Christmas Meal 2013

The adjective "foolproof" in a recipe's title does not mean that I, Gigi, will create a delicious entree.  This year, I tried to follow a recipe entitled "Foolproof Rib Roast."  Next time I need to look for an entree that claims it is "Gigiproof."

In my excitement, I didn't follow the very first rule of letting the meat sit at room temperature for one hour.  So although the meat looked great after 1 hour of roasting at 375* and resting in a turned-off oven for 3 more hours ...

I duct-taped the handle to the stovetop to Gigi-proof the oven
from accidental, unintentional opening.

Looking good so far.  It also smelled so delicious!

The roast came out too rare!

Even Michael thought it was too rare

So I popped the hunk o' meat back into the oven for 40 minutes more.  I had left the slices flayed open to get the heat deeper inside.  It worked up to a point.

You can go as rare as you want because this slice has
everything from medium rare to well-done!

  

Luckily, the other dishes I made turned out stellar!!  For a side dish, I baked sweet potato mash in halved orange "cups" and topped it with a sweet pecan crust.

Easy orange cups!   Half an orange after chopping
off 1/4" of each end and scoop out pulp.

Looks good and well-cooked through and through.

I had known that the kids would not want any beef so I made lo mein from a recipe.  They always love it when we get Chinese food and I wanted to be able to make it for them at home and at a smaller quantity.  While stir-frying, I had a revelation that I could make agedashi tofu with the ingredients I have.   

I surprised myself at how delicious the noodles came out.  The sauce consisted of oyster sauce, soy sauce, brown sugar and honey.  It was so good that if I hadn't made it myself I might have suspected there was MSG in it.  It was addictingly delicious!  But guess who disagreed with me.  My kids for whom I made these new dishes!!  They didn't like it and asked for chicken nuggets instead.  I didn't mind so much because I got to polish off the noodles they didn't eat which was all of it.  

I feasted well this Christmas!