipe.

Time: 1 hour

Makes: 6 cups

Ingredients
1 tbsp. canola oil
1 small onion, minced
2 tbsp. minced fresh ginger
1 garlic clove, minced
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1 star anise pod
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 cup cider vinegar
3 quinces (8 ounces each), peeled, cored, and finely diced
1 Granny Smith apple: peeled, cored, and finely diced
1 12-ounce bag fresh/frozen cranberries (or 340 grams)
1/2 cup golden raisins

Method
In a large saucepan, heat the oil. Add the onion, ginger, garlic, allspice, and star anise and cook over moderate heat, stirring, until the onion is softened, about 5 minutes.

Add the sugar, vinegar, and 1 cup of water and bring to a simmer. Add the quince, apple, cranberries, and raisins and cook over low heat, stirring occasionally, until thick and jammy, about 25 minutes.

Discard the star anise. Serve the chutney warm or chilled.