🦃 Huntington Beach State Park, & a Happy Thanksgiving to You! 🦃

Note: Every camper has something crazy that they simply can not live without. Mike and I have five corgies. Some people have goofy looking blow-up turkeys 🦃🦃🦃 See you in a few days, buddy!!!

One of the most exciting things about going to the beach is seeing the puppies on it for the first time. As you can see, everyone is extremely excited to stare at the waves rolling in and digging the sand. I am equally excited because one of my favorite things is to simply paddle along in the water and wish I could go swimming. Seriously?Two weeks ago, I thought i'm gonna be in that water with nothing more than a skin suit. Sadly, that hasn't worked out for me. I'm hoping that maybe on the warmest day, I'll get brave. Enough to go in, but we'll have to wait and see.

Trillium's favorite thing is to run along the water line and wonder why I'm paddling along in it. I can't get enough of this place morning noon or night. We take several walks a day, and that's not the only thing to do. I'll show you some of our lovely birding photos in a separate post. We wouldn't want anyone getting turkeys confused with herons, ibises, storks, or spoon bills! And just to let you know, this could happen because storks are known as the ribeye of the sky. I've never tasted one, but Mike promises he'll try to get me one for my kitchen next season.

So, as you can see, cooking Thanksgiving on the fire is in high swing. Miraculously, I got the turkey defrosted and spatchcocked. The pot on the left-hand side in the first photograph is going to end up being homemade gravy. Then, we wrapped the turkey up with an enormous amount of stock beer and tinfoil and hoped for the best. About an hour and a half later, Mike checked on it, but it wasn't ready.

That gave us an opportunity to see how bored the puppies were and take a walk before we really kicked into the final dishes. Seriously, I think every Thanksgiving should have a bech walk included.

As you can see, both we and puppies had most of the traditional dishes. I brought all of the mirepoix from home... and by that, I mean Kimberton, CSA, and our back deck. Then I made mushroom and giblet gravy while pulling all of the extra bits of meat for puppy's dinner. Stuffing goes in the pan first so that I can finish it on the fire, greenbean casserole gets a final flick across the top with the blowtorch, and then I get to finally say, come to dinner!!

Oh my, just one more thing... Good stuffing, isn't anything without the properly roasted chestnuts!

Happy thanksgiving to our friends and family near and far. I hope that your meal was exactly as it was supposed to be.With no trips to the ER, fires in the kitchen or feuds at the dinner table.