Thanksgiving update

been a while--busy getting course underway at Ohio State, dealing with elections (we both served as precinct judges for the November 6th election--wound up in Gahanna, a suburb east of Columbus. Fairly light turnout, but good experience for the election in the spring, which will be far more heavy, presidential primary and all (if there's any contest left at that point, given the headlong rush of various states, including Florida and Michigan, to have the earliest primary possible).

We spent the Thanksgiving weekend cooking--mainly soups, which we then canned. Ann did potato/leek, a favorite adapted by Mollie Katzan, then her own Verde, inspired by a green soup from Whole World Restaurant here in Columbus, but made of whatever greens are in season. I did a couple of squash soups, since there was a great buy on squash locally last week, so I got a couple. Made a Butternut/pear/ginger soup, from a recipe in Deborah Madison's soup cookbook, a winter stew with Delicata and Kambocha squash with red lentils, from a recipe found on an animal rights' organization flyer, and Mollie Katzan's Firecracker Chili, slightly modified. Put up fifteen quarts of soup among us, and Ann got to try out the new 7 quart slow cooker that we charged out on Black Friday to get cheaply. Kitchen smelled fantastically by the time we were done!



Then to celebrate, we wound up eating out twice: Friday night at ChiThai, a new -- and good -- Asian restaurant, with Chinese and Thai specialties, with Ann's good



friend and fellow calligrapher Lisa Rodgers, in from Kansas City with daughter Jackie to celebrate Thanksgiving with Lisa's dad, then the following night at Dragonfly NeoV, our favorite world-class vegan restaurant in Columbus (actually, the only world-class vegan restaurant in Columbus). Ann had a spectacular tower of tofu with a fiery sauce, while I had trumpet mushrooms over mashed potatoes with a red wine sauce. Both were (as usual) plate-licking-clean quality. A surprisingly small selection on the menu, but then learned that Magdiale and Cristin were out of town for the holiday, and clearly had left things in a purposefully simplified state for the staff to handle.