Surviving Thanksgiving, Part 4

Friday, November 23, 6:36 am

I survived Thanksgiving night, and I don't really want to talk about what happened. So, instead, I'll talk about the Graitch and buying the ingredients for Graitch.

As you should know, I have elevated Graitch to an artform. Gone are the days where I mixed a grape with a peach jello, through in a cup of ginger ale and a mango. Now I have refined the desert to an artform, equal to or greater than creme brulee and Tira misu.

To start with, I take two grape and two peach jellos as my base. I then add two others. This time I did blackberry fusion (blackberry and raspberry together), and wild strawberry. It should be noted that those last two flavors are only available from Jello, while the rest should be generics.

If you can count, that means six packages of jello, which should be 6 cups of boiling water and six cups of flavoring liquid But of course I have to push the envelope.

I have found that if you stir like a man possessed, you can dissolve 6 packages of jello in only 3 cups of boiling water. You just have to put the jellos in slowly, and stir like a crazy person.

After that is done you will then have 9 cups of flavoring liquid. BUT WATCH OUT!! Just because the hard part is over does not mean you are not in danger. Adding carbonated beverages adds all sorts of risks.

For thanksgiving I sent with:
3 cups grape soda
3 cups ginger ale
3 cups cranberry juice

The advantage of the cranberry was an extra tartness. The disadvatage was a lack of fizz. However, if you want my truly secret ingredient: Pop rocks. I didn't put it in this time, but I have before, and Wow!

As for the fruit, I convinced my sister we should go with quite a bit less than usual, because our guests were basically Rooks (Rookies, in Carlos-speak), and would not be able to handle the complex flavors of Graitch, let alone 700 pounds of fruit. Still, we ended up with two mangos, 2 pints of strawberries, and a half-pint of blackberries. I'm not sure I thought that the blackberries are a good fit, but we'll see.

One other prep note: it takes close to 18 hours for this to set (instead of the usual 4), which I chalk up to not having as much boiling water. Make sure you make it the day before you'll want it.

Anyway, the Graitch will be ready this afternoon, although we may go see BEOWULF, so maybe we won't have it until tonight. That would be pretty sweet.