Sarah Walker The Curated House, Author at The Curated House

Thanksgiving Menu | Stuffing + Our Favourite Sides

Today I thought I would share with you some of our favourite side dishes and homemade condiments that adorn our Harvest Gathering dinner table each year. Like these two beautiful heirloom carrots who became intertwined over time, these simple dishes have become synonymous with Thanksgiving dinner for our family.

There is something comforting about the side dishes we eat at Thanksgiving. As a cook, I love experimentation and exploration, but there are certain dishes that are “not to be messed with” according to my family, and Thanksgiving Stuffing is one of them. The truth is, I make this side dish without a recipe every year, so I have my fingers crossed that I have actually managed to write it all down for you correctly! Once I’m in the zone of cooking, I am often driven by intuition and my senses of smell and taste, so please use yours as well when making this and adjust the herbs and balance of ingredients according to your palette. That said, the recipe below should help you approximate what has become a bit of a cult favourite amongst our family and friends.

I have experimented with making this stuffing with gluten-free bread and the honest-to-goodness truth is it doesn’t work. It’s mushy and unrecognizable and could start a riot amongst my family and friends expecting “the real thing.” My suggestion for those of us who are gluten-free? Cook up all of the ingredients together, and before you add the bread, set aside some of the mix of onions, bacon, apricots and apples with the herbs. The flavours are amazing and a scoop of that on the side of your plate is almost as good as the bread-laced version! Everybody wins.

OK, my next favourite side dish to share with you is another of our annual Thanksgiving traditions. But first, I have a confession to make. I don’t like cranberry sauce. I know, I know, it makes my connection to the original Pilgrims questionable and my citizenship as a Canadian tenuous. But I find the tartness dominates the flavours of my Thanksgiving meal and thus gave up on trying to like it years ago. So in place of the traditional cranberry sauce, I’ve added two rich and flavourful “condiments” that add depth of flavour without taking over the party in your mouth. The first is our Caramelized Balsamic Onions.

I’m always secretly hoping there will be some of the Caramelized Balsamic Onions left over for making sandwiches or adding on top of salads. It makes a divine addition to a cheese board, too. Like, moan-worthy with a good old English sharp cheddar. Yum.

Last but not least, I always make Roasted Garlic Butter each year, and it tends to be a surprise favourite with new guests each Autumn. It’s not much to look at once it’s finished, but the sweet, roasted richness of the garlic makes up for what this condiment might lack in the good looks department.

I just love the way the garlic bulb “skeletons” look once the cloves have been removed. The light was particularly gorgeous that day, showing off their translucency in the loveliest way such that I had to stop and take this shot for you!

So there you have it! 3 of our family’s favourite side dishes for one of our favourite gatherings of the year! Tomorrow I’ll share my secrets to a gorgeous, mouth-watering turkey as well as the recipe for a delicious and seasonal dessert.

Many thanks to the lovely and oh-so-talented Gabriela Hansen for contributing her beautiful photographic skills to this day and this post! What a joy to work with such delightful people.

Wishing you a flavourful and fragrant Thursday!

By Sarah Walker The Curated House|November 8th, 2012|1 Comment

Thanksgiving Table Décor | Part 3 | Menus + Linens

PHOTO BY GABRIELA HANSEN

I love it when all of the lovely details start to come together. With the floral centrepiece and Moroccan-inspired “punched tin” mini pumpkins complete, it was time to finish the place settings. I love a simple yet layered place setting, and I am a big fan of the use of beautiful typography to set the mood for the special meal. Enter my lovely friend Melody Hansen, who graciously offered to design menus for this year’s Harvest Gathering in order to give it an extra special touch of thoughtful detail and design.

PHOTO BY GABRIELA HANSEN

I love collaborating with people who understand my aesthetic. The natural and organic simplicity of Melody’s hand drawn illustrations framing the top and bottom of these elegant menus were the perfect choice to communicate the casual elegance of our seasonal celebration. The watercolour paper on which we chose to print the menus had the same quality as a natural linen fabric – simple yet substantial and sophisticated.

PHOTO BY GABRIELA HANSEN

I’m a big believer in linen napkins – firstly because they are better for the environment, and secondly because they make the meal feel more elegant. That said, I didn’t want the table linens to feel formal. With 14 people sitting around the extended table that we added, I also needed to come up with an option that was cost effective. The solution? $5/yard fabric from Designer Fabric Outlet, a bit of time in front of my sewing machine, and voila! French bistro style cotton-linen blend table napkins that were the perfect bridge between formal and casual, just like the menus.

PHOTO BY GABRIELA HANSEN

With the table settings complete, tomorrow I’ll dive into the food preparations. Can’t wait to share some of my favourite Harvest recipes with you!

By Sarah Walker The Curated House|November 7th, 2012|4 Comments

Thanksgiving Table Décor | Part 2 | Flowers

I love flowers. In fact, before launching my interior design career, I spent a few years working in the floral design industry. The thing about floral design is you’re really just transforming beauty into beauty, giving form and structure to something whose natural form and structure are already spectacular. It’s always a delicate balance between design and overdoing it while showing respect for Nature’s splendour.

For this year’s Harvest gathering, I really wanted the flowers to have a slightly wild and natural feel to them. My inspiration was the concept of a fallen tree that had become a nest into which some of the beautiful flora and fauna of the forest would be nestled.

Working with my amazing wholesale floral rep, I found this incredible cork bark. It is carefully peeled from the trees, leaving the trees unharmed and producing exactly what I was looking for! A natural, hollowed-out, rustic, tree-looking base to cradle my Harvest flowers.

I started by soaking my wet oasis in warm solution water {you can use the packets of dry solution they give you at your local florist to create yours}. *Side note: Make sure you place your oasis into the water with the holes up and let it naturally sink into the water. This process ensures it absorbs water all the way through.*

I cut the oasis into pieces that would fit the organic shape of the cork and then wrapped them in cellophane to hold in the water. I added an extra layer of folded cellophane underneath the oasis as well. I needed the top layer to be penetrable by the stems, so I was less concerned about perfection there as I knew the process of arranging would pull it apart anyway, but I wanted a good seal on the bottom so the water wouldn’t leak all over the table. It worked! Phew.

Next, the flowers. I purchased everything but these Dahlias from my wholesalers, but the Dahlias were in short supply and in bad condition there and I thought I was going to have to go without. Dahlias are my favourite Fall flower, so I was rather heartbroken about it, but the harvest wasn’t good this year and that’s the reality of dealing with nature. It often reminds us that we are not in control, and that really is a good thing, even when it means not getting what we want.

Well, you can imagine my surprise when I went to St. Lawrence Market that Saturday and met a huge and charmingly gruff Amish farmer who was exclusively selling fresh cut Dahlias. This was the only bunch left in a colour that would work with the rest of my flowers, and what a colour! Radiant, mouth-watering blood-orange Dahlias, ready to take centre stage in my arrangements. As his massive, work-worn hands offered me these delicate blooms, my heart swelled with gratitude at the sight of beauty coming from an unsuspecting source. It was a good reminder to always be on the look out for it, even when I don’t expect beauty to be there, it’s probably waiting to surprise me. It’s a constant exercise in transforming the way I think, this search for beauty in everyday life. So good for the soul.

Paired with some Bittersweet Orange, orange thistles and some Ecuadorian roses as big as cabbages, these gorgeous and unexpected gifts made my floral palette complete.

Starting with this kind of gorgeousness, how could I go wrong? Right? Seriously. Nature is amazing.

I must admit that once I’m into the arranging of things, I get into a bit of a zone and inevitably forget to take process photos. You will have to use your imaginations and I will use my words to the best of my ability to describe how I got from the raw materials to the finished product. I started with the thistles and used them as I would typically use greens to create the “frame” for the arrangement, creating a base and an organic shape as a starting point. This step is VERY important, as your base of greens {or thistles, in this case} are usually what hide your mechanics. I don’t like to use the word “hate” much, but I HATE it when people can see my mechanics {i.e. the oasis and whatever else I used to craft the arrangement beyond the featured elements themselves}. Needless to say, this step is important.

Next I added a layer of the bittersweet orange, carefully leaving spaces for the roses and dahlias to nest. The roses were next and I used them to create a beautiful line through the arrangement, finishing with a glorious “centrepiece to the centrepiece” of the precious and prized Dahlia’s from my lovely Amish farmer friend.

I then went back to the bittersweet orange and created a few more carefree lines arching away from the arrangement to offer a delicate, organic flourish. Here’s how the finished product looked.

PHOTO BY GABRIELA HANSEN

I’ll show you more photos of the arrangement tomorrow when I show you the table setting, the napkins I made and the gorgeous menus designed by my friend Melody!

In the meantime, have a cozy, happy Tuesday, and keep your eyes peeled for beauty in unexpected places! You never know what gorgeous surprises might await you around every corner.

xo
s.

By Sarah Walker The Curated House|November 6th, 2012|0 Comments