Tuesday, November 29, 2005

Raisinhater Thanksgiving Traditions

Yesterday I was a little too overwhelmed and overstuffed to tell you in full detail about our Raisinhater Thanksgiving celebration. In fact, I think it’s a bit too much for one post, so you may not get it all today. What I will tell you about today is the newest Raisinhater family tradition.

When the Raisinhaters get together, they fire up the deep fryer. Last Christmas, C Raisinhater gave the Raisinhater parents this deep fryer as a gift. We immediately commenced frying. For our first season, we were fairly reserved. This year we took things to the next level. Cheese, leftover mashed potatos, leftover turkey - we fried it all. Here are a few of our greatest hits.

We started with onion rings. C Raisinhater made his traditional batter of flour, 1 egg, and enough coors light to create a thick sticky paste. Flour the rings, and coat them in the batter.



Toss them in the fryer.



Delicious.



As the weekend went on, we got more and more adventurous. We made coconut shrimp…



Clean and butterfly the shrimp, coat them in flour, then egg, and, finally, a mixture of breadcrumbs and shredded coconut. So easy, and delicious despite the dreadful photo!

Our frying finale was red snapper with spicy mango citrus salsa. I don't have pictures, but I do have a makeshift recipe.

Reduce equal parts (1/2 cup each?) orange juice and water in a small pan on medium heat with a teaspoon of cornstarch until thickened to the consistency of light syrup. Remove from heat. Add 1 teaspoon honey, a few small squirts of sriracha, one finely diced green or red bell pepper, one diced mango, and soy sauce and rice wine vinegar to taste (I probably used 2-3 T each). Stir together and set aside.

Cut snapper into small chunks and coat in flour and batter (same batter as used for onion rings above, but slightly thinner consistency created by extra coors light). Fry till lightly browned. Salt and serve with salsa. This salsa would work with non fried fish too, if you're feeling healthy. Feel free to email me for better recipe details.

Deep frying isn't our only holiday tradition. We drink pomegranate margaritas specially mixed by C Raisinhater, bartender extraordinaire.



We play the annual Gobbler Classic golf tournament



Even in very threatening weather



And sometimes we even drink a little moonshine…

3 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

I think the Raisinhaters need to go to an even deeper level and fry some Twinkies and Snickers bars :) And then post the results.

That coconut shrimp looks to die for! Then again, so do the onion rings, and I hate onions!

9:44 PM  
Blogger Mona said...

Wow, hold the onions, eh Jeff? Ha that's funny. I'm a big fan of onion rings, though I'll admit I had to grow into it...those sneaky things that come out of the fried part can gross me out somtimes. That all looks and sounds great. NICE!

12:27 AM  
Blogger MeBeth said...

Jeff and Mona - I agree, I used to hate the slimy middles of onion rings. But all the fried goodness cured me!

12:52 AM  

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