from here. Nice and simple!

1 4-pound pork shoulder picnic or butt roast (preferably boneless)
8 to 10 garlic cloves (peeled)
Adobo (enough to rub all over the roast)

Preheat oven to 325 F.  With a knife, stab 8 to 10 holes evenly around the roast, including the top, bottom and sides and push the peeled garlic cloves deeply into the holes.  Rub adobo all over the roast and into the holes.

Place the roast, fat side up in a roasting pan and cover with a lid or tinfoil. Roast for 30 minutes per pound. The roast is finished when a meat thermometer, inserted in the thickest part of meat, reads 160 F.

So, I’ve made “black and bleu” burgers before.  I’m still working on getting it juuuuuuuuust right.  This time, it’s only a slight difference. I roasted some garlic over Thanksgiving and have been using it as a sandwich spread. I’ll be mixing that in to my sirloin this time, with some minced onion and butter. We’ll see how it goes!

With regards to burgers…how do you like them? What’s the best burger you’ve ever had?

For me…it makes me want to cry, actually. I fell in love with a burger I had at Ruby Tuesday called the Boston Blue burger. It had a barbeque sauce made with Sam Adams, fried onion strings and blue cheese on it. It was a little bit of heaven.  That said, after I ate it, I did the one thing no one should ever do when they come home from a restaurant:  check the nutrition info online.

That burger was 1400 calories. I kid you not.  For that reason, I’ve never had it again.  Sadness.

I welcome your stories of burger gluttony in the comments.

For those new to the Kitchen, I link recipes that are linkable in my Monday post, but always post the recipe the day it is made and when I can, post a picture as well as my review of it in the comments. So if you are intrigued by a dinner, come on back to see what we thought!

Also, not every day is a new recipe. On days where I’m cooking something we already know and love, I try to link to the original post so that you can still try it, but I pose a Question of the Day that I would love feedback on. On days where we are doing Fend For Yourself (FFY) Buffet, I post something that I “covet” for your review and commentary.

This week is slightly abbreviated since suitNtie and I are heading off to the lovely beaches of Puerto Rico to celebrate my 30th birthday! We’ll only be gone for four days, but it’s our first time away from the kiddos together. Fortunately for this week’s MPM, we don’t leave until Saturday morning. I am hoping to visit Iron Chef America contestant Roberto Trevino’s restaurant Budatai while we are there!  I believe we’ll have internet access while at our hotel, but if I’m on the internet while I’m at the pool, then I have a problem.

Monday -  black and bleu burgers
Tuesday – roasted pork
Wednesday – Cubanos
Thursday – FFY Buffet
Friday – n/a- out for a pre-trip dinner celebration with friends!
Saturday – Puerto Rico!!!
Sunday – Puerto Rico!!!

I know! A double QotD!!! Shocking!!!  But it’s the season of giving, and I’m feeling generous.

(Plus I have been planning ahead in anticipation of my upcoming vacation!!!)

Yesterday, I waxed poetically about my love for sandwiches using Thanksgiving leftovers. With regards to leftovers…I generally eat all my leftovers with sandwiches. But what I’d love to hear are other ways to use them! I love the low prices around Thanksgiving for turkey…I got a fresh turkey for 79 cents a pound this year and was very happy.  But other times of the year, it’s far pricier. My plan next year is to buy a lot of turkey (in the form of turkey breasts) so that we can enjoy it more often.  I don’t want to do a Thanksgiving dinner every time, though.

How do you use your leftovers?

So… in light of the recent holiday, I want to talk sandwich.

All year long, I *thoroughly* enjoy a “Thanksgiving” sandwich.  My idea is turkey, cranberry, stuffing (and that stuffing and the turkey better be at least warm), on a crusty, peasant-y bread or roll.  I will love you forever if you actually grill it like a panini, and have the cranberry sauce squeeze out on the sides so I have to lick it off my fingers. Mayo and/or cheese is sacrilege. Don’t put it NEAR my sandwich. Also, don’t touch my sandwich with anything that goes into a salad. Also wrong. There is no crunch in my Thanksgiving sandwich, just ooey, gooey warm happiness.

Come to think of it, my second favorite sandwich, a club, also features turkey.  I have a very, VERY soft spot for my elementary school field trip standby, peanut butter and grape jelly, though.

What are your favorites?

Love it, love it.  I adore working with fresh herbs in most instances…what I hate is that I don’t have a running herb garden, so I have to pay hideous prices for small piles of herbs. And then I have amazing guilt when I don’t use them fast enough and I toss them in the trash.

I’m thrilled to have found these in one of my magazines.  The site itself is actually pretty sweet- I will be paging through it soon- but the Herb Savor pods are just a great idea!  And I like that I can buy three of them at a discount, because what will I do with one? Generally, I use more than one herb at a time.   So, yay, innovation!

Maybe you can check this one out while you’re eating your leftover turkey sandwich. That’s what I’m doing right now. Yum.

My dinner every year pretty much never varies. I remember the one year I put some roasted garlic into my mashed potatoes and the masses threatened to revolt. (even though they were good, they were not the potatoes that were expected).

This year, I wanted to try something with the gravy. I know my family’s palate is…well…*very* simple. So when I saw Tyler Florence do a gravy that looked conventional, just more RICH and flavorful, I decided I was gonna go for it. I actually made the stock on Tuesday but I will heat and thicken it today. Boy, did my kitchen smell fab-u-lous. Yum.

I wish all of you the happiest of Thanksgivings! May your stomachs and hearts be full, and may your leftover sandwiches ROCK.

this year’s gravy…

2 pounds turkey wings
5 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 medium onion, halved
4 carrots, chopped
1 head garlic, smashed
2 sprigs fresh sage
2 sprigs fresh thyme
2 sprigs fresh rosemary
8 black peppercorns
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Heat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Put the turkey wings (also backbone and neck if you have it) into a small roasting pan and roast them until they are golden brown, about 30 minutes. Heat 3 tablespoons olive oil in a large stock pot over medium-high heat. Add the onion, carrots, garlic, herbs, and peppercorns and cook for 5 minutes. Add the turkey wings. Pour some water into the roasting pan and scrape up all the browned bits on the bottom; add this to the pot. Cover everything in the pot with cold water by 1-inch and bring to the boil, skimming any foam that rises to the surface. Reduce the heat and simmer for about 1 1/2 to 2 hours.

Strain out the solids and discard. Wipe out the pot and put it over medium heat. Melt the butter with the remaining 2 tablespoons olive oil and add the flour. Cook this roux, stirring frequently, until it is golden brown. Slowly whisk in the strained stock being careful to work out any lumps. Cook until the gravy has thickened, about 10 to 15 minutes.

This is the fourth installment of the Kitchen’s 2009 Holiday Basket Bonanza (HBB). Last year, I started doing baskets for a few recipients on our holiday list. They were so well received that I decided to do them again this year, but I am switching out a few of the recipes to try new ones! I’ll be making a trip out soon to buy supplies and I’ll be updating the Kitchen with pictures as we go!

Last year’s baskets included Oreo truffles, banana bread, homemade white bread and Stonewall Kitchen jam, spiced pecans, brownies, cookies and seasoned popcorn. This year, I am keeping the banana bread, spiced pecans and the brownies and I will make a different homemade bread with jam. The rest is getting changed up! I’ll be doing truffles again this year, but I’m going to do Almond Joy truffles instead of Oreo.  I’m also making some savory crackers, snickerdoodles and granola.

This week, I’m sharing the snickerdoodle recipe. Snickerdoodles are one of my absolute favorite cookies and I really think they are underrated!  Everyone gets so distracted with nuts, chocolate, fruit and everything else that you mix in to the cookie dough, forgetting that just a simple cookie itself can be so very delicious.

Adapted from here.  I only omitted the mushrooms because I ran out! Hopefully, it will still taste good. What? You want me to open a bottle of white wine so that I am forced to FINISH it tonight, too? Darn…the things I have to do to keep my blog going.

Zucchini is practically my favorite veggie. I adore it and I’ll take it just about any way I can get it. I love to make a meal of it, so when I saw this recipe I knew I had to try it!

1 zucchini about 12 inches long, or 6 medium ones
3 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 cup chopped onion
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons dry white wine
1 pound ground turkey
2 diced tomatoes
3 tablespoons chopped fresh basil
1 teaspoon chopped fresh rosemary
3/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 egg, lightly beaten
2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons pepper

For those new to the Kitchen, I link recipes that are linkable in my Monday post, but always post the recipe the day it is made and when I can, post a picture as well as my review of it in the comments.  So if you are intrigued by a dinner, come on back to see what we thought!

Also, not every day is a new recipe.  On days where I’m cooking something we already know and love, I try to link to the original post so that you can still try it, but I pose a Question of the Day that I would love feedback on.  On days where we are doing Fend For Yourself (FFY) Buffet, I post something that I “covet” for your review and commentary.

Monday – stuffed zucchini
Tuesday – spaghetti & meatballs
Wednesday – maple dijon pork tenderloin (repeat recipe)
Thursday – Happy Thanksgiving!!!  I will be up at 3am to stuff the 24 lb. turkey and get it into the oven.  We’ll have stuffing, green beans, mashed potatoes, sweet potato casserole, butternut squash, pearl onions…not to mention desserts (none of which will be made by me, thank goodness. I have my hands full with the main meal)!
Friday – the most obvious FFY Buffet day of the year, I think!
Saturday –crunchy parmesan chicken tenders (repeat recipe)
Sunday – easy beef stroganoff (repeat recipe… five ingredients, AND it’s in the crockpot, are you kidding me? It doesn’t get easier than that.)