Wine-braised pears

Because Thanksgiving dinner is full of stodgy main courses, sides, and desserts (ahem, see below), I wanted to make something that would contrast with the usual--in a good way. Whether these pears are a side dish or a dessert is up to you.

Ingredients
6 Bosc firm bosc pears
5-inch stick of cinnamon, cut into about five pieces
1 t whole cloves
1 T vanilla
Almost an entire bottle of dry red wine (I used Merlot)
1 c white sugar
3-4 T lemon juice

Preparation
1. Pour wine, lemon juice, sugar, cinnamon, cloves, and vanilla into a large stockpot (preferably one that is tall but not too large in diameter).
2. While you are bringing the mixture to a boil (making sure the sugar is dissolved and doesn't burn), peel the pears. I didn't peel mine completely, but the more skin you get off, the prettier the jewel-tone will be at the end.
3. As soon as the liquid is boiling, turn the heat down.

Now, at this point you have a choice. I cut the bottoms off of the pears--just enough so that they would stand up straight--and placed them in the pot. Unfortunately, the liquid didn't reach all the way up to the stem and after half an hour of braising, only about 3/4 of each pear had that nice, purple tone. I ended up having to flip them over for the last fifteen minutes just to get the color even, negating the whole point of the bottom-removal and straight-uppedness.

I recommend instead that you:

4. Cut the pears in half, lengthwise, and de-seed them with a melon-baller or a spoon.
5. Place them in the liquid in whatever orientation allows as many of them as possible to be covered with the spiced wine.

Then:
6. Cover the pot and bring everything to a very gentle boil.
7. Allow the pears to cook, covered, for about an hour.

What you're watching for is tenderness and that deep, royal color, but you don't want to cook anything so long that you end up with pearsauce.

8. Remove the pears and put them on a serving dish.
9. Take excess liquid and reduce it to approximately 1 cup of liquid, until a syrup forms.
10. Pour the syrup over your pears.

I added some of the extra toasted hazelnuts from the Gratin to the top of my pears, but there's no real need for that. In fact, if I could sprinkle anything on top it would probably be a gentle dusting of toasted pecans and a very, very small amount of gorgonzola or sharp cheddar cheese. The point of this recipe though, is to be as cheeseless and fruity as possible, so... well, if I ever add the cheese, I will do it in secret.

Butternut Squash and Goat Cheese Gratin

I'm not going to pretend to have invented this recipe myself; I took it almost verbatim from epicurious. However, I changed a few of the proportions and the cooking temperature, so I feel like there are enough differences to warrant a retyping (though I'm leaving the link in just in case the original sounds better to you).

Ben and I had this last Thanksgiving when we were able to cook together, and this year both of us cooked it separately for our friends/families. So far, it's been popular wherever it went, and I'm definitely making it again (just as soon as I can find leeks and butternut squash at the grocery store--for some reason both places I went today were frustratingly squashless).

You'll need:

1 large butternut squash, peeled, seeded, cut into 3/4- to 1-inch cubes
Olive oil
Coarse salt
2 T (1/2 stick) butter, divided
2 t white or black pepper
3 cups leeks, cut finely
3 t chopped fresh sage, rubbed
1 5.5-ounce log soft fresh goat cheese
1/2 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup hazelnuts, toasted, husked, coarsely chopped


Preparation:
1. Preheat the oven to 475˚
2. Place the squash in a large baking dish, pour olive oil, salt, and white pepper on top. Mix.
3. Cook for about half an hour, until the squash is tenderly fork-pokable.
4. While squash is cooking, saute leeks and sage in butter until the mix has cooked down but is not yet brown.
5. When the squash has been removed from the oven, mix the leek mixture in.
6. Lower the oven temperature to 375˚.
7. Layer the squash and leeks, alternating with goat cheese. I started with the squash, then crumbled (well, chevre doesn't really "crumble"... but it doesn't glop or pour, either. I'm at a loss for words) the cheese, and was able to make two more layers of each, with cheese on top.
8. Pour in the cream, making sure that it spreads throughout the dish as evenly as possible.
9. Sprinkle the chopped toasted hazelnuts on top.
10. Bake for about half an hour.

Let the cheesey warmness enfold you in its holiday-licious arms...

Martha Stewart Braidsticks!

This isn't my recipe (it's Martha's from the November magazine), but the picture was so enticing I couldn't eat lunch this afternoon until I'd made some of her braided breadsticks. Even though they were a little fussy (rolling 16 two-foot-long, quarter-inch-wide strips of dough is only fun for .2% of the actual time required), the dough itself is really simple and, without the braiding, easy to make!

Ingredients
2 cups flour
2 t salt
2 t sugar
2 T butter
3/4 cup whole milk

1 egg yolk
1 T whole milk

large-grained salt

What to do:
Preheat oven to 350˚.

1. Mix flour, salt, and sugar until combined.
2. Add butter and milk, stirring and then kneading on a floured surface. Don't knead more than enough times to just get the dough into a ball.
3. Divide the dough until 16 equal-sized balls.
4. Roll each ball into a strand about 2 feet long (it should be around 1/4 inch thick, maybe a little thicker... it doesn't REALLY need to be this length... I think mine were about 75% that).
5. Braid in a four-strand braid, folding over and under at the end as shown.
6. Let dough rest for about half an hour (I didn't do this step, as it took me so long to braid the darn things that a half hour had passed by the time I finished them all).
7. Brush top of completed wreath with egg yolk/milk mixture, covering liberally.
8. Sprinkle salt on top.

Bake for 25-30 minutes, until golden brown on top. If wreaths don't brown, turn up the heat a bit and keep and eye on them until they do!

I had my braided wreath breadstick with a bowl of orzo-chicken-hamburger-mushroom-spinach-thyme-oregano-bay leaf soup (which is much more delicious and harmonious than the confused description would have you believe).

This is just a basic recipe, obviously. I think it would taste delicious with some fresh rosemary crushed into the dough or even with the salt level halved and a bit of cinnamon with some honey on top. But that's just me, and I won't vouch for anything I haven't tried (yet)!