Holiday eats galore

On the menu for Thursday at La Casa de Oropeza y Chihak:

Ten-pound turkey, roasted
Cranberry chutney (see Chef Dan Fluharty's recipe) (photo shows chutney ready to be cooked)
Butternut squash, poached
Potatoes, mashed with roasted garlic
Dressing, my many-years-in-the-development secret* recipe
Dessert: Daughter Ann Chihak Poff providing a home-made apple crisp, after her mother-in-law's recipe

Prep work Wednesday night will include the dressing and cranberry chutney. Cook time on the turkey is expected to be two to 2 1/2 hours.

More details later.

* Dressing secret: Use fresh herbs, not dried, and put them in halfway through the baking.

Culinary school Chef's holiday gift: cranberry chutney

Chef Dan Fluharty had been threatening to dispatch his about-to-be-world-famous cranberry chutney recipe to us in time for Thanksgiving Day. Today, he came through, and by Tuesday, we should be able to bring home some of the delicious-looking concoction.

He offered it only to the "elite few" in his Culinary Foundations II afternoon class. But he revealed the recipe, and I pass it along here. This is for a large quantity, so reduce by half if you have a small group. Or, keep it at this size and store in small batches for future use; it can last for months in the fridge.

               Chef Dan's Cranberry Chutney
2 12-ounce bags of cranberries
1 12-ounce can of frozen orange juice concentrate
12 ounces of raisins
12 ounces of sugar
2 ounces of grated fresh ginger
2 medium apples, cored and chopped
6 ounces water
1/2 orange, including peel and white pulp
Pinch of ground cloves or 1 cinnamon stick
Pinch of cayenne

Cover the orange in water in a sauce pot to simmer 15 minutes. Strain off water, purée the orange. Combine it and all other ingredients in a sauce pot or stock pot and simmer until the cranberries pop, about 15 minutes. Refrigerate for at least 24 hours before serving to allow flavors to combine. Can be served with turkey, chicken, beef, pork, lamb. Adding a pinch of salt before cooking will tame the flavors.

Jump-starting your carry-to-work lunch

This weekly menu from Epicurious reminded me of a little tasty trick I started this week with lunch sandwiches: a smear of chutney, instead of mustard, on the bread or the wrap. Yum!

My wife, Hilda Oropeza, came up with the idea, saying that while she liked the turkey and cheese sandwiches I was making for her, she wanted a little twist on them. She showed it with a bit of cranberry chutney on a lunch wrap over the weekend. Two kinds of chutney -- mango and cranberry -- now grace the condiment shelf in the fridge.

Will use the jarred chutney until I can make my own using fresh ingredients. Stay tuned.

(Photo credit: www.sweatyguineapig.com)