Last weekend, there was so much holiday cheer that it’s a wonder Clif and I have recovered from all the fun. Winthrop had its holiday parade, and that’s what today’s post will revolve around. Truly, for a town of 6,000, it was bang-up little parade, and Bailey Public Library was well represented. Liz and Mary Jane marched with our lovely banner, and Richard, the director, and Shane, the adult services librarian, marched as well.

Blue balloons were everywhere on the main street, and at one point, a single blue balloon flew over the white spire of the Congregational Church. The Lions parked their their snack stand on the side of the street, and from it came the delectable smell of French fries and fried dough. The Flaky Tart was doing a very brisk business, and Clif and I each got a treat, a cupcake and a piece of stollen.

Then came the parade, with its homemade floats, the dancing girls, and the marchers passing out candy. One of the marchers—and I didn’t catch whom she was marching for—was throwing wrapped peppermints so zealously that they become something akin to incoming missiles. “Whoa!” I heard a bunch of children yell as they scattered to avoid being hit by the hard candy. Still, it was taken in good cheer, and when the candy had safely landed, the children scrambled for the candy.

Last year at this time, I was just finishing radiation treatment for breast cancer, and while I did some cooking for the holidays, I was too tired to cook as much as I usually do. This year, however, I am back on track, as the saying goes. I feel healthy and strong, and my energy level is pretty much where it was before I had cancer. A wonderful present! How great it feels not to be tired all of the time.

With my energy back, I have all sorts of holiday folderol planned for goodies to make and give. I’ll be starting out with a bang this weekend as I make brownies for our library’s open house; chocolate ice cream to go in an ice cream pie (thank you oh thank you, Bob and Kate, for the ice cream maker!); chocolate-covered pretzels with little sprinkles; and caramel popcorn.

I’ve never done chocolate-covered pretzels, but when my daughter Dee mentioned how much she liked them, I thought, well, why not dip your own? It can’t be much different from dipping peanut butter balls. We shall see later on this afternoon.

I’ve made popcorn balls before, but not caramel popcorn. For some reason, the caramel popcorn sounds more appealing to me. Probably because it doesn’t involve burning your hands as you form the balls.

I make a delicious homemade chocolate ice cream, but I’ve never put it into a crumb pie shell. I bought little peppermint chips to add to the ice cream so that there will be a mint taste along with the chocolate. We’ll be bringing this pie to our friends’ house tomorrow night, and if tastes as good as I think it will, then I’ll be making more pies in the weeks to come. (I’ll also be bringing homemade crackers, which I made yesterday, and a spread.)

I love this holiday cooking, and I love tucking homemade goodies into gift bags for family and friends. Somehow, there is such a feeling of satisfaction to give gifts made by hand.

In between all the cooking and planning, I found time to go on a bike ride this afternoon. After yesterday’s brisk ride, I decided to really bundle up today. I put on leggings and fleece pants as well as a turtle neck, a heavy sweater, and a fleece jacket. All this clothing did the trick. I was much warmer on today’s ride, and the fleece was flexible as I biked.

Today Maranacook Lake was gray—no blue sky reflected in the water. As I pedaled by one section, a flock of ducks skimmed and flapped away from shore, heading to the middle of the lake.

I have no idea how much longer I’ll be able to ride, but even the past two days have been a wonderful reprieve. And who knows? If the snow holds off, maybe I’ll make it to the middle of the month.

Later: The chocolate-covered pretzels were a smashing success. As I suspected, covering the pretzels with chocolate was not at all difficult, and when the chocolate is Ghiradelli, you have yourself a pretty tasty chocolate-covered pretzel. The only really annoying thing was that I burnt the first batch of chocolate by having the water in the double boiler boil too hard and by not stirring the chocolate constantly. With the second batch of chocolate, I was much more careful, and there was no more burnt chocolate.

Somehow, despite the heavy snow in central Maine on Wednesday, everything went just the way it should on Thanksgiving day. Shoveling the wet snow was arduous, but Clif and I got it done without collapsing. We didn’t lose our power, and our daughter Dee made it to Maine from New York with nary a delay.

Thanksgiving Day itself was bright and sunny, and to South Portland (SoPo) we went, to our daughter Shannon and her husband, Mike’s, house where, for the first time, they hosted Thanksgiving dinner. Into our little Honda Fit we packed green bean casserole, pumpkin bread, and frozen gravy, made several days earlier. (I wrote about the gravy in a previous post and wondered if I had made it too thick.) Our dog, Liam, came along as did Mike’s mother, Gail, who added an apple pie and a chocolate cream pie to the bounty going to SoPo.

Shannon and Mike rent an apartment in a lovely old house, and they have the whole first floor, complete with a dining room and China closet. As soon as we walked in, we were met by the wonderful smell of turkey and herbs. The buffet in the kitchen was ready for the food, and the dining room table looked so pretty with its fall place mats and napkins.

I know this is going to fall under the category of braggy old Mom, but Shannon and Mike did a bang-up job of cooking their first Thanksgiving dinner. The turkey was delicious, and ditto for the stuffing. The sweet potato casserole was creamy, and Shannon’s homemade yeast rolls, made ahead of time, frozen, and cooked right before the dinner, were an absolute delight. The cherry on the sundae, so to speak, was when Shannon announced, “90 percent of this dinner is local, and at least half is organic.” Words to make a foodie mother proud.

As for the gravy…it was exactly the right thickness for my husband, Clif, who likes it very thick indeed, and it was not too thick for the rest of us. (The gravy thickened during the freezing process.) For those who would like a thinner gravy, I would suggest 8 tablespoons of fat and 8 tablespoons of flour, rather than 10.  As I wrote in that previous post, this really is an exceptionally good gravy, time consuming but well worth the effort for one (or perhaps even two) special days a year.

As we gathered around the table, we toasted Shannon and Mike and their first Thanksgiving dinner. We also toasted the dedicated volunteers at the Winthrop Food Pantry who braved the extremely slippery roads on Wednesday so that they could open the food pantry for eleven families who were in need of food.

Truly, it was one of those Thanksgivings that will stand out in our memories.

Addendum: Braggy old mom got the numbers wrong. It was 90 percent organic and 50 percent local. Great numbers however you look at it!

The snow has come as predicted, and suddenly it looks like winter. My husband, Clif, and I will have plenty of shoveling to do as we shovel everything by hand. Nature’s gym, as we like to say. The dog will be in snow-dog heaven. He likes nothing better than to leap at the snow as we shovel, and by the evening, even his Sheltie energy will be spent.

So far, we still have power, and we are hoping for the best. But we are prepared. Clif has started a fire in the wood furnace, we have plenty of water set aside, and we bought extra batteries for the portable radio. We’ve even downloaded an audio library book—The 13 1/2 Lives of Captain Bluebear—on Clif’s tablet so that we can listen to it tonight if the power is out. Squinting to read by lantern light has become too arduous for these old eyes. With the audio book, I can listen and knit. Clif and I are thinking that even when there is no threat of a power outage we might start listening to audio books on his tablet as a pleasant way to spend the long, dark evenings of winter.

This morning, in the New York Times, I came across a piece by Tamar Adler that should be of interest to everyone. It’s called “Thanksgiving Thrift: The Holiday as a Model for Sustainable Cooking.” Adler’s basic premise is that we should cook like it’s Thanksgiving all year round, not so much in terms of amounts but rather in the way we delight in using and eating all the leftovers. Not only would cooking this way be thrifty, but it would also a real time saver as we wouldn’t have to come up with a new meal every single night.

Hear, hear! Yesterday, I wrote about making gravy. What I didn’t write about is what I did with the stewed meat from the turkey legs and the leftover stock. Some of the turkey was put in the refrigerator, and for two nights we had a meal of shredded turkey in barbecue sauce over rice. The rest of the turkey was tucked in the freezer, as was the stock, and with them I am planning to make a turkey and rice casserole with mushrooms and peas. I was hoping to use sage from an outside pot, but I think the snow has dashed my hopes of doing that.

Adler has written a book called An Everlasting Meal: Cooking with Economy and Grace, which I have just ordered through interlibrary loan. Although I try very hard to make good use of our food, I am always keen to learn new tips and techniques. Also, sometimes things slip by, and I’m hoping An Everlasting Meal will inspire to me to be even more vigilant.

Now, on to this snowy day!

Yesterday, disaster struck at the Flaky Tart in Winthrop—at noon there were no triple-decker bacon, egg, lettuce, and tomato half-sandwiches with tarragon mayonnaise. The reason? The Tart’s supplier, who was supposed to come early in the morning, hadn’t show up. This was a legitimate enough reason, but still, as the saying goes, I was cast down. All morning long, I had been looking forward to that sandwich with its homemade bread, crispy bacon, and sliced hard-cooked eggs. The tarragon mayonnaise, applied with a light touch, brings it all together.

After the disappointing news, I was faced with the question, what to eat? The chicken tarragon salad on a croissant tempted me, but I knew it would be too fattening for a noncheat day. (I promise there will be more about cheat days in an upcoming post.) Ditto for the quiche. So that left the minestrone soup, and I ordered a big, steaming cup chock full of vegetables and just the right amount of pasta and grated cheese.

I won’t lie. The soup wasn’t as good as those bacon triple-deckers of which I’ve become so fond that I daydream about them in odd moments, but the soup held its own. With its flavorful, tomato-based broth, it was both spicy and soothing.

As I ate, I sat at one of the tall tables by the window. Patrice Putman, who belongs to my book group, came for lunch, and we chatted a bit about our current book—The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. Patrice left, and outside, a man in an electric wheel chair rolled by the window. Across the street, two workers wearing hard hats paused from their labor. A woman with a big, pink plastic case hurried across the street to Potato, a store that features Maine-Made crafts, and I wondered if she was bringing something for the shop to sell.

In between eating and watching the street, I read a piece by Calvin Trillin in the current issue of the New Yorker, which just happens to be the food issue. As always, with his witty, ironic humor Trillin made me laugh out loud as he recounted his rather limited cooking repertoire.  “Estimates have ranged from three to eight [dishes],” Trillin writes, and he only cooks them when he is at his summer home in Nova Scotia. One of the dishes from Trillin’s rather limited range includes the wonderful scallops found off the coast of Nova Scotia. I am guessing they are similar to the scallops served in Prince Edward Island, not so very far away. It’s been over 20 years since I’ve tasted them, but, quite simply, they are unforgettable. In size they are somewhere between a bay scallop and a sea scallop. In taste, they are incomparably sweet and tender. Maine might have its lobsters, but our scallops don’t come anywhere near to those Maritime scallops.

By the time I was ready to leave the Flaky Tart, the soup and Calvin Trillin had improved my mood, which for various reasons that had nothing to with the bacon triple decker, had been as gray as the November sky. I was ready for a bike ride and to face the rest of the day.