Thanksgiving is on the mind of family foodies and home cooks alike, including Morning Edition host Andrew Garcia and, well, me.
Andrew loves to cook but admits he’s not quite an expert: “The first time I hosted Thanksgiving with my family I made several mistakes.’
On the other hand, I can cook somewhat, but the kitchen just isn’t my happy place. I’m the designated napkin-bringer at our Thanksgiving gatherings.
So with holiday dinners looming, we enlisted some professional help from Daniel Alvarenga, who’s a sous chef at Joey Dallas. Chef Alvarenga also does a cooking demonstration at A Tasteful Place at the Dallas Arboretum. Recently, he gave a demo of a dessert perfect for Thanksgiving —Banana Bread Pumpkin Mousse Trifle.
Between whisks we asked for some tips on how to avoid Thanksgiving cooking mishaps and about the times he ran into Thanksgiving problems himself.
“So, we used to do turkeys back at the Four Seasons and we had these two big Blodgett ovens, and we would only do four turkeys at a time,” he said. “And one day, we actually started a little too late and we needed our oven for our cookies. So, we ended up having to run all the way across the street to the hotel side and having to use their oven.”
TIP ONE: BE PREPARED
Make a plan, start early and schedule out your oven time.
“So, if you’re making a Thanksgiving turkey, start that early, early in the morning,” said Alvarenga
TIP TWO: BE FLEXIBLE
Alvarenga told us about a Thanksgiving where he was cooking bacon-wrapped stuffed jalapenos for his family. The recipe started out great, but unfortunately, he burned the bacon. Luckily, he thought fast, took the charred bacon off and blended up the stuffed jalapenos into a cheesy dip instead.
So be flexible. Not only will it save you from potential disaster, it could inspire you.
“Just being able to pivot off something you're making is really good because then you get to experiment,” said Alvarenga. “You get to find new tastes. It's creativity at its finest.”
TIP THREE: KNOW YOUR OVEN
Hailey Scontrino is Alvarenga’s fiancé. She joined him at the demonstration. She has her own baking YouTube channel and the Banana Bread and Pumpkin Mousse Trifle featured at the demo is her recipe.
Hailey weighed in on our third tip, which is geared toward baking specifically, and that is: Know your oven.
“I had a really bad oven for a while and so that messed up a lot of my bakes,” said Scontrino. “It would just bake unevenly. It was either way too cold and it would just never bake, or it was too hot, and it would burn it. So, the oven definitely affects your baking and might not even be you. You have to know your oven and keep an eye on it.”
Andrew really liked this one. “I am horrible at baking and it's good to know that it might just be my oven's fault.”
That could be TIP 3.5—Deflect blame.
TIP FOUR: KNOW WHEN TO TO CALL IT QUITS
One of my worst Thanksgiving dinners happened a few years back, when my friend and I invited a bunch of people for a Friendsgiving. We started the turkey early, but 3 hours later we noticed that we weren’t smelling that delicious turkey smell. That’s because my friend’s fancy oven had decided to turn off. My friend's solution was to push everything into the oven and turn the heat all the way up.
“Well, yeah, that sounds scary,” said Alvarenga. “Especially since your turkey is probably going to take six hours when your casseroles are only going to take an hour or two hours at most. Try to avoid cooking everything together.”
So, there you have it. Don't cook everything all at once on full blast.
And if all else fails, remember our final tip: There's always takeout!
Need more help? Take a look at my post on area cooking classes with a Thanksgiving twist. And for more autumn events head to Go See DFW.
The Go See DFW calendar is a partnership between KERA and The Dallas Morning News.
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