This year we've decided not to go to The Sardine Factory in Monterey, with me cooking on the weekend. I'll just be cooking tonight and tomorrow. At the request of @IdaRose and @TiffanyAnderson via Twitter, where I'm @JAdP, here's my menu and recipes. Nothing new really. I'm following my traditions of the past few years.

As always... Don't forget to preheat your oven(s) and simmering bricks.

Colonial Virginia Peanut & Chestnut Soup

• Parboil raw peanuts in the shell for about 10 minutes, then roast them for another 10 in a medium oven.
• Cut an X in the shells of raw chestnuts and roast in the medium oven for about 20 minutes.
• Allow the peanuts to cool, and then put the chestnuts in a brown paper bag, just until they're cool enough to handle, and then shell them.
• Cook a rich vegetable stock that includes the normal onion, parsnip, carrot, celery, bouquet garni and garlic, but also has a diced turnip in it.
• When the stock has been simmering on the bricks for most of the day, add the peanuts, still in the shell, as well as the shelled and skinned chestnuts into the stock.
• After about 10 minutes, remove the peanuts and allow to cool, and then shell.
• Using a stick blender or a food mill, purée the stock, leaving all the vegetables and chestnuts.
• If too thick, add more stock or hot water to thin.
• Shave a raw turnip with a mandolin or slice it thinly with your favorite, sharpest knife, and add the cooked, shelled peanuts and slices of turnip to the soup, and cook for another half hour - salt to taste.

Pumpkin Soup

• Take the "lid" off two sugar pumpkins, scrape out the seeds and fibers, and roast for two hours at 325°F
• Scrape out the meat of the pumpkin, and allow to cool
• Toast the pumpkin seeds in the oven - they make great garnish later
• Bring 8 cups of fire roasted vegetable stock to a boil, add the roasted pumpkin meat, fresh thyme, fresh ginger grated, a bouquet garni of bay leaf, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves, dry sherry and sautéed onions
• Cook for two hours, then purée in the pot or by passing it through a food mill
• bring back to a boil and tip in a cup of heavy cream right before serving

Spiked Spiced Cranberry Orange Sauce

Here's a "per bag" recipe.

• 12 ounces fresh, whole cranberries, washed and picked over for stems or wrinkly, bursting, rotting rejects
• 1 glass [~6 oz.] of sherry, port or mistral
• 2 or 3 Satsuma mandarin oranges - remove the rind, cut in half along the torus cross-section and remove any seeds
• one cup turbinado [raw] sugar
• a bouquet garni consisting of a cinnamon stick and 5 cloves
• Put it all in a heavy pan [I use porcelain coated cast iron] and over a high heat, stirring often during the cooking, until the cranberries start to pop, about five minutes, than remove to a lower heat [I use simmering bricks over a gas flame] to simmer until the oranges release their juices [get mushy], remove the spices and cool overnight in a heavy crock or non-metallic bowl - may be served whole or passed through a food mill or processor

Wild Mushroom Bread Pudding

A vegetarian version in a pan is what I'm making, as well as using it as the stuffing by mixing with mild sausage and stuffed into the bird. I use a mix of dried and fresh mushrooms, so the first step is to soak the dried ones [this year porcini and mixed wilds] for an half-hour in a 50/50 mix of white wine and warm water [never use stale water from the hot water tap for cooking]. The only fresh mushrooms I'm using this year are cremini and portabello.

• 1 medium red onion, Italian torpedo if you can find it, sliced
• two cloves of garlic, two carrots and two stalks of celery, sliced
• 1 tablespoon each of unsalted butter and olive oil
• sautée until the vegies are soft
• About 1-1/2 pounds of fresh mushrooms and four ounces [dry weight] of the dried mushrooms are used; remove the dried mushrooms from the soaking liquor and pass the liquor through cheese cloth or coffee filter or white paper towel; rinse and squeeze the soaked dried mushrooms and then mince them; clean and slice the fresh mushrooms, and sautée the mushrooms
• Add fresh sage, chiffonade, and fresh thyme leaves, salt and freshly ground peppercorns, finish the sautée, and add a glass of white wine - whatever you'll be serving with the meal is always best and at least a cup of the reserved mushroom soaking liquor
• Set aside the vegies and start on the bread pudding
• Cube some bread - less than 1/2-inch on a side; you can use heavy bread, light bread, even brioche; I prefer a potato rosemary batard and use about two loaves
• Make the "custard" from 1-1/2 cups of heavy [not sweetened] cream, 2 cups of milk, 6 eggs, salt and pepper to taste
• Pour the liquid custard over the bread cubes and squeeze the custard into the bread cubes until they are saturated; lightly toss in the sautéed vegies, and place in a heavily buttered casserole dish or lasagna or roasting dish [glass or ceramic, not metallic]
• Bake at 350°F for about an hour, until the top is brown and a knife stuck in slight to the left of center comes out clean
• If your going to use this to stuff the bird, reserve the amount that you'll need later in the day, or, if you cooked the bread pudding more than 24 hours in advance of stuffing the bird, reserve the vegies and bread that you need, and make up custard to use the day you'll be dressing the bird; add two-to-four links of broken up, cooked mild sausage to the vegie mixture before tossing

Mashed Roots with Garlic and Brown Butter Sage

Ok, ok, basically mashed potatoes with added rutabaga and turnip goodness, boiled with garlic and using a brown butter sage sauce as well as cream to get to the finished product.

• 1/2 potato per person, 1 rutabaga and 1 turnip for every 4 potatoes [potatoes of choice are yukon gold or red creamers], 1 clove of garlic per potato.
• Leave the potatoes whole, skin on or not as you like, cube the rutabagas and turnips, add the root vegetables, including the garlic, to salted boiling water and boil until a fork easily pierces a potato [15 minutes maybe],
• drain,
• [if you left the skins on the potatoes, cool and remove now if you want].
• Put 1 teaspoon of unsalted butter per potato into the hot pan, leave the butter to melt and then wait until the edges of the melted butter turns brown, add chiffonade sage [1 leaf per potato or to taste], let it sizzle for a minute,
• add 2 tablespoons of cream per person and stir until the cream bubbles,
• add the root vegetables back and mash 'em with a potato masher, keep stirring until heated through. One alternative is to stir in a consistent direction until the mash is like taffy - about three hours.

Squash and Potato Casserole

Roasted and mashed, or sliced thin with a mandolin and layered with the custard, this is a must for Thanksgiving.

You could be roasting the sweet potatoes whilst the bread pudding is baking. You need three cups of mashed roasted sweet potato, so start with two 8-inchers.

• 2 each sweet potatoes yams and carnival squash, roasty, toasty and mashed
• 1/2 cup of turbinado [raw] sugar added to the mash
• salt as you like it and you might like paprika, cayenne or black pepper, or not
• this custard is 2 large eggs, 1/2-cup of milk, a tablespoon of cream and you can even add pure bourbon vanilla [I have about a gallon left from my Montara Magic days] or maple syrup; add the custard to the potato mixture
• top with a mixture of 1/2-cup brown sugar, 1/2-cup flour, 4 tablespoons melted butter and a 1/2-cup of toasted whole pecan halves
• bake at 350°F for 30 to 45 minutes

Brussels Sprouts with Chestnuts

Maybe not that traditional, but the best way to prepare those little green balls that I've ever found. I really do like this dish, though I can't remember where I found it. It's not a family tradition.

• Clean the outer leaves, and any loose, damaged or brown leaves from around the brussels sprout, slice off the woody stem, cut an X in the bottom and let sit in salt water for about 15 minutes - oh, and use about 10 sprouts and 4 chestnuts per person
• Cut an X in the shell of each chestnut and roast at a low temperature up to an hour or at a high temperature for 10 or 15 minutes, or buy vacuum packed or jarred cooked, shelled chestnuts, for as much as I like old fashioned cooking, in this case it is a real pain in the nicta and very time consuming
• Heat a pint of vegetable cooking stock, and add the sprouts and chestnuts, cook until tender which I've seen take as little as 15 minutes and as long as 45

Wild Mushroom and Giblet Gravy

Or leave out the giblets if you're going for Tofurkey instead.

Take the pan drippings from cooking the turkey and separate off the fat. While that is settling, in a pat of butter and a splash of olive oil, sauté the minced shallots, diced up giblets, and sliced mushrooms [maybe reserved from the bread pudding, maybe not]. I reserved some of my minced wild mushrooms that I had soaked earlier - add those now. Remove from the pan. Add [per cup of finished gravy desired] a tablespoon of butter and allow to brown slightly, then add a tablespoon of flour, mixing into the butter until all the butter is absorbed. Keep scraping from rue from the bottom of the pan, until the flour is cooked - about 3 minutes. Add a glass of your white wine, slowly, mixing it into the flour, and then add a glass of the dried mushroom soaking liquor that you reserved, stirring it in. Cook down to the desired thickness - there should be a cup of gravy. Add a chiffonade of sage, and some thyme leaves.

Stuffed Turkey

Here's the basics: remove the fresh turkey from the brine that its been soaking in overnight, take enough of the Wild Mushroom Bread Pudding recipe [don't mix this more than an hour in advance of stuffing the bird] with added, broken up and cooked mild sausage, to fill the body and neck cavities of the bird, put peeled garlic cloves under the skin of the bird [usually takes at least one head of garlic], brush bird with a rosemary twig dipped in olive oil and herbs de Provence before putting in the oven and as the basting method, cook it as you normally would. Add white wine and maybe stock [vegie stock, white stock - chicken and veal - or turkey stock made from the neck] to the bottom of the pan. Get the skin nice and brown, and cover with aluminum foil to keep if from burning if it's browned before the turkey is done. If you do that, uncover the bird for the last 15 minutes of cooking.

Update: I've been using the term chiffonade. Let me explain. One can only chiffonade larger leaves: think basil, sage, mint. Wash and dry about eight leaves, and make a "cigar" out of them. That is, layer them by overlapping them about half-way along the long axis, and roll them up so they look something like stogies. Sharpen your knife, the sharper the better. Slice along the "cigar" cross-section, so that your getting very thin slices of herb.

Dessert

Dad made an apple cake from the four types of apples growing in the back yard. I bought, yes, bought, a pumpkin pie. Earl is bringing Black Sambuca to serve with coffee. Stilton and crackers will also be served.

Have a great Thanksgiving. Enjoy.

I'll update as things change while I'm cooking.

I've been sending and receiving email "on the go" for well over five years. My solutions have always involved the PalmOS. I've never had to resort to a "redirector" from my desktop/laptop email client. There are a variety of approaches to mobile and wireless email. Daniel Taylor speaks to the solutions and ongoing problems in "Mobile e-mail solutions for small business".

Small businesses often have the edge here over large and even medium sized businesses. They can control the email service they use. Businesses that rely solely on using a Microsoft Exchange Server, or other proprietary collaboration server such as Lotus Notes, with that server located behind a firewall face the toughest challenge. The email services can be set up so that the proprietary collaboration server is only part of the package, with the standard protocols SMTP, POP3 and IMAP4 being part of the mix as well.

The first mobile email I had was way back in 1994 [pre-Palm] at Oracle using either Oracle Office Disconnected Client or Oracle Mobile Agents. Oralce's Collaboration Suite still serves up fully synchronized email to a wide variety of devices.

Synchronization for "casually connected" clients is also one, albeit asynchronous, solution, and even the earliest Palm software allowed synch'g your inbox, read, respond and compose offline, and synch again later. Not great if you want near "real time" information exchange.

The solution that I use now is the best I've ever had. In addition to our consulting services, we've started a hosting service, the TeleInterActive Networks. We provide IMAP4 email. This is great for multiple email clients from wireless connectivity to your favorite desktop email client, through in a laptop, and even webmail from a convenient Internet Café they are always synchronized through the IMAP server: inbox, sent email, even critical "saved" folders can all be sync'd. I can even get attachments and read them on my Palm.

Though this does get me back to a pet peeve of mine. Since email became the killer app for the Internet and is still the most used application, we've kludged everything possible onto it. eMail was never meant to send files and is not secure. Even today, email

• attachments can't always be read,
• take effort to remove from the email, if your email client can even do this
• looses the chain of delivery when you do detach an attachment
• is painful to encrypt or otherwise make secure, and thus,
• is rarely used securely

There are far better collaboration tools than email. But I'm getting off topic. If you do want to use email wirelessly, take a look at the services that Dan cites to extend MS Exchange beyond the firewall. Or, consider a hosting service that will give you IMAP email with enough storage space to keep your current attachments to hand.

"Handhelds will Replace Laptops" and desktops, and clip boards, note pads, planners, sticky notes and more. This is a concept to which I subscribe whole heartedly. The question is what's an handheld?

Is an handheld a PDA, a smart phone, a Linux Slate, a Windows TabletPC, a wireless network appliance? What does the UI look like? How does one present information in a meaningful manner? What data visualization tools make sense on the available screen size? How do you deal with the casually connected state of most, if not all, wireless systems? I've been pursuing solutions to these questions since I first worked with Oracle Mobile Agents in 1994 using snail-slow wireless modems and greyscale handhelds that could be used for strength training.

Times have changed quite a bit, but I'm still amazed at how many people don't use - or want to use - an handheld of any type. Or at how many people, young professionals even, need to print something out before it becomes real to them. While many technical challenges have been solved, and while millions of folk use computers and handhelds and smart phones, there are still many challenges to be overcome, both technical and behavioral.

I agree with the following

"Now mobile users are just as hooked into corporate networks as their desk-bound brethren. Their data is as fresh and accurate and their response time is nearly comparable. Data in the field is no longer untimely or out-of-date; it is just as accurate as data available at the desk top."

and

"All these consequences, generated by wireless applications, will continue to squeeze inefficiencies out of operations."

-- Jim Chard in Handhelds will Replace Laptops

Though I would replace each "is" and "are" in that quote with "may". The statement could be true, but it rarely is. But I like the "will". Things are headed in that direction, the quicker the better. I'll be pushing all the way.

Dan Gillmor and I started a discussion in email back in 2000 about our various ways of staying connected when out of the office. Back then, I was using a PalmVx with a Novatel wireless modem and the Omnisky service. Now Dan talks about his ideal handheld in "Perfect Handheld? Not Yet".

I've always tended towards "best-of-breed" rather than accepting the compromises associated with squeezing everyhting into one box. This is true of Business Intelligence systems, integrating Open Source projects, stereo systems, even take out food [don't ask, don't tell]. It is especially true of my PDA.

I have a fierce brand loyalty to Palm [er, PalmOne, PalmSource, oh, yes, Palm is fine] and I'm very attached to open source.

I've been back-of-the-envelop designing a wireless network hub that would take care of that part of the system, until small-enough processors and wiki(software radio) catch up to each other in terms of specifications provided and required. OLED screens that can pull oull out of a rod like a scroll will make life better in this area too. I think I would rather carry a few small devices, than one clunky, compromised device. But ignoring packaging for a moment, here's a list of funtions, features and standards that I want with me all the time:

• Open Source OS
• Lot's of third-party apps
• Synchronization capabilities, wired & wireless
• wireless PAN, LAN, MAN & WAN - whatever the latest protocols are
• Voice and Data
• eBooks
• calendar, text processing, word processing, contacts
• graphics rendering [data visualization, games, and more]
• SD storage, maybe two slots, maybe even one CF
• email
• attachments
• web & wap
• feed syndication reader
• cookies & javascript enabled
• SSL & other encryption

Several small devices easily distributed in various pockets would suit me just fine. I do want to get rid of the leather pouch I always have attached to my belt. Right now the leading contenders that could be mixed and matched to get some of these, if not all, are

• Palm TungstenT-5 or LifeDrive, especially teh LifeDrive as it has WiFi and Bluetooth built-in
• Any bluetooth phone, the smaller the better, with any 3G or near 3G data capability, maybe with a camera
• Nokia 770 Internet Tablet
• The Pepper Wireless Pad is available for pre-order through Amazon.com
• HP iPAQ h6300 Pocket PC - though I would hate to go with Windows Mobile whatever
• PalmSource may qualify for the Open Source OS
• A digital camera, SD card or bluetooth enabled, if not the camera phone; of course the latest, bestest Nikon for hobbyist stills
• My Jabra BT FreeSpeak

If I had a convenient user interface, processing power, the OS and software and storage to do it all, the headset, the various connectivity capabilities, and Bluetooth tying it all together, I wouldn't need or want a "cell phone" per se. With what's available right now, it really is hard to put together a working system - and of course, coverage in CDMA, GSM or 802.11[whatever] is spotty at best, though iPass does have a good solution for worldwide accounts.

Finally, Palm has come out with a device that has both Bluetooth and WiFi, the LifeDrive. I'm very excited about this device. They also squeezed in a 4GB hard drive. Only 16MB of ROM though, so I imagine that not just "all your important files" but software must go onto that hard drive. I wonder how that will affect performace of those apps?

I may just have to find out via Amazon.

Update: From PalmOne LifeDrive Mobile Manager: Is it cool or too big for today's comsumer tastes? by Todd Ogasawara -- PalmOne's LifeDrive PDA is the first PDA I know of with an integrated microdrive (4GB large). It also has integrated Bluetooth and 802.11b WiFi capabilities. So, is the world ready with an open wallet for this intersection of a Palm PDA and iPod mini?

I'm a diehard Palm fan, and have been since my first Palm Pilot in 1996. Many of the points made by Todd Ogasawara are well taken. I do want to get rid of my cell phone, but I don't find the screens on smart phones, even the Treo, to be adequate. I think my ideal PDA would take from the Treo650. TungstenT-5, LifeDrive and Tapwave Zodiac: the large screen [with rotation between portrait and landscape modes], built-in WiFi [though give me a/g not just b], bluetooth and cellular [GSM or CDMA based options with latest data protocols], 256MB RAM/ROM, and two expansion card slots [either both SD/SDIO or one SD & one CF], and, of course, running the latest PalmOS. I don't really want the keyboard of the Treo; I've been using grafitti for so long that I my handwriting is now illegible.