Early Thanksgiving....ish

Ever since I remember Thanksgiving has always been at my grandma's. This year, however, she isn't in the best of health and so we are getting our dinner brought in from somewhere. Chris was kind of sad that we aren't getting a home cooked meal. So I, in my infinite knowledge, decided to make a mini Thanksgiving dinner with my friend, Charlotte, tonight because we cook dinner and desert every week. (Ok, so it really has only been one week in the past 2 months. But, we pretend like its a weekly thing).

We were going to make a little chicken, red potatoes, salad, and a pumpkin cheesecake. Well, due to a blizzard warning she didn't want to come over in her tiny sports car. So we decided we would do it later. While I was at schoo,l Chris text me saying he wanted a big dinner because someone stole his lunch at work. So I decided to go do it anyways. Minus the pumpkin cheesecake because I figured we will make something like that next week on our weekly dinners, and substitute funeral potatoes for red potatoes. Chris loves those. Class got out early so I ran to the store before I picked up the Z Dawg. As I was roaming the store I decided it would be fun to surprise him with a set table and candles and the whole sha-bang.

I got home, looked at the recipe. I didn't realize I needed string for this chicken. I called my mom to see if it was really necessary. She said it would probably fall apart without it.

So I bundled Zoey up and off we went. I roamed the store for a while and finally asked the butcher where it would be. I figured this close to Thanksgiving it would be easy to find. Turns out, they didn't sell any. But, he was nice and said he could go give me some. I think he had pity for the girl hauling around a screaming baby, who must be her younger sister because there is no way that a 14 year old would be the mom. I felt bad for just leaving without buying anything since this wasn't the store I originally bought all my groceries at. So we went down the baby section and bought Zo a plate. We are starting to work on using spoons....but that process is a whole different post.

I got home around 4:30 and put Zoey down for a nap since her first one got cut super short. I decided to start on the chicken even though it said it takes 1 hour and 15 minutes to make. I generally take a bit longer, so I wanted to be ready to surprise Christopher at 6:30 when he got home. It turns out you have to remove the giblets...I still don't really know what those are. So I called my mom again.  

I got to cleaning and pat drying this baby and realize the close says 5:10. How did I just spend the last 40 minutes just taking junk out of the chicken and drying it? Anywho, so I put the rub on it. Wrap it up...I didn't really know what I was doing, so I just kind of mummyfied it... and put it on the pan thing. (Can you tell I'm not much of a cook?) I reread the directions and it says to put it breast side up. Ummm..... Which side is the breast side. I thought I had it the right way, but called my mom just in case. Call number 3. This was starting to remind me of when I first moved away, I had to call her hundreds of times for the simplest of things. I had it the right way. YAY! But she told me it stays more tender and moist if I do it the other way. So I flipped it over. By now it was 5:40. So much for having this a surprise since it takes an hour to cook...

So I clean up the kitchen a bit and set the table with our nice place mats and everything. By the time I get it clean enough to make the funeral potatoes, he was home. I hurry and whip them up and put them in the conventional oven so they would be done the same time as the Chicken, then all I'd need to do is pop in the rolls for 7 minutes. Our conventional oven started to crisp the top a lot sooner than wanted, so I turned up the oven and put them in with the chicken. I checked the temperature of the chicken and it was 160 and needed to be 180. I figured I would be done soonish anyways, so I didn't see a problem with putting both in there. This is around 6:30...so 2 hours after I started this epic meal. Next thing I know its 7 and Glee is on. I check the chicken again and now it was reading 150! Not at all what I was expecting. At 7:15 the potatoes had been done for a while, and I figured the thermometer just wasn't working so I decided it was done. I put in the rolls in our convention oven and sat down to watch some more Glee. On the commercial I check on them and they were black and hockey pucks. I'm not sure how it happened. But it did. So Luckily, being the smart woman I am, I buy the tubes of croissant rolls whenever they are on sale. I check the meat again and it still hasn't made it back to 160. So we make the new rolls and take everything out. We spoon up the potatoes and cut the chicken. Turns out, it STILL wasn't done. So I put it back in and we just ate the potatoes and rolls.

Finally, at 8:30 it finally read 180. But by that time we were already full from snackin on the potatoes. So we ate a few bites and put it in the fridge. I called my mom one last time to tell her that I'm never cooking one of these again!

I kind of want to make this cranberry salad and take to dinner Thursday, but I'm a bit scared after tonight.

I'm linking up with Small Treasure Tuesdays because cooking is a treasure...and one day I will find it. Somewhere. Hidden in a shoe box or something.