HI,

Last year for New Year's, I bought something like seven pounds of King Crab Legs. However, I was not willing to pay 3X to recreate this meal this year. I have standards somewhat.

I guess I went polar opposite in cost for New Year's Eve: tuna noodle casserole and Captain Nancy's corn pudding. My sister had never had tuna noodle casserole, so what the heck. What I really had planned was shrimp, but was distracted by other stuff.

New Year's Day was really more like a holiday meal than any we have had recently. The big difference was having a guest and lingering at the table just chatting away.

Not that I really believe in lucky food, I did make a black eyed pea salad made with leftover Christmas ham, celery, red onion slivers, Balsamic vinegar and olive oil. I made a small enough quantity to finish it in one swoop.

I made popovers with an onion gravy using turkey stock made from a past Thanksgiving turkey carcass. I served it as an appetizer instead with the rest of the meal after reading it is often served in the UK as a separate course. This solved a ticklish problem when one has one oven: popovers need 15 minutes at 450 degrees F and a reverse sear roast needs 500-550 degrees F for 5-10 minutes or so. Doing popovers followed by the roast was so much easier to time manage.

Main course was a seven-pound rib roast, which had been salted and air-drying since Christmas. I got up at 6:55 AM to get it into oven just after 7:00 AM at 200 degrees F. When I checked it for temperature around 11:00 AM, it was cooking faster than intended so I pushed it back to 175 degrees F. I finally pulled it just around noon. Let it rest on the back burners with tented foil. I needed to finish the onion gravy. I did not start the popovers until everyone arrived.

Black eyed pea salad went to the table first to appease some people. The popovers were served next with the onion gravy. Just as I sat down the temperature alarm beeped and the roast went it for a searing good time. My sister happened to finished her popover first, so she had the honors to mash the potatoes.

Once the roast was finished, it came to the table along with corn pudding (I split this recipe into two 8x8 pans for two meals), pomegranate cranberry sauce and some other condiments. Totally forgot to make horseradish sauce, though nobody seemed to notice it was missing.

I cut the bones off to give to my Dad. I have removed them in the past and tied them back on. I thought about doing it the day before and didn't. It was so easy to cut off those bones, I am certain I would have spent more time detaching and tying back. Cutting them off at the table was less time. I go back and forth on this detail.

I was worried I went a little gungho on salt, so I warned people. Only one person found his last bite to be a bit salty. I think when it was meat, it absorbed the salt. The fat cap sat on top and did not go far. I did cut some off to render fat drippings for the popovers, which I thought was salty.

Dessert was all the leftover cakes and sweets from Christmas.

Family was disappointed I never did the Japanese-style KFC meal, so it will come to be next Christmas Eve. Always have to have something to look forward to. Now I can say it was by their request. Win!

Happy New Year!

CAthy2

YUM. Jeez all we did this year was make our own sushi rolls and poke bowls, standing around the kitchen counter.