Farewell Ojibway
Happy Thanksgiving to all our Canadian friends. I was thinking about where I was last year for Thanksgiving and scrolled through my photos. I was on the Atlantic Huron in October 2022, cooking for a crew of 24. I had a very nice experienced 2nd cook so it was a fairly easy month and the table we prepared for the Thanksgiving festivities was full of delicious treats. I had just joined the Atlantic Huron and there was no Turkey so I made a prime rib dinner and Salmon Wellington with egg sauce. I made my famous homemade Sucre a la crème candy. I had brought little pumpkin molds to make the candy which added a nice decorative dessert for the festive table. I usually like to make Turkey for Thanksgiving and I always use a roasting bag. The Roasting bags keep the Turkey really moist and it yields extra juice to make lots of gravy. I like the sides to go with Turkey dinner and always serve it with lots of gravy, dressing, mashed potatoes, mashed turnips, and green peas. I always make sure to have homemade cranberry sauce.
I love making Turkey dinner with all the sides.
I bring my own candy molds when I know that I am going to prepare a holiday meal. From my restaurant days I have all the molds for every season and like to make my sucre a la creme candy in the pumpkin mold. I spent years perfecting the fudge-like recipe and it is always a crew favorite when I make it. I often make homemade turtles for the holidays too.
Today is the first Thanksgiving that I have been home and not working or sailing in over 29 years. I always like making the special holiday meals. As Lorraine (my sister, best friend, and publisher) and I were walking through the grocery store on Friday, I reached for a Fresh turkey and then hesitated. We are leaving on vacation in two days for our 10-day vacation in Maine so we decided that I would make a nice turkey dinner when we get back. When we had the restaurant for 24 years, I would always make special Holiday meals for my staff for each Christmas, Easter, and Thanksgiving. Our restaurant, Creperie Catherine, was located at a ski resort so the Holidays were always busy. The Thanksgiving weekend always attracted numerous people who would make the trip to see the colored leaves. Often they were surprised that the leaves in our area had already fallen, the higher elevation accelerating the process. When I think back over the years, it was not surprising to already have a light dusting of snow on Thanksgiving weekend. Because all my staff had to work for the busy weekend I started making turkey dinner with all the sides for them to take home and enjoy. It became a tradition that they looked forward to and something I enjoyed doing too. Before I opened our restaurant I sailed for 13 years, the last five years as chief cook. I always enjoyed making Turkey dinner, so making dinner for 16 or 18 of my staff and packing it up to go was something that connected me to my sailing years. I always thought of sailing and I am so grateful that I could return to sailing in 2019.
I used to make a turkey dinner for each of my staff to enjoy. Holidays were always busy at our restaurant so I made a meal that they could enjoy after a busy day.
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My first Thanksgiving on a ship again, after a 24-year hiatus, was on the Algoma Hansa. It was a smaller crew of 17 and I was still in the mindset of the larger crews of 30 that I cooked for. I was working by myself on the Hansa and pulled out all the stops wanting the day and meal to be special. I laugh now when I think about the Captain coming to me the day after Thanksgiving saying, "The food was delicious but too much. nobody could work after they indulged" I had made Turkey for lunch and Prime Rib for supper. I'm laughing as I write this. He was right. I was on the Hansa for over a year and when Christmas dinner and Easter dinner came along, I only made one big meal with a lighter lunch so that they could enjoy the meal and still go back to work. When I make Turkey dinner I always think of my dad, it was his job to cook the Turkey and make the dressing. He would take the beautifully cooked Turkey with its crispy brown skin out of the roasting bag (This is where I got the tip to use roasting bags) and separate the turkey while my mom would make the gravy, mashed potatoes, and mashed turnips. The tradition of pumpkin pie only started after I started sailing. My German immigrant parents were not familiar with pumpkin pie and never acquired a taste for it. I love pumpkin pie and had my best pumpkin pie at a Cracker Barrel restaurant on the side of the I-95 as we made our way to Florida one year. It had a crumble topping which I had never seen before and it was so delicious. Lorraine and I have stopped into Cracker Barrel restaurants in different locations if it is around the US Thanksgiving time of the year. We have never come across the delicious pie again. We still look for it in case they decide to make it again one day. As I am writing this I am starting to think perhaps I should try to make it and share the results with you.
I love pumpkin pie and will try to recreate the pumpkin pie we had with the crumble topping.
“36,000 km that’s the most km I’ve seen on a 2023 vehicle...you girls must like to drive”
Friday morning we took the pretty red car for an oil change, tire alignment, etc. It was a 32,000 Km checkup (we were at 36,000km, 19,883 miles). The man behind the desk said he hadn't seen a 2023 with that many km. He continued on to say, "You girls must like to drive" The appointment for the pretty red car was three hours and we took time to sit in a coffee shop enjoying doing nothing. We went through a few stores then picked up the pretty red car and stopped for a really good Greek salad from Kalistos Greek restaurant in Ottawa, a short distance from the Mitsubishi dealership before making our way back to Tremblant. It's a beautiful drive on a regular day, but the colored trees made it even more beautiful. Yesterday was a rainy day. I love a rainy day and although I had a lot to do including packing for our trip to Maine, I decided to do nothing. Absolutely nothing, ok I did try a new recipe with some mini eggplants that I purchased the day before in Ottawa. It is for the new book and it came out really good on the first try. I will adjust the measurements a bit and then it will be ready for the next cookbook. I love to go through grocery stores. In Ottawa, at the Walmart grocery section, I walked through the vegetable aisle seeing things I had never seen before. I looked for the price card so that I could see what I was looking at but there was none. I tried to find a store clerk but had no luck so I will share the photo with you of the mystery item and please feel free to tell me what it is so that I can look it up. I thought the one piece looked like a fish, but it is a vegetable.
Do you recognize this vegetable. I thought this one was funny because it looked like a fish, but it is a vegetable.
I like to buy the big bunches of cilantro that they have in the Walmart grocery section. You get such a big bunch and it is always fresh. I bought two curly parsley and will make the chimichurri to take along on our vacation. I also plan to make a couple of other sauces to take along. We plan to make some of our meals in while we are on vacation. The condo on Wells beach that we have been staying in for the last 18 years is overlooking the ocean and we cannot get a better view to enjoy our meals. Lorraine called me last night, checking in on how I made out with packing, knowing full well that I probably didn't pack at all. She shared with me that her bags were ready and reminded me that we were leaving at 07h00 on Monday morning. We laughed together when, as she suspected, I had not done any packing and just had a relaxing day doing nothing. She knows me so well, and like my mother, I am a last-minute packer. She asked me to remind you to order your t-shirts, hoodies, tote bags, and aprons early to make sure that we can get them to you on time if you plan to gift them for Christmas. We are working with a small family business to print the shirts and want to make sure to give them enough time. They are a lovely little family and when we went up to pick up our samples, their little son went up to Lorraine and asked "Are you here to play with me" Lorraine joined him on a little trip to the apple tree. His younger sister is named Catherine which I thought was fun to meet a little Catherine. Lorraine also asked me to mention that we will reimburse shipping if we are able to send the articles you order at a better rate. We are still working on getting the shipping down to a more reasonable price. When I said I did nothing yesterday, I actually went through my photos and videos and saw a video that I made on April 5th, 2022 which I did not share with you yet. I posted it today and you can see it on my YouTube channel @shiptoshorechef or click on the following link,
https://youtu.be/FmIHxnOccbg
remember to like, share, and subscribe to my YouTube channel.
The rainy day set the tone for me to work on the video of the final day of the Ojibway. In the video, look for more pictures of the Niagara's shadow on her hull in the photos. (pictured above) It was so eerie as the early morning sun cast our shadow across her hull and like a ghost of stories and memories it traveled from her bow to her stern and then disappeared. It was a very special moment. It was like seeing all her memories carried away in our shadow. In August 2023 I was sailing on the Spruceglen and took the video of the Ship Graveyard, remembering the day I saw the Ojibway on her way there to be dismantled. If you look closely you can see all the pilot houses that sit in the graveyard, all that is left of the great majestic ships that are no more Have a wonderful day.
The ship graveyard. I always find it kind of sad to pass by.