A full winter-break meal plan (two turkey dinners, snacky days, soup days) sketched out day by day, alongside a breakfast sausage recipe locked in (half a pork loin at $1.20/100g works out to half the price of premade) and a steamed, three-day hoagie roll process built from four different sources.
Undated. Winter.
Pho bo
Winter break menu
| Date | Theme | Meal plan |
|---|---|---|
| Tues 18th | (grocery run) | Turkey 6–9 kg; turkey neck and/or wings |
| Sat 21st | (grocery run) | |
| Sun 22nd | Turkey day prep | Stock; gravy base; stuffing; veg prep; brine turkey (possibly on the 21st) |
| Mon 23rd | Turkey day #1 | Classic turkey meal: turkey, gravy, corn, roast veg, mashed taters, stuffing, cran sauce, pie? |
| Tues 24th 🎄 | Leftovers, snacky day | Leftovers; sandwiches. Snacky: spinach dip, veggie platter, corn bean salsa, jalapeño cheese sticks n red sauce, popcorn chicken and various sauces |
| Wed 25th 🎄 | Breakfast wraps, leftovers, snacky snacks | Wraps: mashed potatoes, corn, sausage (breakfast), eggs, hot sauce (optional). Leftovers: casserole or sandwiches |
| Thurs 26th | Soup day | Leftovers; French onion (French onion soup) |
| Fri 27th | Soup day | Pho tai / bo vien: beef balls, thin sliced top round (beef). Turkey prep (repeat some set of #1) |
| Sat 28th | Turkey day 2 | Classic turkey meal |
| Sun 29th | Leftovers day | Squash soup |
| Mon 30th | Leftovers day | MacBurgers or Junior Whippers |
| Tues 31st 🥂 | Snacky day | Leftovers (duh). Snacky: Hawt Buffalo dip (Hot Buffalo chicken dip), Welsh cakes (Welsh cakes, leftovers for the Remple’s) |
| Wed 1st 🥂 | Grandparents leftovers |
Sodium citrate and citric acid
- Queso
- Sour pickles
- Mac & Cheese 🍝🧀 (recipe)
- 2.0% to 3.0% sodium citrate of the total weight of liquid plus cheese
Breakfast sausage
Updated %s, texture and flavours were spot on (more fennel could work, maybe more brown sugar).
I bought a half pork loin for $1.20/100g and turned ¼ of it into breakfast sausage (about ½ of premade sausage pricing). To get the right texture:
- Grind using small plate
- Partially frozen fat and strips of pork loin (including fat cap)
- Pre-froze grinding hardware
- Paddled minced meat the next day from cold
- Pressed patties and hand-formed links
Hoagie roll
(Sources: Hoagie roll recipe from a Reddit comment, Ethan’s recipe video / text, and another from Sorted, and one more from Charlie Anderson the pizza guy)
For 3 x 15cm/6" hoagie rolls:
- 290g bread flour
- 174g lukewarm water
- 23g oil
- 6g salt
- (1.2% note: less salt → lighter roll, typical is ~2-3%)
- 6g diastatic malt or sugar
- 2.2g instant dry yeast
Mix all ingredients in a stand mixer or by hand for 10-12 minutes or until the dough isn’t sticky anymore. Once the dough is all mixed, let the dough rest for 30 minutes, covered in a bowl. Once rested, ball the dough up tightly to a smooth dough ball. Let the dough rise at room temperature for an hour or until the dough doubles in size. Divide the dough into 3 equal pieces and ball them up tightly. Stick the dough balls in the fridge for 24 hours.
After 24 hours, take the dough balls out at room temperature and ball them again. Let the dough balls sit at room temp for 2+3 hours or until the dough balls double in volume.
Once doubled in volume, roll the dough balls into a cigar shape that is 6 inches long. Let them rest in a towel or a deep covered container for 1-2 hours to proof.
Preheat your oven to 500 F with a cast iron dutch oven inside. Once the oven has been heated to 500 F for 30 minutes, take your Dutch oven out of your home oven and place one roll in the oven along with two ice cubes. Cover the Dutch oven so the ice cube melts and steams the dough and bake the Dutch Oven for (covered) for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes uncover the lid of your Dutch oven and bake your roll for 5 more minutes or until golden brown. Repeat the same baking steps for the two remaining rolls.