Sweet Dreams Are Made of Brie: Part 2 of a "What I Ate for Christmas" Series

Life gets busy this time of year. I watched a version of A Christmas Carol yesterday and couldn't help but laugh over the emphasis that Dickens put on not working on Christmas day. I shook my head and thought, "Nope. 8:15 to 5."

We are lucky enough, though, to live in an area where everyone seems to be away from their proper families. Somehow everyone ends up with a place to go at one of the "Heartwarming Orphan" holiday parties. Normally, Josh and I host one. This year, we were both a little too homesick to try distracting ourselves with hosting duties. Our friends Derek and Jess opened their apartment to us, and anyone else who needed to feel a sense of belonging. It was perfect.

I was asked to bring an appetizer, and with a 20 minute drive ahead of me, I wanted to make sure it was a fuss-free food. I made baked brie for the festivities. If the idea of baked brie intimidates you, don't let it. Think of it as oven-baked grilled cheese.

Ingredients:
-1 can of crescent roll dough
-1 or 2 Tbs of your favorite fruit preserves. I use apricot or blackberry (blackberry in this case).
-1 circle (that's a unit of measurement?) of brie cheese

Yep. That's all you need to make this. You may want to grease your baking sheet, but only a little.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Lay half of the crescent roll dough on your baking sheet or pan. Pinch together the rips and tears in the dough. Then place the brie on top of the dough.

Put your spoonful of preserves on top of the brie, and spread it around. Have fun with this step.

Fold the corners of the dough up towards the top of the brie. If you're like me and end up with extra dough, cover up any open spaces where the preserves may leak out. And of course, make crescent rolls out of the extra dough. Waste not, want not, and all that fun stuff. The crescent rolls will also help you gauge when the dough around the brie is ready. The crescents should look golden brown on top when you're finished.

Bake for 12 minutes, then check how the crescents look. If they're golden brown, your brie is ready. If not, wait another 2 minutes or so.

It looks like a super-charged dinner roll or biscuit. Considering it takes about 20 minutes total to make and only has three ingredients, it's a really simple appetizer. It's been a hit every time I've brought it to parties, so have fun with this one!

The finished product. It went really fast once we got to the party, too. It's a simple, vegetarian-friendly recipe that looks and tastes like a lot more effort than it really is. It's become something that my friends look forward to, and maybe it'll become a staple at your own festivities.

Let's Talk Turkey: Part 1 of a "What I Ate for Christmas" series

Christmas is only three short days away. Shopping is complete. Shipping is another story.

Josh and I are both working on Christmas, so hosting any sort of party-- let alone making a festive dinner would be a wash. We're going to a friend's house tomorrow, and we were asked to bring appetizers. On Christmas, there's a casserole contest at work, so that will be an adventure in and of itself. Knowing that there won't be much time for us to pause, reflect, celebrate quietly, or any of that homey stuff for the rest of the week, I decided to make our turkey today instead.

We were lucky and a little shocked that turkey hadn't been too difficult on Thanksgiving. Also around Thanksgiving, Publix supermarket had a sale on young turkey. 59 cents a pound? Unheard of. That was a LOT less than any other meat item-- and any other food item for that matter. So, like any thrifty girl with an extra day of holiday pay in her paycheck, I bought three turkeys! Haven't had to buy meat since.

Looks pretty tasty, right? It still has about an hour and fifteen minutes left to go before it's ready, but it smells DELICIOUS!

Ingredients:
-Turkey
-A stick of butter
-A roughly sliced red delicious apple
-Half of a roughly sliced large onion
-2 Tbs. ground cinnamon
-2 Tbs. herbs de provence OR 3 springs each of sage and thyme
-A cup of water

The turkey itself is about 10 lbs. First thing's first. Preheat the oven to 500 degrees F. Cover the turkey skin with a stick of butter. You can certainly use less butter if you feel like it.

After cutting up the apple and onion, put the pieces in a microwave safe bowl. Then add the spices. Cover all of these lovely things with water. I know I said a cup, but really, just cover the contents so they are all submerged. Microwave for 5 minutes. Pour all of this (water included) into the turkey-- basically, instead of stuffing.

Put the turkey in the oven for 45 minutes (do this no matter the size of the turkey). After 45 minutes, put a thermometer in the turkey leg (make sure you don't touch the bone), and check the temperature. This will give you an idea how much time to leave the turkey in the oven. The end-game temperature is 160.

Lower the temperature to 350 degrees F. Expect to leave the turkey in the oven for about 2 hours. Make sure that the juices run clear and that the finished temperature is 160 degrees F as mentioned earlier. Put a tin foil tent over the turkey for 15 minutes to ensure that everything settles and cures properly. Enjoy!

On that note, we're going to watch A Christmas Story while turkey finishes cooking. Josh just said, "It smells like Christmas!" and you know something, it really does.