Chinese style. I am not going to pretend to know anything about Chinese traditions, but I do know how to fry some rice with some tasty add-ins.

It does not look like my Chinese Year is off to a good start.

This is one of my favorite things to order when I go out. I’ve always thought if I tried to make it myself it would be too much work or just not very good. I was dead wrong on both counts. It was easy AND delightful.

Adding to my resume of mediocre and unmarketable skills: trimming a beef tenderloin.

This recipe has been around forever – cookie press cookies. Now it has a pretty picture too

Operation Thanksgiving Leftovers was a huge success. The only thing I had to throw away were some mashed potatoes and turnips (which are secretly rutabagas) that didn’t even come out all that great in the first place. The reason I’m pleased is because the guest list for dinner dropped from 9 to 4 and I’m not that good at adjusting quantities on recipes. So anyway, on to the real fun – Thumbprint Cookies. Typically, these are filled with jelly or jam or preserves or whatever, but I thought they’d be a great vehicle for some leftover cranberry sauce. I was right. I puréed the sauce with a handheld immersion blender and it kinda whipped it up a bit.

Yeah, I’m over this whole turkey thing for a while.

If we pull out that ole college cookbook again, we’ll find another well-worn page with the Cream Soup recipe.  The reason this was such a favorite was because it had four variations listed that were each basically: add 2 cups <insert vegetable> and 1 tsp <insert seasonings>.  This was probably one of the first recipes that encouraged me to just make it up as I went along.

So today, I decided it was cold enough outside for soup and I was getting closer to the one-week deadline with no exciting ideas for a leftover Green Bean Casserole.  The result: Cream of Green Bean Casserole Soup.  Jason won’t eat it, so I will freeze the extra in small containers for some more warm lunches.

In the true spirit of the Holiday Season, this breakfast was a complete family effort.  Grandpa Wally brought over his amazing sweet potato casserole for Thanksgiving.  Nana Dee emailed the sweet potato pancake recipe used as the basis for this creation.  I measured out all the ingredients last night for a quick morning.  Jason mixed the batter and cooked the pancakes.  And Logan gobbled up 4 pancakes before we all sat down.  Yum.