We have a few recipes from friends in France and Sweden that use metric measurements. Some of the volume-volume (e.g. 1 teaspoon=5 mL) or weight-weight (e.g. 500 g=1.1 pounds) conversions are pretty trivial. Other conversions are more difficult, and I wanted to document these to ease future recipe conversion.
One of the common, slightly difficult ingredients is butter. Most domestic recipes with which I am familiar give butter measurements by volume (e.g. “2 Tbsp butter”), whereas all of the metric recipes I’ve made measure butter by weight (e.g. “50 g butter”). I don’t want to go through deriving the conversion; instead, here’s a table showing a few common measurements and approximations (indicated by a leading “~”):
US-metric butter conversion
| US measure | Metric measure |
|---|
| ~½ stick | 50 g |
| ~1½ Tbsp | 20 g |
| 1 lb | ~450 g |
| 1 stick (¼ lb) | ~115 g |
| ¼ c | ~55 g |
| 1 Tbsp | ~15 g |
I only took a few pictures of our Thanksgiving feast. Fortunately, my cousins brought their cameras and didn’t hesitate to use them (and share)! I’ve included a few crowd shots from Greg and Cal. They also allowed me to add their pictures to our photoset. Jeremy and Ducky have their own Thanksgiving photoset on Flickr, including pics of the annual “appetite enhancement” ride (and pictures from our dinner, obviously).
Barb made this fantastic ham for our Thanksgiving dinner. The mustard is very subtle and makes a nice change of taste!
- 1 ready-to-eat ham, 14-16 lbs, with bone
- lots of whole cloves
- ¼ c apricot preserves
- 3 Tbsp Dijon mustard
- 1 c packed light brown sugar
- 2 c apple cider
- Preheat over to 350°.
- Carefully cut off the rind and most of the fat from the top of the ham, but don’t cut through to the meat! Score the top of the ham in a diamond pattern (1 inch?) with a sharp knife.
- Set the ham in a shallow roasting pan. Stud the ham with a whole clove at each intersection in the diamond pattern.
- Place the apricot preserves in a small sauce pan over low heat to melt slightly. Brush the melted preserves all over the ham, then brush all over with the mustard. (Why not combine the mustard and preserves and brush them all on at once?) Pat the brown sugar all over the ham.
- Pour the apple cider into the roasting pan and bake the ham for 90 minutes, basting frequently, until the ham is glazed and brown.
When the ham is finished baking, slice thinly and serve.
