Tiffany (00:02)
Hello Kat. How are you going to crunch?

Kat (00:03)
Hello, Tiffany.

Uh-uh.

Welcome to the ASMR episode of Greening Up My Act.

I won't do this the whole time it's too loud. I'm eating pretzels because we're talking about food. And I was like, you know what? I've never eaten on this show. It's going to get annoying, I'm sure.

Tiffany (00:14)
you

Yeah

Yeah, we're talking about Thanksgiving.

Yeah, I want...

You know, I don't care. That's what I said. I was like, some people will hate it. Some people will love it because of the ASMR quality. And I am totally indifferent, so...

Kat (00:36)
OK, well, I'll do it for part of the show until I'm like, wait, I can't hear you. I'm eating them like Cookie Monster, basically.

Tiffany (00:42)
Love it.

I love that. I keep messing with my freaking camera because I literally duct taped it to my computer. Because my ⁓ holder is way too high and it's like looking down on me from a mountaintop. So I'm trying to get it to the right height. if anybody has a solution for how to make a webcam that's external.

Kat (00:58)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Tiffany (01:11)
look like you're not. Yeah, exactly. Please tell me. So.

Kat (01:14)
in outer space or something. ⁓

be like well

here's four four to five hundred dollars worth of equipment you could get.

Tiffany (01:23)
Right, there's probably some little thing you can stick on your desk. And it just has an arm or something, but I don't know. They do have those for mics and stuff, but.

Kat (01:36)
Yeah,

the gorilla tripod or whatever.

Tiffany (01:40)
Okay, yeah, there's so many. Anyway, yes, so we are talking.

Kat (01:47)
I am going to stop this, isn't it? Goodbye pretzels.

Tiffany (01:50)
We are talking about Thanksgiving and ⁓ Thanksgiving food specifically and how I kind of wanted to go at it from an angle of like how to be less wasteful but I also we kind of wanted to talk about like recipes that we love so it's kind of

Kat (01:53)
Mm-hmm.

And you know,

so my idea is about kind of keeping your costs in check.

Tiffany (02:16)
Yes, yes, which is a big one. And the less wasteful you are, probably the less money you're going to or waste. they go hand in hand. we Americans waste tons of food from Thanksgiving dinner alone. 305 million pounds is the estimate. 305 million pounds.

Kat (02:20)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

That's

almost a pound per resident or citizen in the US on one day.

Tiffany (02:47)
Yeah, that's what somebody

was saying that it could feed.

like so many people for a year if we just didn't wait. Yeah, it's just crazy the amount of food that we waste on that day. ⁓ And we've also talked about how waste in general goes up during the holidays. Waste and spending and excess because we're all sort of in that holiday spirit and we stop thinking about it.

Kat (02:56)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

which

yeah, it's no longer feasting. It's now consumer, consumer, consumer, which yes.

Tiffany (03:20)
Yes.

Yes. So, but in our opinion, that is not inevitable. So we don't have to become just like waste, wait, monsters, holiday monsters. There you go. So let's go over tips for a lower waste Thanksgiving meal, like how to limit waste. And I found a super cool

Kat (03:26)
Right.

Monsters. Yeah. That's a cookie monster noise I should be making.

Tiffany (03:49)
It's like a free online tool that's really cool. And how to use leftovers in creative ways along with some of our favorite recipes to try this year. Welcome to Greening Up My Act

Kat (03:52)
Awesome.

Awesome.

Tiffany (04:18)
the music. It will never get easier.

Kat (04:21)
I, we're using the most up to date tools they have. So I'm going to leave that in for some behind the scenes goodies.

Tiffany (04:25)
Theoretically. Okay,

that's like user error, always. That's fine. All right, so let's go over my sources, because I did look up a couple things. University of Minnesota was where I got that stat. ⁓ The NRDC, which is the Natural Resource of Defense Council, I think is the title. They have their guesstimator tool, which is the tool I'm going to talk about.

⁓ Hungry Harvest, I use them, their blog. Another blog called Move for Hunger. And Going Zero Waste was another blog. And I use a lot of blogs. And then I got recipes from a sugar spun run and Add A Pinch. So, yes. So, all right.

Kat (05:09)
Yeah, I mean...

Tiffany (05:24)
I realized I didn't. I was just reading this. was like, I didn't really write any kind of intro into this. So yeah.

Kat (05:32)
You know what? It's okay. It's Thanksgiving.

We're all off work, hopefully.

Tiffany (05:36)
Yeah,

exactly. So, ⁓ all right, basically I'll wing it. We are going to go over limiting waste and then I'm going to talk about what to do with the waste that you do create because inevitably there's going to be something, what you can do anyway, and then how to plan for leftovers. So.

Yeah, and then we will share the recipes that we like too. All right, so if you're looking to limit waste, I actually think this tool that I was talking about is the number one place to start. And I'm definitely going to use it for my holidays. It's called the NRDC Guestimator. And I know, and it's linked. Are you looking at it?

Kat (06:26)
I love this.

No, I saw it in your notes, let me I'm going to look it up while we're talking.

Tiffany (06:34)
Yeah, because it's linked in the show notes and basically you input the number of guests and the guests you separate into big eaters, regular eaters and small eaters, which is so cute. Which is like, have to think, okay, uncle Bob is probably going to eat a lot, so I'm going to have him as a big eater. ⁓ Then you choose what kind of meal it is.

And it basically seemed like sort of like a with meat without meat or an assortment of the two. and then after you do those things, it gives you the number of ounces or pounds of each item that you'll need. So it's literally like your side dish. You'll need 20 ounces of peas, whatever. It doesn't really matter what it is, but like 20 ounces of peas. So you cook like a bag of peas rather than like eight bags of peas. Yeah.

Kat (07:17)
Okay.

Right, okay.

Tiffany (07:33)
And then it said like, the one I was looking at was like, and then you put in how many leftovers you want to.

Kat (07:38)
I okay yeah so I'm looking at save the food.com it looks like they okay.

Tiffany (07:41)
Yes,

that's the one. It's from the NRDC, I think. Unless they just linked to it, but I don't think so. I thought it was their tool.

Kat (07:47)
Okay.

Okay.

I mean, I saw that they had a press release about it. So I'm guessing they came up with it first and save the food.

Tiffany (08:04)
Okay.

yeah, that's interesting, because it's not actually on there. Huh.

Kat (08:12)
savethefood.com.

Tiffany (08:14)
Okay. ⁓ maybe NRDC just link to it then. But anyway, yeah, savethefood.com. And it's, yeah, it's super awesome. They also have like recipes and planning and storage, like all of this advice. So yeah. So yeah, start there because then you'll know, like it's, I put in a random number and it's, I,

Kat (08:15)
Yeah.

Yeah, it looks like a pretty good site.

Tiffany (08:41)
It said like you'll need six pounds of chicken. Whereas for a dinner party or whatever, you might cook way, way more than that. ⁓ So it was just sort of an example, but so then you know if you only have four people or four or five people, you need a six pound turkey, not a 20 pound turkey.

Kat (08:51)
Right.

I, this is, yeah.

Yeah, this is fun. Yeah, so I'm looking at this. So I put in my, you know, for my... ⁓

My family is coming for, so I put in like two light eaters, six average eaters and four big eaters. I'm assuming the teenage boys are going to be big eaters and maybe my brother's in law. And then, you know, we've got, okay, we got bread rolls. Probably salad, probably potatoes. Stuffing, obviously. And then desserts we're going to have. Yeah, this is fun. ⁓

Tiffany (09:13)
Yes, that's right.

Yes.

Yeah,

it's awesome. And then it's also like a helpful tool because you don't have to just guess.

Kat (09:46)
Right. Yeah, this is fun. And we'll say fruit salad. Sure. OK, finalizing the menu. This is fun. OK, keep going. Sorry.

Tiffany (09:55)
Yeah, no, it's awesome. I think everybody should try it. well. Maybe next time.

Kat (09:57)
no, it didn't load.

Shoot.

Tiffany (10:05)
It loaded for me, but...

Kat (10:07)
Maybe I chose too many pies.

Tiffany (10:11)
I don't know.

Kat (10:12)
Anyway, okay, I gotta eat a pretzel in disgust for that.

Tiffany (10:14)
Yeah.

So yeah, I think just play around with it. And I think it's a really cool idea. ⁓ So then once you are trying to come up with what you're actually going to make, and a lot of times it's like a potluck situation, so you might only be making some of it. ⁓

Kat (10:27)
Mm-hmm.

Tiffany (10:42)
One recommendation I found online was to try to limit fancy quote unquote recipes as much as possible ⁓ because that limits the number of like random ingredients that you might need to buy. ⁓ Yeah.

Kat (10:55)
Yeah, for sure. Like you don't

you don't need six pounds of saffron for one dish that you're to make once.

Tiffany (11:01)
Yes, yes. That's

actually a really good example. And later I have ⁓ this cranberry sauce that I used to make had star anise in it. And I would buy star anise for it and then the rest and spend $100 and then the rest would go bad. So yeah, it's like, and then I just quick Google found a different cranberry sauce recipe that doesn't have star anise. yeah. So yeah, just keeping that in mind could be helpful.

Kat (11:12)
Never use it again.

Tiffany (11:30)
⁓ If your family doesn't mind, mashing potatoes with the skins on can save scraps. Yeah, I think it's delicious. ⁓ Right. Yes. Do you do that with russet potatoes, though? Because I know red potatoes.

Kat (11:35)
do that. Mm-hmm. I think so too. Just scrub them, scrub them, you know, cut off the the gangly eyes, but yeah.

Red potatoes, usually, because I don't want to have to chop the potatoes, I get the little, just the bag of potatoes, basically throw it in.

Tiffany (11:54)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah,

I don't know how good like a russet potato skin would be in there.

Kat (12:00)
They're

not bad. mean, like think it's like a baked potato. You can scrub them, you know. ⁓ It gives them some texture too. That was my mom always used to say, lumpy potatoes let you know it's real. yeah.

Tiffany (12:03)
True, yeah.

Nice.

That is true, unlike instant. Yep. Yes, I love that. That makes me happy because mine are always lumpy. It's just the way it is. Yeah. Yeah. Broccoli stems can also be used to add more crunch to a dish.

Kat (12:16)
Mm-hmm.

yeah. But yeah, it's like eating a real food rather than a baby food.

yeah, great in a salad.

Tiffany (12:38)
Yeah, and you can eat the stems. They're just, yeah. You can freeze leftovers or broth. And I even thought about like, ⁓ you could bring over, like plan ahead a little bit, which all of this does take a little bit of planning, but you could bring over, like I'm going to my brother-in-law's for Thanksgiving. That's what we do every year. So I could bring my silicone bags, silicone, silicone, whatever, bags.

Kat (12:39)
I know, there's no reason not to.

Silicon. Yeah.

Tiffany (13:07)
silicone bags, glass jars, or stainless steel containers with a plan to package them into like, freezeable portions, whatever leftovers we have, because we always have so many. ⁓ So, you know, because I don't really do the main cooking, I could try to, you know, enforce this tool on us, but it's also, it is nice to have leftovers. So as long as people take them and use them, then it's fine.

Kat (13:17)
That's smart.

Yeah,

because you've got three to five days really. Although trick, okay. I read on NPR that food lasts in the fridge maybe five days max, depending on what it is. But if you reheat it to the internal temperature that it was like, you know, 140, 135 to 165, you get another five days out of it. Yeah, I don't know how long in perpetuity you can do that. But so...

Tiffany (13:59)
Really?

Huh. Yeah, just

forever.

Kat (14:06)
Well, I don't know if it's for, but you know, hopefully you eat it is the thing. like, so if you take it out and and heat, you know, your rice back up to 130 gently now, gently not. But reheat it up to the right internal temperature, you get another three days out of it, basically. Mm hmm. Put it back in the fridge and you can do it again the next day and get another three days out of it. Yeah.

Tiffany (14:10)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

interesting and then you can put it back in the fridge.

Whoa. That's

crazy.

Kat (14:33)
So that's the thing like every three days in our fridge I'm like, this pasta heated up.

Tiffany (14:39)
Wow, that's pretty cool. Does it just kill the bacteria if anything's on it? Is that the idea?

Kat (14:41)
And they, yeah, is the idea.

Yeah. And they found, sorry to just throw you off on tangent here, but starches like rice and pasta, actually, if you cook them initially, let them cool and then heat them back up, it changes the sugars in them so that it's not as quick of a glucose spike. So like plain white rice, if you just eat

Tiffany (14:48)
No, please, yeah.

Hmm.

interesting.

Kat (15:10)
regular if it's been like refrigerated overnight and then reheated gently I don't know exactly what gently means but not you know like don't don't boil it to death I guess but reheated the starch in it changes so the sugar properties change so it's actually better for you're gonna it's gonna take longer to digest it than if it was just fresh out of the pot so yeah

Tiffany (15:19)
Yeah, I was like microwave it. Yeah.

Hmm.

That's fascinating. I wonder if that's

why fried rice always feels more filling. I don't know. That's interesting. Huh. Yeah, maybe we'll have to link. If you send me that article, we can link it in the sources because I would like to read that too. ⁓ Is that true for meat?

Kat (15:38)
It might be part of it. Yeah, but it's an interesting.

In terms of the reheat? No, it's just for start. You mean in terms of being able to reheat it for three days? Yeah, apparently. Yeah, I believe so. I'll find that article for you. But yeah.

Tiffany (15:56)
like heating it.

Yes, like extend its lifespan. Interesting. So you're to

eat like 10 day old meat and not die. Theoretically.

Kat (16:09)
Well, as long

as it was heated. Yeah.

Tiffany (16:12)
Right.

Huh. That's cool. I trust NPR Generally speaking, Okay. So then, so there's a lot that you can do beforehand to limit the waste. Like for example, I could actually talk to my family and be like, Hey, should we use this tool so we know how much we actually need? And then you can even put in the number of leftovers you want. So we can still have leftovers.

Kat (16:18)
Generally. Yes, me too.

Tiffany (16:41)
So yeah, because it's hard because it is usually a communal thing. But ⁓ yeah, there are ways. And I'll think about it. ⁓ But even just for.

Kat (16:45)
Yeah.

I hope,

I'm sorry, I hope our YouTube listeners are like watching me eat pretzels

Tiffany (16:57)
Silently, yeah.

Well, I was going to say even just for your own contribution, you can do the calculations. So it's kind of helpful. My last two Thanksgiving contributions have been pretty bad, but I'll try to fix that this year. Both times I used new recipes that I never made before. Yeah, one of them was rolls.

Kat (17:06)
sure. Yeah.

In what sense?

What do you mean bad?

⁓ yeah, that's a danger.

Tiffany (17:25)
Because I'm like, I'm a good baker. I'm going to make dinner rolls. Make them.

They were raw.

Kat (17:34)
Paul Hollywood was not happy.

Tiffany (17:37)
No, definitely

would not have even eaten them probably. But I was so mad because they were delicious. Like the ones that were cooked were so good. But then in the middle, they were just like sunken and raw. I was like, damn it.

Kat (17:41)
Yeah.

Was it like your oven maybe? Probably.

Tiffany (17:52)
I think I just didn't cook them long enough. don't know. But I could try it again. I don't know. Fool me once, you know? ⁓

Kat (17:59)
That's Well, I think

that would be a suggestion is if you're don't try new recipes. If you.

Tiffany (18:06)
Yes, actually, because in the next

year I did a new recipe also and it was not good. was like roasted, roasted vegetable, roasted root vegetables. And there was something about the sauce that the recipe had on top that was just not good. So.

Kat (18:10)
Hahaha

Yeah.

⁓ bummer.

Thanksgiving is the time for the tried and trues. Because if it's not tasty, you're not going to eat it.

Tiffany (18:26)
Yeah.

Yeah, I think you're right.

Yes, exactly. Yeah. So I will probably if I whatever I bring, I'll probably bring cranberry sauce this year because I've done it before and it's easy. OK. So whatever waste you do have, like skins or carrot tops or whatever. A couple options. A lot of people say you can just like bag those up, freeze them.

Kat (18:40)
because you know.

Tiffany (18:59)
and ⁓ use them in soup so you can make veggie broth out of them. I have never managed to actually do that before anything, before it all turned freezer burnt to shit, but this is a nice idea. This is like a fantasy life, fantasy version.

Kat (19:11)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, I mean,

I yeah, I'll just do it the day after just set up the instant pot or a pot on the stove. Throw it all in there. Maybe salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion, celery, carrots, you know. And in the instant pot, you can set it up to basically make bone broth. Just break it all down and then you strain it and you can freeze it, you know, and you've got soup. You've got stock and broth for, you know.

Tiffany (19:21)
is smart.

Yeah.

Kat (19:46)
whatever you need it for soup or risotto if you fancy, you know.

Tiffany (19:50)
Yeah,

totally. should. Yeah, you're right. Because if you wait, it's never going to happen. Yeah, it's so true. ⁓

Kat (19:56)
Right.

And you're gonna want

stock for the winter, so.

Tiffany (20:02)
Yeah, totally. That just made it sound like we were living in cabins. You need stock? No, you're right. Yes. And I had the same note about using the turkey carcass as like, yeah, for broth or whatever, or even just as soup.

Kat (20:08)
We're gonna want stock for the winter. I mean, that's when you make soups. It's soup season. Maximize soup making time, yeah.

Yeah, I threw that in there too. Yeah.

Yeah, and you can throw

everything in there. Yeah. Because you're going to strain it out. So.

Tiffany (20:27)
Mm-hmm and then straighten it out

All right, maybe I... Hmm. So, okay, so there's that. And then if there's anything that you can't do that with, or if you just don't feel like making broth and nobody volunteers in your family to do it, ⁓ composting is another good option. And, you know, a lot of people don't have a compost bin, but if you do, you can offer, like, be the one to gather the scraps and throw them in your compost bin, like bring over a bin, a little bin, and then...

Kat (20:45)
Yeah.

Tiffany (21:02)
or a little bucket or something. And if you don't have one, can also offer to bring it to the local landfill if they have a composting facility. So just sort of like be the doer and just offer and then other people will be like, sure. I don't care.

Kat (21:11)
Right. Yeah.

Yeah, I would do whatever you want with my trash. Yeah.

Tiffany (21:19)
Yeah,

exactly. Okay, and then now I'm trying to think, like, should we... Let's just take a break because I don't know if we even need one, but it is 21 minutes into it, so... Okay, all right, sweet. Yes.

Kat (21:30)
Yeah, it's almost recipe time.

Yeah, why not take a little break for everyone. I'll eat more pretzels.

Cool.

Tiffany (21:54)
Okay. Sorry. I think it's only like 12, 13 seconds. Yeah. Okay. So plan for leftovers. I have, I actually looked up ⁓ like leftover recipe ideas, but you can also just Google because there are so many out there, but there were some, some, I pulled out some good ones. So.

Kat (21:55)
Now is not enough time to cram enough pretzels in my mouth. Yeah, they're bad.

yeah.

Tiffany (22:24)
One of them was leftover roasted veggie hash. So if you have like a roasted veggie tray that you make, with, I don't know, Brussels sprouts and sweet potatoes or whatever it is, kind of like the one I tried and failed at, but it will be better. Maybe this would make it good. I don't know. You can heat up the veggies in a cast iron skillet and crack an egg over them the next day for breakfast. Delicious. Yeah.

Kat (22:51)
It's a frittata now.

We do that a lot in this house. Yeah.

Tiffany (22:56)
you do? That's really smart.

Kat (22:58)
Leftovers with eggs. Sean just keeps a thing of rice at all times. And so we just make like a fried rice. Yeah. But he'll eat anything with an egg on it.

Tiffany (23:04)
Oh yeah, yes. Fried rice is so good and so easy.

That's awesome. Yeah, it's put an egg on it. Was that, was that Portlandia that was put a bird on it? But yeah, but I was going to say the same, same idea though, the same generation for sure. But it is delicious. So you can't argue with that. Um, obviously sandwiches, but, um, I have one, two.

Kat (23:12)
Mm-hmm.

Put a bird on it. Let's see. Put the precursor to a bird on it.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Tiffany (23:34)
ideas for sandwiches actually, but one that I'm totally stealing from the sandwich shop that I used to work at because it was so good. What was it called? I can't remember now. Turkey, Ultimate Turkey, I think it was called.

Kat (23:41)
Mm-hmm.

We always, we just always called ours

Thanksgiving dinner. That was the name of the sandwich. Yeah.

Tiffany (23:55)
there you go.

that's funny. Yeah, this was ⁓ specifically this, but you can use a lot of different things. But this was baguette with cranberry sauce, cream cheese, ⁓ lettuce and tomato. And then they used Chipotle mayo, but it sounds weird, but it worked really well. OK, yeah, it was so good. I think you can actually just make that. I don't know what.

Kat (24:11)
yeah.

Ooh. No, that sounds amazing. Yeah.

Tiffany (24:24)
exactly what you'd put in it, but I don't think it'd be hard. ⁓ And then turkey, so yeah. I'm like, my mouth is watering.

Kat (24:32)
You can even, I mean, we always would just, I know,

we would always just make like a sandwich with just the leftovers from Thanksgiving. So it would be like, like didn't even add mayo or anything. It would be like a cranberry sauce, turkey stuffing gravy sandwich, you know, on a dinner roll or whatever. Yeah.

Tiffany (24:40)
Yeah.

That's basically it.

Nice. Yes. Yes.

Yeah, you can't go wrong. There's also, found this, I know of this really, really good turkey salad. It can be chicken too, but chicken salad, whatever. Sandwiches. Recipe. And it's got like grapes and pecans and apples. So it's very crunchy and very sweet, but it is so good. So, so good.

Kat (25:08)
Yeah.

Ugh.

Because usually

Thanksgiving turkey can get kind of dry, but also it's typically really salty. yeah, so balancing it out with those crunchy sweet elements is really nice. Yeah.

Tiffany (25:22)
Yes. Yes.

Yeah,

and that was from Add A Pinch. ⁓ that recipe is in the show notes. Some other ideas I found. Turkey Shepherd's Pie, where you'll use the, if you have leftover mashed potatoes, ⁓ then you can use those on top or just make new. I I feel like you're gonna have to fill in some places, but.

Kat (25:42)
yum.

Yeah,

you know, it's funny, my best friend growing up, her grandma, apparently when in the 50s and 60s when she was raising my best friend's mom, she would, she would keep all of the food they didn't eat from the week in a milk carton, like a, you know, ⁓ cardboard milk carton. And then at the end of the week on Friday, she would

dump it all in like a nine by 13 pan, smooth it all out and cover it in mashed potatoes and serve quote unquote shepherd's pie. Yeah. And I was like, well, I mean, if you were doing meal planning and everything fit together for the week, but I imagine like,

Tiffany (26:29)
That is so interesting.

Yeah, or if like a lot

of the food that you make is very similar in in flavor. But if you have like.

Kat (26:41)
Yeah. But meatloaf and tacos and pasta.

Yeah, it wasn't, she wasn't known for her cooking necessarily, I think was the, but it like, it's a, that's a thing you could do. Yeah. You know, like you can make, top anything with mashed potatoes. Ta-da, shepherd's pie.

Tiffany (26:53)
I do love the, I love it. Yeah.

Yes,

totally. I love the A for effort for sure. Yeah, maybe not for the children, but.

Kat (27:06)
Yes, yeah, yeah. Oh, it always

makes me feel like, okay, I'm an okay cook. I know how flavors go together. I'm all right. I'm fine.

Tiffany (27:13)
Right.

Yes. Another one that sounds really good was cranberry sauce grilled cheese. like they said brie or cheddar, but if you have whatever cheese, I feel like Havarti would be really good. But just cranberry sauce with ⁓ grilled cheese, like yum. That sounds amazing.

Kat (27:23)
Yes.

Yeah.

on grilled cheese. Yeah. Just

a sweet element on it. mean, I, yeah. The cranberry sauce with cream cheese on a sandwich is like, it's killer. Yeah.

Tiffany (27:49)
It's a game changer.

Kat (27:49)
because it's tart and sweet

and then he got the cream. Yeah, it's really, yeah, I'm a fan.

Tiffany (27:53)
Uh huh. Yes.

Yeah, I think if I make the cranberry sauce, I'm going make like, go against everything I just said and make like a four times portion so I can have like double for myself. Because I want to do all of these things. They sound so good.

Kat (28:02)
You're like, dee dee dee. Yeah.

Tiffany (28:13)
Yeah, I mean, like we said, you can make turkey stock or bone broth ⁓ easy. I had like a little recipe, but it's easy. another interesting thing. You can actually turn leftover wine, like if you have half a bottle of wine that nobody's drinking, into vinegar. I know.

Kat (28:28)
That's awesome. And then

just kind of have it for, yeah, for cooking with.

Tiffany (28:32)
Yeah, yes,

like white wine vinegar or red wine vinegar. You buy them.

Kat (28:36)
You can

yeah, can make like vinaigrette out of them.

Tiffany (28:42)
Yeah. And all you have to do, what?

Kat (28:44)
I've yeah

I was gonna say I've never known a half bottle of wine in this house but I could happen it could happen

Tiffany (28:50)
I know, that's the other thing. You never know. Yeah,

yeah, yeah. But yeah, all you have to do is add a little bit of apple cider vinegar, the kind that has the mother in it, which the fancy brands do. And then you let it set for like two weeks. And then it's vinegar. And you can...

Kat (29:03)
Gotcha.

Wow.

Tiffany (29:13)
keep adding to it. like if you ever have a little splash sploosh of wine, you can add it to it and within a couple of days it turns to vinegar. So it's sort of like sourdough, but

Kat (29:20)
I might just start... yeah,

I might start just doing that every time somebody brings over a bottle of 19 crimes or the Snoop Dogg wine. Yeah. I'm like, this... thank you for my vinegar, honey. We're not drinking this. It's too sugary.

Tiffany (29:26)
There you go. You should.

Exactly. I don't think

I've tried 19 crimes. Is it really sure? ⁓ gross. OK.

Kat (29:38)
There's like higher end bottles of it, but it's so sweet. It's

just, you know, I mean, it's gas station wine, which 20 years ago, I would have like, thank you. And now I'm like, get it off my lawn. Yeah. That is a headache in a bottle for me. Yeah. Yeah. None of that 19 crimes in my backyard or yellow tail. I don't even know if they sell yellow tail anymore.

Tiffany (29:45)
Yeah.

Yeah.

NIMBY not in my backyard yeah

They do, yeah. I've seen it. I haven't tasted it in like 100 years, but yeah. That's for the 10 year olds.

Kat (30:05)
That's for children. Yeah.

⁓

god, no, okay. We don't recommend feeding your children alcohol and we would never do it, but...

Tiffany (30:15)
No.

No.

Kat (30:18)
22 year olds are buying these wines, which is fine. You gotta learn.

Tiffany (30:20)
Yes. Yeah, or

realistically, people are buying them for 19 year olds, but yeah. No, just people. ⁓ and then Kat, what have you made?

Kat (30:25)
Not us though, not us. We're not that kind of podcast.

well, I was just thinking, look for stuff you have in your house already. So one of the things that for some reason I have, and I never eat is like saltine crackers.

Tiffany (30:45)
Yeah.

Kat (30:46)
So we make a casserole in my family with like yellow squash or zucchini squash. You cut it into rounds, just, you know, quarter inch thick slices chop up an onion, ⁓ know, dice an onion and do like a layer of squash.

We use green chili, but you don't have to. Green chili is delicious, but like a jar of green chili. ⁓ So layer of squash, layer of ⁓ onion, layer of cheddar cheese, like shredded cheddar. Cover that with crumbled saltines and then do that again and make like a squash casserole. And then you use your saltines before they go rancid, which is nice.

Tiffany (31:09)
Mm-hmm.

Interesting.

Kat (31:34)
I don't eat them. I'll buy them for something and yeah. Yeah like in a chicken soup or like a chili and then you like don't eat them so yeah but make sure they're not rancid before you make the casserole because I definitely brought that to a Thanksgiving potluck once and every I was like why did nobody eat my casserole and it was because the something was off but anyway

Tiffany (31:34)
That is awesome. No, know they're so good when you're sick and then they're so not good.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. ⁓

⁓ no.

⁓

no, that's a bummer. Wait, I feel like oyster crackers are the solution to that because those are good to just munch on and they also are the same thing basically.

Kat (32:04)
So yeah, but you can, know, whatever crackers you have, even chips, you could throw them into a casserole to add a little crunch and like soak up some of the juice, you know? ⁓ there's all like, if you already have, obviously like most of us don't have a bag of cranberries just lying around. So you, you know, but like use the stuff you have.

Tiffany (32:10)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

I know. They can be hard to

Kat (32:25)
I love making fresh cranberry sauce but I'm also a sucker for the canned stuff

Tiffany (32:29)
I know, it's true actually. Yes. Yeah, and actually that is delicious on a sandwich too.

Kat (32:30)
I love when it comes out in the loaf and you know.

Yes, I mean, that's because it's

already pre-sliced, you know, pre- don't have to like corral it. It's already just in a- so no judgment there. ⁓ I have- I have my mother's stuffing recipe. I brought it up from my email. So you can buy stuffing mixes and they're perfectly fine. But it actually doesn't take much more work to like just make it from scratch. I mean, it's a little more work to do the baking and stuff. She- she's like, bake a can of cornbread.

Tiffany (32:42)
Yes. Yeah, totally.

nice.

Kat (33:05)
read it off the side of the cornmeal container. Like I have cornmeal. I can make cornbread. It's like a little bit of milk, an egg, you know. She says leave out the sugar. That's the only thing. And then you, or you could buy cornbread cubes from the store. And then she used a pound of breakfast sausage, but you don't have to. And then.

Tiffany (33:09)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Okay.

Kat (33:32)
One onion chopped, three to four ribs of celery sliced, and two to three Granny Smith apples peeled and sliced. Cube up the cornbread and then add the sausage and the veg and apple mix, or just the veg and apple mix if you don't make the sausage, and then toss to mix it up. And then use poultry seasoning.

And then add two cans of chicken broth or a box, heat it up, pour it over the, and then bake it. ⁓ and yeah.

Tiffany (33:58)
Huh. I've never heard of cornbread. I hate stuffing,

but I love cornbread. I might like this.

Kat (34:04)
Cornbread stuffing.

love stuffing. So that's always our favorite cornbread stuffing. And it's not, it's not really that hard to make. And like this stuff's so much better. It's you bake it at 350 to crusty up the top 20 to 30 minutes. You just crusty up the top. My mom said, yeah. So she had a whole thing in here. Like, uh, fry about one pound of breakfast sausage links in a little olive oil. Be careful not to buy maple sausage links. Cool.

Tiffany (34:11)
Yeah.

Kat (34:35)
she didn't mean cool like cool. She meant cool them down and then cut them into about three pieces. I'm like, my mom just wrote cool in the thing. No, she didn't. But yeah, she says like with the poultry seasoning, I cover the top of the stuff in the bowl and toss it to mix and taste it and cover the top again and toss it around and taste it and do this until you can taste the poultry seasoning. So not even measure. I get carried away, but we seem to like poultry season, maybe three tablespoons quite a lot, you know, like, yeah. So, you know, it's

Tiffany (34:37)
Cool them off, yeah.

Okay. Okay.

I love that she wrote that, that's awesome.

Hmm, that's

interesting. I might try it. Yeah. I do, yeah.

Kat (35:04)
It's a little more work instead of doing it. I'll send you the recipe. I'll just forward that to you. Yeah.

A little bit more work maybe than, but like we forget that like from scratch wasn't actually that much more work. Yeah. Like making a cake.

Tiffany (35:19)
Really not.

Kat (35:25)
without a box is just a little bit more measuring, you know? Yeah, it's like cake flour and yeah, yeah. But a basic, like I made bread the other day. I got a bee in my bonnet. I'm like, I've got a Dutch oven. It wasn't sourdough. It was just yeast, sugar, salt, water, flour. Let it rest, know, knead it, shape it a little and throw it in the Dutch oven. And I was like, this is awesome. I made white sandwich bread, basically.

Tiffany (35:28)
Yeah, it's like two other things that you measure. Depends on the cake, of course, but...

Mm-hmm.

Kat (35:54)
you know, and it wasn't that much more work. And it was, it was much cheaper, you know.

Tiffany (35:55)
Yes. Yeah, it's so fun. No, it's crazy. It is so crazy. Yeah. I actually ⁓

made the other day homemade cinnamon rolls because I was thinking like, ugh, I have a recipe that takes 48 hours and they're delicious and they're amazing. like, that's a once a year thing. But yeah, but I found this recipe that

Kat (36:19)
Yeah, that's Christmas. Yeah.

Tiffany (36:24)
said that it took about 30, 45 minutes and no, maybe an hour, an hour total, ⁓ but only 15 minutes rise and they were delicious. And it was actually so easy. And I'm like, I'm going to totally do this again.

Kat (36:38)
Yeah.

Yeah, it like, I mean, if you've got the time off on Thanksgiving to bake and stuff, like I might try. We always have orange, Pillsbury, cinnamon rolls on holidays. So maybe I'll.

Tiffany (36:52)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, but

those are so weak compared to homemade. The grand ones are okay. Just okay.

Kat (36:57)
Yeah, mean they have a yeah, but like, yeah, it's just

a flavor that we're eating, but like I can, how hard can that be? You know?

Tiffany (37:06)
Yeah,

I mean, you could just add orange zest and maybe some orange juice to the frosting. Yeah.

Kat (37:08)
Basically. OK. Maybe I sound,

yeah. But yeah, like, I could probably make that. And we've just kind of been told that like, cooking is so hard. And so that we'll buy these processed prepackaged things that actually it's 10 minutes longer maybe sometimes to do it yourself.

Tiffany (37:22)
Yes.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

We need the convenience.

Kat (37:34)
Yeah, okay, that sausage or that stuffing recipe maybe isn't 10 minutes longer because you got to bake the cornbread but like.

Tiffany (37:40)
Yeah, but I mean if you're gonna be making stuffing anyway then you know you're yeah I think I want to try that because I love cornbread and I hate stuffing but I think I would like that and I love sausage so

Kat (37:43)
Yeah, it's not impossible. Yeah.

Okay, I'm gonna forward

it to you right now before I lose it again into my inbox of doom.

Tiffany (37:54)
Yeah.

Yeah, that sounds delicious. Cool.

Kat (38:01)
Yeah,

so I yeah, there's all kinds of I love I love hosting Thanksgiving and I love whoops, that's not how you spell Gmail. I love hosting and I love cooking and all those things and you know.

Tiffany (38:18)
I like the planning part, which is weird. I find that fun. Yeah, it's kind of like this anticipatory, like, ooh, this is fun.

Kat (38:21)
I don't think that's weird. Yeah.

I like juggling the

oven and like, what do I have to cook the night before? Like you got to do the pumpkin pie. The pumpkin pie is freaking easy too. No, from a can. Ooh, maybe this year I'll try it from a real pumpkin, but.

Tiffany (38:30)
Yeah. From a pumpkin or from a can of pumpkin. Okay. I don't

think that's that hard. I think you just roast it and then probably, yeah.

Kat (38:41)
You roast and puree it.

Yeah. The hardest part is probably slaughtering the pumpkin, but getting all the seeds out. Yeah. Yeah. It's a thing. Yeah. It might taste terrible. Although the seeds are good.

Tiffany (38:45)
Yeah, but the little baking pumpkins are pretty small, so.

Yeah, don't use a regular pumpkin.

Yeah, I don't think they're

edible, but yeah, ⁓ I tried to roast the seeds out of our pumpkin this year and ⁓ I... What happened? we had to put our dog down in the middle of it. So, yeah, so they sat on the counter for like a week and I was like, these are no good. These are going in the trash. I was like, that's sad. But however, there's just no way. Yeah, we did not have the bandwidth, so.

Kat (39:06)
I always burn mine.

⁓ that's why. Okay, well never mind then.

throw them in the yard and plant them. Yeah. You know, sometimes you got to give yourself some grace. Yeah.

Yeah, there's nothing wrong with Thanksgiving from a can either. Also, they sell, like when I was in college, they sell little just turkey breasts. So you don't have to buy the entire turkey. You can get just a little four pound turkey breast for you and your roommate or whatever and enjoy it. know, like.

Tiffany (39:36)
Yeah, you're right. Yeah.

Yeah.

Kat (39:47)
There's all kinds of solutions out there. You don't even have to eat turkey, you know.

Tiffany (39:50)
Right. Some people, if they're like vegetarian, they roast a head of cauliflower in place of the turkey, which can be so good. So throw some cheese on it. Golden. I said vegetarian. Daya cheese, soy cheese. Yum.

Kat (39:55)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

That's not vegan, but yeah. Yes, you're right. right.

Yeah, there's all kinds of... there's... die. Yeah.

nutritional yeast, that's the substitute. Yeah. Yeah.

Tiffany (40:17)
Yeah, which is also pretty good.

Cool. Well, that was all that I had.

Kat (40:23)
Yeah, that's perfect. We're at 40 minutes.

This is our last episode of the season. We are gonna try to return and we're gonna take the holidays off. But ⁓ we might have a Patreon episode or two for you, but ⁓ we will return for January, hopefully, if all things go according to plan.

Tiffany (40:28)
I know.

Mm-hmm.

Yes, we have a rough plan. So yes, that sounds good. Yeah, we are. Cool. All right, well, we will have a happy holiday. Wishing everyone a happy holiday. And. ⁓

Kat (40:46)
Yeah.

We're good planners, we'll figure it out.

Yeah, happy holiday. Yeah.

easy and

Tiffany (41:04)
Yeah, stress free, low key. Don't travel if you don't feel like you want to. Say no to your family. That's what I'm doing. No offense to my family, but I'm not doing it. I'm not doing it. Yep. Just take it easy. It's okay. All right. Well, I will talk to you soon. Thank you. Bye.

Kat (41:05)
Yeah, I hope.

Yep. Yeah, good. No, totally fair. Yep, not this year.

Yep. Yep.

Thanks Tiffany. Thanks listeners. Talk to you soon.