{"id":39103,"date":"2014-12-24T23:24:52","date_gmt":"2014-12-25T04:24:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/horizonsmagazine.com\/blog\/?p=39103"},"modified":"2014-12-25T16:05:50","modified_gmt":"2014-12-25T21:05:50","slug":"christmas-eve","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/horizonsmagazine.com\/blog\/christmas-eve\/","title":{"rendered":"Christmas Eve"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"woman<\/a>I love Christmas Eve. I don’t celebrate commercially but Dec. 24th marks the beginning of a week off for me.\u00a0 I always cook on Christmas Day and prep for it on Christmas Eve.\u00a0 But first, I began the day by labelling the January Horizons subscriptions and got them to the post office as they opened. \u00a0 Next door,\u00a0 I got my five gallon jugs for the water cooler refilled at The Waterman.\u00a0 We took a drive to the beach and ended up at the dog beach so we checked out the pooches.\u00a0 It was a beautiful sunny day.\u00a0 I drove up the coast and took the scenic South Tropical Trail route back. I love driving in the sunshine.\u00a0 I felt on a roll getting things done, so we stopped at K & C Oriental Market for keffir lime leaves, lemongrass, fresh ginger, galangal, red peppers and chuka soba. We’re stocked up and ready to hunker down until holiday madness subsides.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/p>\n

I went home and began making a fruit chutney<\/a> to go with the turkey tomorrow. \u00a0It’s amazing how I can boil fruits in white vinegar and get such a sweet flavor. I added some fresh cranberries and apple, roasted onion and grape tomatoes, chopped dried apricots, raisins, dates, a fresh orange, crushed mustard seed, chili garlic paste and sriracha. It was just the right combination of sweet and sour with a hot bite at the end.\u00a0 This chutney is what I use in place of cranberry sauce for holiday dinners, also to replace fruit jam.\u00a0 Tasting it after it had sat in the fridge all day, I realize I went heavy on the sriracha, so I’m glad I forgot the ginger.<\/p>\n

In the evening, I prepared my turkey breast for tomorrow.\u00a0 I first made a mixture of 2 tablespoons of flour, two tablespoons each of fresh chopped rosemary, sage, thyme. One tablespoon each tarragon, onion powder, garlic powder, curry powder. A half teaspoon ground cinnamon and crushed mustard seed, salt and pepper.\u00a0 I mixed it well, then placed 1\/3 of the mixture in a roasting bag and shook it all around to coat the bag.\u00a0 I cuffed the top of the roasting bag down to make it easy to put my turkey breast in there after I’d seasoned it.<\/p>\n

To the flour and herb mixture, I added 3 tablespoons of olive oil and mixed it into a gooey paste,\u00a0 I put on kitchen gloves and rinsed the bird off and dried it well.\u00a0 I then rubbed it down with the oil and herb mixture and placed it in the cooking bag.\u00a0 It will go in the oven tomorrow for a noon luncheon.<\/p>\n

As I finished up, I saw it was 7pm on Christmas Eve.\u00a0 It feels weird not to be at church but everywhere I am is a holy instant if I treat it as one, right?<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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