Thanksgiving Feed - The Gravy

And here we are ... almost done with the "main" dish ... turkey/dressing/gravy. I will confess I've never been very good making gravy. My Mother wasn't and my Italian grandmother didn't make it that I can remember. Sooooo ... what am I to do? I suppose I will do what cooks have done forever ... use the pan drippings, some flour, some milk and viola! GRAVY! Isn't that the way it's supposed to work? 

If you actually make gravy from a recipe, let me know. PLEASE!

Cornbread Dressing

The Thanksgiving table is full. Meredith is attending as are three close friends. Probably could seat two more, but I think this will be enough for my first trial run of "Feeding People". December will be here before I know it, with another round of folks to feed.

Back to Thanksgiving ... can't have turkey without dressing, right? For this, I have no recipe, however. Even my Mother, who was all about the recipes, didn't have one for this. I remember my Papaw (her father) sitting at the kitchen table, chopping everything to go into the dressing. She used to boil the turkey "innards" ... heart, liver, neck ... all the stuff you have to take out of the turkey before you start ... and then Papaw would chop up everything but the neck to go into the dressing. Daddy used to get the neck because he loved to gnaw on it. And the water from the cooking went to moisten the dressing.

Oh well, I very much dislike innards. So I don't really follow Mother's traditions in this area. I do, however, used all the other things she put into her dressing. Here's how it goes:

Use a package (or two, depending on how many you are feeding) of cornbread dressing mix. Chop a large apple, some mushrooms, a large onion, and a couple of stalks of celery. Saute them in BUTTER. Melt another entire stick of butter (or two). Combine the butter, dressing mix, and sauteed vegetables. Mix and add chicken stock until thoroughly moistened. I always think I have added too much and that's when I stop, because it all seems to cook out.

I don't stuff the turkey. I put this in Corningware or Pyrex ... HAS to be Corningware or Pyrex to maintain the tradition ... this is one time I don't use my oven-safe Tupperware. Bake until the top is crispy. Yum!!

Brined Roast Turkey

  I've never brined a turkey before, but I'm going to try it this Thanksgiving for "Feeding People". I trust Alton Brown (why, I don't know). But this HAS to be safer than deep frying, right?!?!?

I hear people rave about brined turkeys every year, so this is the year I try it. Now all I have to worry about is finding something big enough to hold the brine and the turkey for 16 hours ... perhaps a cooler???

Anybody out there ever done this? Suggestions?

Here's the link to Alton's recipe. Would you do this?

A Year of Feeding People -- The Project

As I mentioned on Facebook (if that's how you got to here), I am starting something new. Let's call it "A Year of Feeding People".

This current year, 2013, was awful in many ways, not to be listed here. But we have made it through and for that I am supremely thankful. I have decided to celebrate my thanks in the traditional Italian way ... feeding people. 

My Daddy used to tell us that no one, no matter how high or low their social status, ever refused to put their feet under his table and eat his food. I think he meant that feeding people was the great equalizer. When we sit around a table together and share food, it becomes more difficult to hate them. One can disagree, even dislike, someone with whom you have shared a meal, but hating is not likely. 

Combine my Daddy's philosophy with one I read about Mamma Leone (of New York restaurant fame). Her son, Gene, whose cookbook I have, said that his mother was happiest when she was in the kitchen preparing a meal for guests. I believe there is a great sense of appreciation for people that arises when you prepare food for them. 

In addition to all the wonderful philosophy expressed above, I love to cook! George and I are blessed with such wonderful, interesting family and friends that gathering some of them together each month to eat something I have prepared especially for them seems to be the perfect way to celebrate our thanks for the blessings that have come our way during our lives. A way to concentrate on the good, rather than the bad. 

I will use this blog to announce when the invitations have gone out each month, share the menus, perhaps discuss the cooking, describe the meal and the conversation that occurred, and, of course, thank my friends and family for being who they are. More info tomorrow.

Mangia!!

June 19 - More waiting

Spent some time with Dr. Liem, radiation oncologist, today. Laid out the treatment plan. But wait ... it appears I haven't yet been scanned enough, so he would like a PET scan. It can be done at the same time as the first CT scan but he wants to confer with the PET technician before he schedules everything.

So we wait again. Should hear from him by Thursday with a date/time for the CT/PET scan. The CT purpose for this scan is to build a 3-D image of my body and also create a body mold. The 3-D image will be used to design the distribution of radiation so it is focused most tightly on the tumor. The body mold will be used every time I get radiation to ensure I am always in the same position.

If they do a PET scan, it will be used as a baseline for follow up. He says renal cell cancer glows more brightly on a PET scan.

So here's the plan as I understand it.
1. I have the CT/PET scan to create baseline images and body mold. This appointment is yet to be determined ... waiting to hear back from Dr. Liem.

2. Two weeks after the CT/PET scan, the treatments can begin. These will be about 10 minutes each ... I originally thought 20 minutes, but that's the amount of time I should schedule, not the amount of time for the scan itself. I will have up to 20 of these treatments, depending on how I react in terms of side effects.

3.Then we wait approx 3 months and take another look with either CT or PET. We monitor every three months for as long as a year. We will be able to tell during that time one of the three possible reactions: (i) the tumor has shrunk ... hooray! (ii) the tumor has stopped growing ... also hooray! (iii) the tumor is still growing ... time to look for another treatment.

I had some new revelations during the discussion of details:
1. I had thought the response would be much faster. This news that we might wait as long as a year to determine if this has "worked" was quite a surprise.

2. Much as I hope we can shrink this tumor to nothingness, just halting the growth of the tumor is a success. Of course I want this thing out of me, but not being able to do that, halting its growth is a good option. As Dr. Liem said ... there's no problem with it just sitting there and doing nothing.

3. I finally got a mental model for how to think about this as a chronic disease. I already have a chronic disease ... heart disease. I treat it daily with medication ... I occasionally have to spend some time in the hospital due to an acute attack ... no one could look at me and tell I am sick ... life goes on. This is so different from having a surgery, a long hospital stay, and a longer recovery and then moving on. I can live with this and just keep going on.

Interesting!

June 12 - Headed home

Finalized the treatment plan with Dr. Corn today. We had basically three options on the table:

1.  Surgery - His surgeon said the surgery would not be impossible, but he certainly wouldn't recommend it as the first option. So we put that in our back pocket and move on to:

2.  Systemic therapies - like chemo, these are ingested or injected. They work throughout my entire system, targeting the cell's reproductive cycles or other important pathways. Problem with these ... they boost blood pressure, sometimes to stroke level. Also, after all the scans on Friday and yesterday, we are certain this recurrence is very localized. No other spots anywhere to be found. So a systemic treatment isn't really necessary, if there is a localized treatment, without the systemic side effects. That leads us back to:

3. Tomotherapy, which I first discussed with Dr. Liem in Albuquerque. Dr. Corn in Houston thinks this is the best first step for several reasons ... if we do another scan in a couple of months, and nothing has changed or the tumor has grown, we move on to systemic therapy. Tomo is very localized and doesn't have nearly the severity of side effects ... some nausea, some fatigue, but nothing terrible. Then Dr. Corn says he talked with his Tomo guy and the recommendation is that I return to Albuquerque for this therapy.

Dr. Corn is going to call Dr. Leim and they are going to discuss Tomotherapy in general and my case in particular. He will then call me on Thursday and, if he likes the way the discussion goes tomorrow, he will let me know how to proceed with treatment in Albuquerque. If, by chance, he should hear something from Dr. Liem that puts him off, we will replan for Tomotherapy in Houston ... but that's a very slim chance.

So, I am happy with the prognosis. I am getting comfortable with treating this like a chronic disease. And I am very happy to have the prospect of being treated at home, rather than having to uproot to Houston for some long period of time.

There is a light at the end of the tunnel.

June 9 - Poked, prodded, and tested

Met with Dr. Paul Corn at 10AM yesterday. I like him.He offered us several alternative biological therapies, talked at length about tomotherapy, and is willing to discuss my records with his surgeon. No avenue cut off yet. So, the upshot is, by running all the tests at MD Anderson, he would have enough data to advise on treatments and have a plan of attack by the time I head back to Albuquerque.

That means I spent all day Friday being poked, prodded, and tested. I had a CT scan, bone scan, complete blood work-up (four vials!), and chest x-ray. It was a long and exhausting day. Still facing an MRI on Monday. That will conclude the tests and we will meet with him on Tuesday. I am very encouraged by this, more so than when we returned from Dr. Lee's visit. I think MD Anderson sees lots more of my type of cancer and can offer  many different therapies that UNM might not have available. I think we lucked into Dr. Heywood, the surgeon who did my liver resections, and now he's not practicing at UNM any more. So I will be treated in Houston.

It may mean finding an apartment to rent for a couple of months here and finding someone to house-sit for us in Albuquerque, but it's not all bad. I get to see Houston family and friends more frequently. How's that for finding a silver lining??

Spent today with family. Lunch with Aunt Pat and Sylvia ... dinner with the Campise cousins. Great fun reminiscing, catching up on the latest news, laughing, and just talking. Ashley was able to come along and show off baby Andrew, who proved what a good baby he was by sleeping most of the time. Back at the hotel now, tired and ready for bed.

Feeling more upbeat than I have in quite a while.