Happy Thanksgiving

To everyone, friends and relatives, I wish you all a very Happy Thanksgiving.

This year is especially important for me to give thanks to all the blessings I have received and also for surviving a serious illness. I'm thankful for all the support and encouragement and help.

To sister for coming and visiting to help and support and encourage me.
To Carole for checking up on me and always so encouraging.
To my niece Lou for listening and just being there when I have to vent.
To Nene for making sure I can always call.
To Fanny for calling and always checking up on how I was doing.
To Marissa for all the long talks and prayers and always being there even when you yourself is going through a lot as well.
To Marie for making sure I'm looking after myself.
To Rogelio for all the suggestions.
To the ladies of Laidley for caring.
To Sandra for all the wonderful suggestions and encouragement from far away.
To Ped for always listening. 

Without all your support, it would have been a more difficult recovery.
And now to RBR for understanding all the insecurities. Thank you for the laughter and some needed disagreement. Hang in there. The journey has not been all easy. The bumps have been small, thank God.

So far an exceptional year. 

More food......

These are more of what I tried or cook while I was visiting my sister. As usual there are foods I ate that I did not take pictures of mainly because I always forget or remember just after I had a few bites.

 

Oysters with asiago cheese, there were six oysters but remembered to take pictures after I had eaten two. I had to rearranged them to look good. I had this at Hawgs. Really good.

 

 

Beef Kabobs at the House of Kabobs in Sunnyvale...my last lunch in San Jose. Another excellent meal and the service was good and friendly.

 

 

Water chestnuts and bacon with spicy/sweet sauce. Yummy!!!

 

 

Cassava cake, one of three desserts for Thanksgiving dinner.



On the menu.......

These were some of the dishes on my menu the last few days. Just simple dishes cooked from what I have or bought to prepare for lunch or dinner.

A simple beef stir fry, easy and fast and light.

For fast weekend lunch...flatbread with leftover jerked chicken and mango salsa.

Roasted pork leg...it was bought cheap at Save-on-Foods and I just roasted it with Santa Maria seasoning and it turned out, crispy skin and meat was perfectly cooked....not dry.

The best way to use left over roast pork (lechon) is to make paksiw na lechon which tastes even better after a few days. Good served with just plain white rice.

Once in a while I get lazy on the weekend and this was what I had for lunch with gravy made from the drippings of the roast pork, yummy.

Thanksgiving dinner

So this is the meal I have decided to cook for Thanksgiving. Pineapple/apricot glazed ham, pasta salad, scallop potatoes, only because I have not had this in a long time and creme caramel, a different recipe which turned out really delicious.

The pictures are ok except for the potatoes....have never done this without the cream boiling over the rim of the dish and I can't transfer it to another dish just to get good picture or it would not look good serving it.

Also the picture the morning after....pancakes with pan fried leftover ham.

So what did you have for Thanksgiving? Was the meal your usual or was it different? What was your favorite? Mine was the ham and the creme caramel. I am quite sure that offices all over Canada will see leftover turkey/ham or whatever combination for lunches.



Cheesy chicken and rice

On Monday I wanted to make sometthing other than roasting or baking chicken, so while flipping through the pages of Canadian Living I saw this recipe and made it. It was ok, at least I had dinner ready in an hour and took left over to work the next day. I don't really like creamy rice but it was different and fast and easy.