Happy Thanksgiving! Turkey Toes, Pumpkin Cheesecake, Turkey Roasting and More

Happy Thanksgiving dear readers!
Today I have a plethora of topics upon which to write. Before I impart all of my wisdom and knowledge, and ceaseless humility, I want to thank you all for being such a wonderful addition to my life this year. I was lonely and lost when I started this blog and you have all made it such a fruitful and worthwhile endeavor. Thank you for your kind and encouraging words.
Onto our first topic today. My feet. This year I will be working my butt off from Thanksgiving throughout the weekend. Black Friday I will be working two eight to nine hours shifts on the same day and I won’t have a lot of time to take pictures and post anything until after that following week, so I have had to plan in advance. The first thing I did to celebrate the coming of Thanksgiving is to paint my little toes. I did a clear base coat and then polished every other toe with either my Sinful Colors Cloud 9 or my LA Colors Wave Length. Once they had dried I took out my trusty old black Sally Hansen Nail Art Pen and drew a turkey on to each big toe. I started by making a big circle that was to be the body. I then drew two sticks for the leg and a stick for the neck. I added an oblong circle to the top of the neck stick and then added its waddle. Finally I drew a fan shaped group of lines onto the turkey butt to resemble their feathers. Pretty simple and it may look a bit juvenile, but I don’t care. I like my little turkey toes.

Next it is onto the food prep for Thanksgiving. I like to do a salt, pepper and baking powder rub onto my turkey 24 hours in advance of putting it in the oven. This is supposed to help to crisp up the skin of the turkey. I am making a 13 pounder so I used 2 1/2 Tbsps of Kosher salt, 2 1/2 tsp. of baking powder and 2 1/4 tsp. of ground black pepper. I took the turkey out of its bag and removed the giblets, which I will use to make stock to baste my turkey and add to my stuffing. I then rinsed and dried my fat friend and then gave him a good rub down with the salt,powder,pepper mix. I very loosely covered him and set him in the fridge on a baking sheet overnight.
Once my turkey was prepped I moved on to stock making time.

I added my giblets, minus liver to six cups of water and brought that to a boil. I then set it to low and added a carrot, two celery stalks, a shallot and three crushed cloves of garlic. I halved the shallot and I broke the carrot and celery up into chunks. I let this simmer for an hour then added the liver and simmered on very low for a half an hour. I then removed from heat and strained, reserving the cooked giblet and liver for stuffing later, if I decide to use them at all.
Once this was done I moved on to my Pumpkin Cheesecake bites. Last year I made a Pumpkin cheesecake for Christmas and it was wonderful. The only problem was that I ate a slice of it every night after dinner. This year I want to be able to feed the beast inside my belly, but not over-indulge in a slice of cheesecake every night. My solution to this is to make mini cheesecake bites. This way I can have one or two mini-bites to satisfy my craving and stop there. I plan on taking whatever I don’t need into work with me to help boost morale.
This is based on two recipes. The first is the Double Layer Pumpkin Cheesecake recipe from Allrecipes.com and the second is a white chocolate cheesecake recipe that I used to make my 4th of July cheesecake.
Here is the recipe:

2 C. Graham Cracker crumbs
1/2 C. Butter (Melted)
1 C. White Chocolate Chips
1/4 C. Heavy Cream or Half and Half
1/2 C. – 3/4 C. Sugar
3 eggs
3, 8oz. packages of cream cheese softened
1 tsp. Vanilla Extract
1 can pumpkin puree
1/2 tsp. Cinnamon
pinch of ground cloves
pinch of ground nutmeg
pinch of allspice
pinch of ground ginger
Preheat your oven to 325 degrees
In a double boiler melt the white chocolate chips and cream or half and half over medium heat.

Cream the cream cheese and sugar until smooth.

Add in the eggs, 1 at a time, blending well for each egg. Add in the vanilla extract, blend well and set aside at least 2 cups of batter for white chocolate layer.

Add the melted and cooler white chocolate to the reserve bowl and fold to blend.

In the main bowl add your pumpkin puree and spices and blend well.

Line your paper liners into your cupcake or mini muffin tins. Blend your melted butter into your graham cracker crumbs with a fork. Add a layer of your crust to the bottom of each liner and press into the bottom of the pan to secure.

Begin your cheesecake layers with your white chocolate batter.

Follow along with your pumpkin batter.

If you want to go all out finish your cheesecakes with another layer of white chocolate batter and then bake in a hot water bath.

For mini-cakes bake for 15 minutes and for muffin size 25 minutes. Allow your cakes to cool completely and then refrigerate for eight hours or overnight.

These cheesecakes are so delicious and because you can make them into individual sizes or bite sizes you have a bit more flexibility on how to serve them.

Okay so all I have left to do is make the chestnut stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce and assorted vegetables. Luckily once I put the turkey in the oven I have about five hours to relax before I have to start any of these things. Well, except the stuffing, but that goes in the turkey.

So one final thing. I will be holding an ornament exchange through my blog. If you are interested in doing this then please let me know. You can go to my Facebook page and PM me and I will set you up with someone else who wants to exchange. I am thinking it would be nice if you could send an ornament that means something to you personally or maybe showcases something about your area or this nation.
Happy Thanksgiving Everyone! Thanks for reading!