Yummy~issimo! Thanksgiving with Shayne Graham and The Bengals

In case you haven't noticed, I haven't written in a while. The last couple of months have been so crazy that I didn't want to drag you into the Yummy! frenzy that is my life.

It has been nonstop cooking since I can remember. I got it into my pea brain that this year I was going to bake for Thanksgiving. I hate, hate, hate to bake and typically leave desserts to somebody else. Anybody else. And, as if that wasn't bad enough, I decided I'd make all homemade pastry for said pies. YIKES! I evidently had visited Bacchus a bit too much when I had that crazy idea.

Did I mention that I needed 19 pies for Thanksgiving?

Yep. 19.

After I got through all the client orders for Thanksgiving, I only had half of Wednesday left to prepare for my Thanksgiving dinner at Shayne Graham's beautiful house. I really needed about 3 days!

But I absolutely could not disappoint my Bengal buddies. Imagine feeding a bunch of 6'5" 350 pound men. I didn't think it was possible for any human to eat as much food as they did.

I cooked 2 ~ 24# turkeys, made 8 loaves of homemade cornbread so that I could make 15# of cornbread dressing, 2 different potato dishes, gravy and 11 sides.

And pies. Don't forget the freaking pies!

The first person through the door was my buddy, Frostee Rucker. Limping a little. But with the biggest smile and an even bigger heart, he's one of the nicest people you'll ever want to meet. Except possibly for Jason Shirley. I hadn't had the pleasure of meeting Jason yet until dinner but he's right up there in the "Super Nice Person" category along with Shayne and Frostee.

I got through Thanksgiving with only one minor hiccup. Moving a big stack of heavy, dirty plates wasn't one of my better ideas. Actually it belongs in the same category as making all those pies.

Yep. Dropped the dishes. Broke the dishes. Had a huge mess all over the gorgeous wood floor and cabinets. Food, broken dish shards and silverware for as far as you could see.

Sigh.

But. The pies were awesome. Flaky crust. Fluffy spiced pumpkin with rum. Crunch pecan with bourbon. Peanut butter and banana with no alcohol. More pie flavors than I can remember.

But I sure was glad to get home to visit with Bacchus.