first, an announcement: we have a 2009 layout! we can move on now.
mind you, that means the rest of my holidailies entries might just end up being full of nothing but pointless drivel, but i suppose that's nothing new.
the one meal i am responsible for every year is the christmas dinner. and the centerpiece of my dinner is my cornish game hens. here's a picture from 2005:
these babies are stuffed with saxy's spruced up stuffing (box stuffing with "extras"); basted in butter; seasoned with lemon pepper (small amount), season salt, and parsley; and then covered in brown sugar. i baste them for the hour and a half (or so -- when you have 5 or more hens in one pan, it takes a little longer) they are in the oven, and remove the cover for the last 10 minutes or so so they can brown a bit. they're done when you stick a fork in the joint of a leg and it falls off. ;)
everybody loves my hens, and it looks like this year, the hens will be the only part of our traditional dinner we get since they were purchased before kitten's soon to be ex failed to send the full support he owes her. but christmas day is not the only day we're getting hens.
we're having hens tonight as well.
as i said, we already have all our hens for christmas dinner. the other day, saxy calls me and tells me that one of his clients has also just given him a double pack of hens for christmas. problem 1: they were already starting to defrost. this meant they needed to be used fairly quickly. problem 2: including the night he was bringing the hens home, we'd already had two days of chicken and are looking at another chicken meal tomorrow.
fortunately, saxy went shopping last night and picked up some other foods, including some pork. so last night, we broke up the chicken streak with a pork stir fry. and to use the hens before they become usable, we're having them tonight. not quite sure how we're splitting up two hens between 5 people, but we will figure out a way. plus there's plenty of stuffing and we're having corn and carrots with them (corn is usually part of the holiday meal, carrots aren't).
so, we may not get the whole holiday dinner we usually have on christmas day, but we're getting the main course twice this year.
funny, even with three days of chicken this week, i still don't hear anyone complaining. ;)
