cupcakes and turkey

Happy Turkey Day folks! We have a lot to be thankful for, family of course, good health, and plenty of food being the big ones. We are having a great time here in southern Utah. We hope you are all happy and healthy too!

Wednesday, we decided to go to 25 Main for breakfast and cupcakes. The breakfast was good and inexpensive. They have a small menu but it is a good variety, frittatas, pancakes, french toast, and various sides. The decor is clean and funky. There are even finches in a bird cake in the window... one has even figured out how to escape. :)

The cupcakes are tasty and worth getting. We had four flavors, vanilla with raspberry, pumpkin chip, chai, and orange. The size of the cupcakes was pretty normal, not a dot and not a giant. The ratio of frosting and cake was perfect.

After breakfast, we started on the big Thanksgiving day meal and waited for the tots to arrive. We haven't seen the nieces and nephew for about 4 months so they are a bit bigger. They have so much energy and so many more words in the vocabulary!

The full list of dishes we made:

1. Turkey (brined overnight and super moist, woot!)
   
2. Mashed potatoes (recipe ala The Pioneer Woman, cream cheese is really the secret ingredient)
   
3. Gravy (from scratch!!! It worked!)
4. Stuffing (a slightly modified version provided by Paula's Aunt)
   
5. Whipped sweet potatoes (no crazy marshmallows but always a winner)
   
6. Green bean casserole (classic)
   
7. Rolls (cheater rolls from the dough man)
   
8. Corn (something simple)
   
9. Cranberry sauce (cranberries, pears, mandarin oranges, and fresh ginger)
   
10. Pumpkin cheesecake (with a ginger thin crust)
    
11. Pumpkin maple pie (yep, maple)

And of course, sparkling cider. We started preparing food Wednesday afternoon and finished right on time Thursday. The timing worked out well.

Shirley, having just taken a floral arranging class, whipped up a cheery centerpiece. The table was really lovely.

I am just glad that when we picked up the turkey, the girl was nice enough to give us a smaller turkey. I cannot imagine that a 17 pound turkey would have thawed in time and wow, that is a lot of turkey!

Anyway, bring on Christmas. Cheers to you!!!

Zion National Park

We're here in St. George for Thanksgiving this week. Today we visited Zion National Park. We had a great time looking at the animals (mostly mule deer, but also big horn sheep, and lots of birds), the plants (it's amazing that those pine trees can grow of out almost nothing), and the magnificent rock formations in the canyon.

We stopped for lunch at the Red Rock Grill in the lodge inside the park. The Zion burger's were very good and their achiote chicken soup was amazing. Misty asked the waitress if there was a chance we could get the recipe for it. The waitress returned later with a printout of the recipe for 5 gallons! Sweet! We'll try out skills at recipe reduction and see if we can make a smaller batch at home.

After lunch, we took the road towards the the Mt. Carmel Junction through the tunnel built in the 1920's. On the way we came across the bridge that my great grandfather helped build.

Seattle weekend

We visited friends and family in Seattle the first weekend in November. We managed to hit some of our favorite spots from last trip, including Pike Place of course, and Trophy Cupcakes. We were lucky enough to stay at Aroon and Aarthi's swanky new place overlooking Lake Union.

The conservatory at volunteer park housed an amazing collection of flowers and cactii. We all enjoyed walking around and taking photos. After the conservatory, we went to the Pacific Science Center down by the Space Needle to see the butterfly exhibit. Afterward, we took some night shots from Gas Works Park. And on the way back from there, we spotted the troll under the bridge.