Christmas Chef-tacular

One of my first food memories is baking glitter cookies with my great grandmother in her kitchen. My cousins and I used to stage sleepovers at her house and baking inevitably worked its way into our agenda.

Grandmother Lang would measure out the dry ingredients for the cookies and let us pour them into the mixing bowl. We'd fight over who got to crack the eggs. She usually ended up fishing stray pieces of shell out of the batter regardless of which sous-chef won egg honors.

She had a kitchen table that folded away into the wall like a Murphy bed. The leg hung down just within reach of our little hands - we used to hit it against the wall like a door-knocker, re-creating the scene in the Wizard of Oz where Dorothy arrives in the Emerald City while we waited for the cookies to come out of the oven.

Once the door to the Emerald Palace had turned back into a kitchen table, we'd spread Grandmother Lang's assortment of sprinkles across its surface while (I'm sure) she braced herself for the mess that would soon ensue.

Twenty-something years later Grandmother Lang is gone, but her recipes are still with us. We made her rolls for Thanksgiving dinner and one of my aunts brought glitter cookies for Christmas (even though we tease her for being the worst cook in the family - someday, I will describe "cake balls" and everyone will understand why).

My grandmother (Grandmother Lang's daughter) is also a great cook. The trait was passed down to Momma J and one of her brothers, and in turn, on to me and Lil'Bro.

This year for Christmas, Grandmother bought everyone a cookbook. This is nothing new - someone inevitably gets a cookbook every year- it was just the first time cookbooks were the featured present. I give her points for trying, but I think Grandmother might be loosing it just a bit...

The first few selections were perfectly typical. Lil'Bro got Bobby Flay's Bold American Food (one of his faves, along with Tyler Florence). He's already planning to make barbecued ribs with peanut-chipotle sauce for NewYears:

My uncle got Hubert Keller's Burger Bar. He's lucky he kept a watchful eye on it, otherwise it may have ended up in someone else's pile:

Then I unwrapped...  The Official Southern Ladies' Guide to Being a "Perfect Mother":

A few gems for your entertainment:

You know you're a Southern Mother if:
You took the initiative to help pick your daughter's husband, silver pattern, honeymoon destination, and even the flowers in the table decorations - at her birth.

You keep a discrete stash of sedatives for use during important events if needed.
Your Granny's idea of "going green" is with creme de menthe.

At some point in her life, every Southern female experiences the shock and awe of recognition: I have turned into. . .her. I AM MY MOTHER.
[so true. it's already happened to me.]

I mean, I get the joke - I live in New York, she wanted me to have a Southern cookbook. But... really? Forget Hubert and Bobby - clearly, I was gifted the winner.
 
Until Momma J opened her cookbook:

Morbid? But funeral food is also a big Southern thing, I guess...

Surprisingly, the biggest hit was a cookbook devoted entirely to bread, which Momma J had bought with the intention of giving to someone as a gift, but couldn't part with:

My uncle entertained us all by reading excerpts aloud, our favorite being Jim Lahey on the beginnings of his bread-baking career:

I baked bread for the first time to impress a girl. I was in college... Bread's sculptural quality attracted me. I don't think anybody else I knew then, crazy as they were, would imagine that thrusting a loaf at his girlfriend was the most romantic idea in the world.

The juxtaposition of "thrust" and "loaf" was enough to reduce us to inappropriate comments and laughter for a good half hour. (I love my family...)

Whether this fine selection of cookbooks was given in earnest or meant in humor, I can't say. All I know is, they definitely made for another successful family Christmas.

You know you've never left highschool* when...

(*specific to my lovely alma mater)

...your FaceBook fan pages consist of the following:

Index:

1. The lake we grew up on
2. The short-lived, crappy burger restaraunt started by some kid we graduated with (located approximately 300 yards from our highschool campus)
3. The amatuer band made up entirely of guys we went to highschool with (also of note, they are all related)
4/5. Italian restaurants run by your highschool buddy's dad (approximately 1 mile from our highschool campus)

In other hometown rants, please see the following:

 

Oh Amy, I sure did.

Trip in Pix: ATX

Happiness is...

Beer and Cupcakes.

Texans Know Best:

Around town: Capitol + 360 Bridge

Around town: Lake Austin and Mozart's

A few of my favorite things: Xmas trees on the side of the Hwy

Best dog in the world turns 3:

From total domination to loss: Why I never play board games with Lil'Bro

Over the river and through the woods: Real tree at Gmother's

Hope your holiday was as great as mine!

Annual Xmas Blizzard: '09 Edition

Last year, several of my friends fell victim to the huge snow storm that hit around Christmas-time while I was lucky enough to make it out.

This year, however, joke's on me - I spent the weekend snowed in with the rest of New York City.

After a tacky sweater party and a night on the town with the HLP and EV on Friday night, I was actually quite proud that I woke up on time, showered, "put my face on" (as my Southern grandma would say) and got to the airport in one piece.

The line to check in was a monstrosity, and of course, I had to check my bag since I'd opted to drag the largest of my suitcases back to Texas in anticipation of cramming a bunch of Christmas gifts in there for the return trip.

As I got closer to the front of the line, I noticed that a bunch of the flights were cancelled. My outlook was not so good as I stepped up to the ticket counter.

When the Southwest employee told me my flight was just delayed as opposed to cancelled, I got so excited that I apparently made a great impression on him, and he instantly fell in love.

I'm not kidding, he told me he hoped I'd "come back and see him real soon." Weird. But whatever.

I made it through security and to my gate, but realized I was probably going to miss my connecting flight. While waiting in line to try and sort it out, I struck up a conversation with this guy from West Point. We started chatting because he was wearing a Texas ballcap - which was weird since he proceeded to say some not-so-nice things about Austin.

Obviously, I pointed out the irony of this, and told him he probably didn't deserve to be wearing that hat. IAAB, as me and Rach would say (I am a bitch).

He was also an inch shorter than me and dipping. Cleary a winner - almost as good as my new Southwest Airlines ticket counter boyfriend.

Anyway, I was definitely going to miss my connection and there were no other flights going to Austin. They suggested I take the first flight (to Chicago Midway), stay the night, and then take the first flight to Austin the next morning.

Oh, and did they mention, they weren't going to pay for my hotel.

The next option was to fly out tomorrow (Monday) morning. As much as I wanted to stay in some random hotel near the airport in Chicago on my own dime, I went ahead and re-booked.

Next step: find the big-ass suitcase I had just checked. They told me to go wait by baggage claim and that they would have someone bring it out.

I waited. And waited. And waited. There were no Southwest employees behind the downstairs counter, so I finally went back upstairs to visit my SWA boyfriend.

Clearly, he was overjoyed to see me. Clearly, the girl he was talking to at the time was not as A) I skipped the entire line and B) the guy stopped talking to her in midsentence to help me find my bag.

Fast forward 3 hours later, and he was finally able to find out that they put my bag on the plane to Chicago. FML.

At that point, I was beyond being upset and instead had reached the place where everything goes so wrong that it ends up being hilarious. I took a cab BACK to my apartment (yes, $60.00 wasted) and, as I was walking in the door, got a call from my SWA boyfriend telling me that he had in fact found my bag at LGA and that he would hold it for me if I wanted to come back and get it.

FML x TWO.

I had him send it on to Austin, where it will (hopefully) be waiting for me. While I'm kind of pissed that I missed two days of scheduled vacay in Austin, I have to admit that the first real snow that piles up in the City is pretty magical. It only stays this pristine for a short time before turining into dirty, runny, brown sludge. I'll enjoy it while I can:

Always love for Always Sunny

Hulu + Always Sunny = Instant cure for boredom.

Dennis: No. Women aren’t allowed to try out for football.

Dee: That’s ridiculous. They should at least be able to try out.

Dennis: Well, there are plenty of other sports that women can try out for. Like, uh, cooking and…

Mac: Complaining to your friends about your boyfriends.

Dennis: Yeah. Playing… Playing at ballet.

Mac: Cleaning. Displaying cars at auto shows in tiny bikinis.

Dennis: Yeah. When you get older, you can play bridge together. I don’t know…

We think we're as funny as Dennis and Sweet Dee... Sometimes.

Me: Drew reminds me exactly of Mac.

Lil' Bro: Charlie (friend from HS) reminds me of Charlie.

Me: Oh, and you remind me of Frank.

Lil' Bro: Oh yeah, well you remind me of Artemis.

Me: I love you, too.

Marathon Weekend: Part II

The weekend that LP had her boy meltdown (what seems like a million years ago as opposed to mere months), we discovered one of our favorite brunch spots in the East Village. Our love affair with Café Orlin was instantaneous and so strong that we went back the next day.

Of course food couldn’t solve the shit she was going through, but 5 variations of the most sublime eggs benedict ever invented definitely stifled some of the depression.

I’ve since been back for dinner with the LP, and for dessert with one of the most awkward dates of all time. Although the dinner company was obviously superior to the dessert company, both visits were still amazing as far as the culinary experience.

We finally went back last Saturday during Part II of The Marathon Weekend. Over brioche French toast and more eggs benedict, we discussed the Ozzie situation and discovered that I had a text from a long-lost boyfriend of my own.

I met “Garth” (as in Algar of Wayne’s World) on Halloween, and was pretty proud of myself for my ability to make a boyfriend while rocking my heinous plastic, ankle-to-thigh, post-surgery leg brace and crutches. Sympathy vote maybe?

Anyway, my friend EV was dressed as Liza that night, complete with silky cropped wig. After examining pictures from Halloween night I concluded A) that I probably shouldn’t have been as proud of my boyfriend-making skills as I thought I should be; and B) that Garth and Liza should never have a love child. Those glasses and Liza’s hair just don’t go together…

I had exchanged numbers with Garth that night. We’ve since texted a few times but not hung out as he doesn’t live in Manhattan (score another point for Garth… ) So I wasn’t surprised when I received this gem at 3:30AM:

How’s my favorite bed in the city?

We should probably set Garth and his lips up with Ozzie and his bed and call it a day.

Anyway, after our Orlin fix, we decided to go track down friends that were at Santacon. By that time it was around 1PM so we figured they’d be drunk enough not to care that we weren’t dressed up at all.

Several detours later ($35 spent at the Young Designers Market, a random key-chain purch in a cutesy Village drugstore, finding the Free Store in a random/awesome market, a tour of Babeland, and a snack at Rice to Riches) we decided to have dinner at Lombardi’s, just for the helluvit.

Where we met Kenneth from 30 Rock’s doppelganger and were outraged by the no credit card/$3.00 ATM fee situation that no one mentioned during our 45 minute wait. But generally happy with the pizza.

Afterwards we went in search of Bank of America to avoid further ATM gouging, and somehow ended up in Little Italy eating cannolis and stumbling upon a parade of Mitzvah Mobiles (campers with Hanukah propaganda and 5 foot tall menorahs roped to the roof) before deciding to meet our friend CB at Cheap Shots, which turned into Doc Holliday's which turned into the Horseshoe.

Still we had not hung out with a single Santa – only stalked them from afar. Until we met up with EV, but more on this later.

This was actually the first time EV and the LP had met – they got along famously until LP semi-Irish-exited for Long Island.

I suppose I could have just told you Marathon: Day II was a combination of The Hangover and Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle and let you make your own conclusions, but what's the fun in that?

If only we had met NPH - preferably dressed as Santa - it would have been pretty complete.

"I'm so fat, I want to eat my muffin top"

I love this saying, stolen from the always funny KH. It's not only funny but sadly true as well... Getting over this knee surgery has taken much longer than I thought and I've subsequently lost all motivation to eat healthy and count calories. That coupled with the advent of the holiday season means I'm in serious trouble.

For instance, I had eggnog and holiday cookies for breakfast this morning - thoughtfully provided by my office during our annual White Elephant gift exchange. (Also of note, they call it "Yankee Swap" in the North, apparently...)

The leftover cookies are currently displayed at one of the most high-traffic spots in our corridor right next to the printers and supply closet. I couldn't help but notice that all of the Santas, candy canes and mistletoe are gone while the blue dreidels and star of Davids basically stand alone next to the leftover eggnog. (Which then made me think of lumpy, curdled eggnog... gross.)

I've concluded one of three things:

1. Our entire group has a strong aversion to the color blue.
2. We're all religious bigots.
3. We're all a bunch of fat kids who immediately went for Santa's jolly, rotund face and the giant candy canes because they covered more surface area than the tiny stars and dreidels.

The fact that we have a menorah in the waiting room and that we handout an official guide to foraging for free food in each new intern's welcome packet clearly leads to number 3 as the obvious conclusion.

Guess this just means that I will be renewing my vows to love and honor Crunch come New Year's Day.

Marathon Weekend: Part I

Rooms: We're going for drinks, want to come?
Me: I just drank my face off for three days straight, otherwise would love to go with.
Rooms: You don't look hungover at all! You actually look pretty energized.
Me: I mean, I'm apparently becoming a legitimate alcoholic.
Rooms' BF: No, just a true New Yorker.

Love them.

I am also impressed that I'm in decent shape right now - this past weekend was Barney style legen-wait for it-dary. LP went through a pretty rough boy sitch a few months back, then some family drama, then there was my surgery... so our Friday night sleepover tradition has been derailed for quite some time now. Until I somehow talked her into coming to a work happy (seven) hour(s) we had on Friday.

And apparently now we're back, full force to the max. I think I mentioned our proclivity to make boyfriends and, speaking of Barney, just wanted to point out that we're pretty awesome wing women. Something about the two of us together just works - I think our personalities balance each other out, and we'd never fight over a guy EVER. She definitely has a type, while I tend to be more all over the place. But I can honestly say I've never really been into any of the guys she's picked. And probably vice versa.

Well, minus our mega-hott RA in Spain who (to quote LP) is "an Adonis of a man" and genuinely one of the nicest guys ever. But he was off limits for both of us, so doesn't count.

So when I turned around on Friday night and saw her talking to an extremely tall black man with dreads (pretty much the antithesis of the Italian/preppy/Catholic boys she usually eats alive), I decided I'd better check on her.

Which is when she enthusiastically introduced me to her new boyfriend Ozzie "Smith." Ozzie is a pretty good lookin dude, and has an abs situation to rival The Situation's. Ozzie is also a no-nonsense kind of dude, and was pretty appalled when one of my co-workers walked up to him and casually struck up a serious conversation about dinosaurs.

Ozzie: This is ridickalous - whys you talkin bout dinosaurs man? It's 4 in the mornin and you all up in here talkin bout the T-Rex? Dinosaurs is dead man, don't go tellin me bout no Triceratops.

Er .. maybe you had to be there. Or hear LP tell the story. In any case, she gave Ozzie Smith her number and he's pretty much in love. She had a text waiting for her when she woke up the next morning:

917-XXX-XXXX: Hey gurl, when can I get those lips?

Clearly we should have posted this on Texts From Last Night.

What do you say to that? We tried extremely hard, but never came up with the perfect response.

If I had to guess, we probably won't be seeing Ozzie Smith again any time soon. But if you hear two girls laughing hysterically about dinosaurs in the middle of a bar in the near future, you'll know you've found us.

I always wanted to say this... fa-shizzle.

Several friends have sent me links to various articles on Tiger's trashy texts this morning, and every commercial break on TV last night was like, “Coming up next on your LOCAL NEWS, Tiger’s racy SEXTS!”

I’m sorry, local news? This is pertinent to my life? Entertaining yes, but worthy of 10 lead-ins before the 10 o’clock news? TMZ and FOX are like, practically the same thing these days.

P.S. How awesome would it be if Chapelle's Show was still on the air? This would make one bad-ass skit, fa-shizzle.

Eggnog-ural Snow of the Season

It "snowed" last week in Austin - people bought provisions, just in case. School closed at 2PM, just in case. The snowflakes fell for about 20 minutes, and stuck to nothing. Not exactly a winter wonderland... and definitely typical of Texas.

We used to wake up before the sun every Christmas morning, hoping for snow so we could make angels and build Frosties. Nature delivered once or twice, but we could never get enough of the snow.

To this day, snow makes me giddy. So imagine my excitement when I saw the first flakes of the season last night in NYC:

Even though you can barely tell, I promise it's snow. And snow means Eggnog, mistletoe, peppermint schnaps with your coacoa. Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer and Santa Baby. Gingerbread and candy canes. Papa Noel, pine needles, poinsettas, holly wreathes. Snowball fights in Central park, ice skating in Bryant Park and the tree at 30 Rock.

Get excited. Angels and Frosty here I come.

Gossip Girl: You just got vetoed.

Monday's are semi-bearable, thanks to the promise of post-work Gossip Girl (or XOXO as one of the rooms calls it). While I love our XOXO Monday night ritual (even one of the rooms' BFs regularly gets in on the action) it's sometimes hard to catch everything that goes on underneath the running commentary from the peanut gallery.

It doesn't help that one of the rooms is a law student who loves to point out the improbability of every single tiny little detail of every show. And let's face it - there are a lot of them.

Which brings me to the reason that Tuesday is way better than Monday: Daily Intel's Gossip Girl re-cap, which scores the fake vs. real every episode, indexing the probability that this shit could actually happen.

Favorite excerpts from today's edition:

"The outfits of the Constance mean girls whose names we refuse to remember were puzzling this episode. Each of their school uniforms was accessorized monochromatically: One was wearing all purple, one was in blue, and one was in green. We're too old to understand, but we think this must have something to do with which sex acts they're willing to perform. So Plus 5 for that."

"D: '[Paul Hoffman is] a handsome guy, he's a sophomore, he and Vanessa have a lot in common.'

N: 'He's a douche.' Plus 3."

"Serena walks out of the country house with her baggage and no car in sight, just planning to 'find a cab' in the middle of bumfuck Nassau County. God, she's amazing. Plus 5."

Additional insights from OneC (our apt.):

"Instructing your driver to 'take you to Nassau County' is the equivalent of saying, 'take me to Long Island.' OK, now what??"

"Me and the rooms: 'That girl (Eric's sidekick) totally won her role on GG in a contest.'

Reply from rooms' BF: 'No way, she's totally legit! Didn't you see Spanglish?;" 

"If Willa had been involved in that threesome instead of Hilary Duff, we could have re-named Dan Vanilla."

I can't wait for next week Tuesday...

"You can't squat with wobbly shoes and a cookie in your mouth"

“You know what else is bullshit, besides juice cleanses? The idea that wearing some ugly Reeboks with a curvy sole will give you an Ass of Steel.” - Gawker

Sorry Reebok Easy Tones - I agree with the haters.

IMO, the only way to shrink/tone any body part is Biggest Loser style – hardcore cardio/weights combo. As someone whose weight fluctuates as regularly as the seasons, I should know.

Also, as someone who has been lacking the ability to properly hit the gym since, oooh… JULY, I’ll go ahead and tell you that if there were magic shoes, cookies, pills, liquids, or any variation thereof I would have found it, marketed it, and amassed a small fortune by now.

And speaking of the Biggest Loser, I haven’t been quite as fanatical this season (I have work-out envy – watching other people get their shit together when you’re physically incapable of doing so is a huge de-motivator), but I am super excited for tonight’s finale. Team Amanda!

"I'm actually in to capes and lasers"

-Rach

Even though I live in the City, part of me will always be a hippy. When things get super stressful, I dream of mountains and Colorado and I turn on Rift or Lawn Boy.

When Phish announced tour dates last Summer, several Lil' Bro phone conversations were dedicated to our obsession with obtaining tickets.

He was going to fly to New York (well, actually, he originally planned to Road Trip - if you know my brother, you are laughing right now) so we could go see Phish at Jones Beach.

Until we saw the prices - $1,000 a piece for seats in the last row in the upper right hand corner of the amphitheatre? Right.

Which brought us to plan b: Me + Bro + Canoe = . . .

["If you could only see what I see when I walk on the stage. I see the faces, I see joy, and if that's escapism for 3 hours, then fine. There are enough bad messages in our culture that people are being bombarded with, constantly. You're not good enough, you don't look right, you don't have enough money.' And to be able to look at a large group of people looking back at you, who don't look like they have a care in the world for 15 seconds, and not only that but joy, actual joy etched onto their faces for that bit of time....its such an honor."]

-Trey

I mean, it could work, right??

In the end, I went with the more practical (yet boring) plan c. When Rachey told me one of her friends had an extra ticket to a show at MSG last week, I totally stalked him until he sold it to me. I met up with him, another friend, and ... HIS DAD who had bought the tickets, sat with us, and jammed out through the entire concert. Amazing. Did I mention these were seats on the floor? For $50.00?

Obviously, I called Lil' Bro during intermission, just to rub it in. We love each other like that.

I also called Momma J, who couldn't believe a sane adult was willingly in attendance. She's of the opinion that every song sounds the same, and can't stand the "jam." "So how many songs did they play? One?"

Snark.

She talked to Lil' Bro the next day and mentioned that friends and I were also going to see Ghostland Observatory, thinking he would be impressed with my week in concerts.

His reply: "That's like having a really shitty dessert following the most amazing meal of your life."

Hater.

Ghostland was a-m-a-z-i-n-g per usual. How can you not love Aaron Behrens? And lasers?? I know I do.

Silver Bells

It's Christmas time in the City...

And that makes me:

Basketball, Broadway and Bromance

You've seen the t-shirts at the gym. The ones in different neon colors that are often a few sizes too big for the girls lined up on the elliptical machines. Zog Sports, huh? Must be some young-professional Christian thing... (When you're in Texas, these kinds of guesses are actually legitimate, and would probably be correct).

Intramural sports for those of us who still wish we were in college? Sign me up.

First attempt: wiffle ball with the rooms. This didn't work out so well, mainly because the games were held in some weird, paved lot on the Upper West Side. We live in the East Village... getting Manhattanites to cross over to the other side of the island is like getting your Grandma to switch detergent brands. Most likely aint gonna happen (unless the word free is involved - which works in both cases).

Next, after the failed wiffle ball season: basketball. Basketball and I have been in love since my Youth Association days. Sadly, I wasn't good enough to play college ball (you know, being a short white girl and all...) but loved pickup games and IM at Gregory. I also played twice a week in a women's leauge in Austin after I graduated.

So putting down my 80 bucks for co-ed Zog basketball only seemed logical. I find myself in short supply of good guy friends in the city, which is kind of irksome (not to mention boring...) for a girl who basically grew up as one of the guys. Thinking this would be a good excuse to bro out, I showed up to my first team gathering and met... the married Broadway theatre actors.

After initial disapointment in my failure to make any new bromances, I realized that this was way cooler and exactly the reason that I love living in New York City. I am constantly inspired and motivated by the people that I meet.

During our season, one of the guys was hoping to land a role in the revival of Ragtime on Broadway .

Turns out he did and it's getting rave reviews. I'm hoping to go see him this month.

And in the meantime, you can find me on Sundays at my next co-ed, potential bromance-making endeavor: BrewSkeeBall.

Side note: SkeeBall is also great for homances. More on this later...

I've said it before, I'll say it again.

Everything's bigger in Texas and Thanksgiving is no exception. Although one of these years I'd like to stay in NYC and actually go to the parade instead of watching it from the couch in Texas.

Lil' Bro was in charge of several Thanksgiving dishes this year - he's quite the cook. I would say his future wife is a lucky lady, but I'm not sure his culinary skills will make up for all of the other crap she'll inevitably have to put up with.

Cooking with him is always fun - last time I was home he made watermelon-injected pork tenderloin with jalapeno watermelon salsa one night and New York strip steak with cilantro butter and buttermilk cheddar biscuits the next.

We come from a long line of cooks, and holidays are spent predominantly in the kitchen, picking at things as we make them, marathon eating our way through breakfast, lunch and leftovers for dinner.

And Grandmother has a special thing she makes for each of us. I am buttermilk pie, my mom is hanky pankies for breakfast (sausage and cheese baked onto cocktail ryes) and my uncle is cheesecake.

The year that my uncle and his family stayed in Arizona for Thanksgiving, Grandmother attempted to FedEx a cheesecake to his house. He said it took a minute to figure out what the football-shaped lump inside the package on his doorstep was supposed to have been. God love her for trying...

This year's Thanksgiving was no different. The gang was all there, hanky pankies and all. Momma J, Lil' Bro and I made the majority of the gorge-fest. Here's what we had:

Oven-roasted turkey

Smoked turkey

Herbed oyster stuffing

Sausage terrine stuffing

Brown gravy from homemade turkey stock

Whipped yukon potatoes with scallion

Great-grandmother's butter rolls

Steamed asparagus and green beans

Maple sweet potato mash

Gruyere mac 'n cheese

And my favorite thing of the entire dinner - prime rib with horseradish sauce

What about dessert you ask? We had some helpers in this category, but here's the laundry list:

Coconut cake

Buttermilk pie

Chess pie

Chocolate chip cookies

Homemade pumpkin ice cream

Clearly we should be professional eaters. And drinkers. That handle of bourbon we cracked open on Wednesday night barely lived to see another.

I think I'll fast 'til Christmas - don't think we won't be doing it all over again. Just substitute ham for turkey...