(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Ho, Ho, Ho..., a Colorado State Open Thread, 11/27/2023 [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2023-11-27 The Colorado State Open Thread is headed into the home stretch of the year, where food, festivities and holidays are on peoples’ minds. Well, those who have Maslow’s hierarchy taken care of so that food, warmth shelter and space are accounted for. Thankfully, I do have those needs taken care of, and I hope the same goes for every Kosack out there reading this. This last week has been very busy. I opened up my house for Thursday’s Gluttonalia; I issued an invitation for people who wanted to share company on Thanksgiving to come to my house since I was planning on making the feast with the usual trimmings and I was hoping to get some folks to come help spare me some of the large amounts of leftovers. I wound up having five people come over and the menu consisted of: Beer can turkey (a 14 pound butterball with a locally brewed “Rock Cut brewery Campfire brown ale” which had a smoky consistency to it bubbling up through the middle) Dressing (not called stuffing since it wasn’t stuffed into the bird) Roasted root vegetables (carrots and beets, roasted in the pan juices below the turkey) Candied canned yams with marshmallows toasted on top Fresh green beans (brought by a guest) Mashed new potatoes Brandied cranberry sauce Turkey gravy Homemade Dutch apple pie Two(!) pumpkin pies brought by two different guests There were some unplanned moments to the dinner that didn’t lead itself to the perfect evening, but all-in-all my guests said they really enjoyed the meal and I was very happy for the suggestion by Kosak “scrambolero” in my beer can chicken diary www.dailykos.com/… where they said they make beer can turkey and that sounded worth trying. This turkey was brined overnight which did a fine job of helping moisten the whole bird. There is beer in the central cone of this pan. You may notice, if you look at the other diary, how the turkey is much taller than the chicken. This was bumping the roof of the smoker. Top — apple pie. Right — Brandied Cranberry sauce. Left — pan where stood the cone to put the turkey, the beer and the root vegetables The turkey, with a nice smoke on it but no char anywhere. It came out delicious. Snow started Thanksgiving afternoon but fortunately we didn’t get the forecasted amount. We were expecting 10-15 inches or so on the east side of Rocky Mountain National Park, but instead my house received a little bit of ice and then about five inches of the white stuff. Nobody had any problems getting to the house. The next day, Friday, the snow finished around early afternoon and then the temperature plunged down into the single digits. One of my friends who had come up from Longmont for dinner and then stayed over to see the Christmas parade through downtown decided to leave early because it was going to be very cold and parking downtown was going to be tough because of all the construction. She wasn’t the only one to skip the parade. I had some friends tell me they streamed it and I noticed that there were far fewer people lining Elkhorn street than there were last year when they had about 20,000 people come out. This year, my guess would be about 10,000, if that. We had a new Mrs. Claus this year. She had been Mrs. Claus for a “Toys for Tots” event last year, but this was her first time being up on the float with me. I had two pairs of gloves and she had some of the pocket hand-warmers which tried to help me stay warm, but the whole combination still couldn’t keep my fingertips from freezing. I’m not sure just what the temperature was, but we started out without wind and it was probably about 10 degrees. By the end of the parade, the truck pulling the float had sped up and the temperature, with the windchill, was probably around zero. As I rolled along as Santa, I not only wished people a “Merry Christmas” but I also thanked them for coming out and I invited them to go get something warm. After the parade, I went over to one of my elves’ house where I met her family, children and her grandchildren including the cutie at the top. I hope I can get some more pictures as she grows up every year. Sorry I wound up a bit behind tonight. I got caught looking at cyberMonday sales for warm gloves, boots and coats. I’ve got good stuff and I don’t go out often, but Dam(n) that was cold and I couldn’t go inside and get warm! Well, the floor is yours… Have a good holy day season, no matter your flavor of choice. 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