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Writer's pictureKathryn Bechen

Easy Turkey Leftovers Recipe & New Mini Home Tour


Kathryn Bechen cookbook binders

Greetings from our little home in Arizona, USA!


How will you be spending your Thanksgiving Day, my fellow Americans?


Is there any one holiday that binds us together as Americans like this tradition? I don't think so!


That being said, we all celebrate the holiday differently and below I will show you what Steve and I will be doing this year as well as sharing one of my favorite super-easy recipes for your leftover turkey!



We don't personally eat turkey anymore since we went "almost" plant-based years ago, but I thought YOU might like turkey so I went into my vintage recipe binder of collected recipes and pulled out my absolute favorite turkey recipe. No big whole bird required; you can just bake turkey breasts and then make this, or use your whole turkey leftovers the day after Thanksgiving.


NOTE: If you are feeding a crowd, I suggest making this recipe in triple amount as the recipe below is just for two or three really.


RECIPE SOURCE: Someone named Patti Clark gave me this recipe years ago from an Episcopal church we attended in Omaha, Nebraska in the 1980s and I have kept it all these years and made it countless times. It never fails to get raves. :) Thank you Patti!


Kathryn Bechen Patti Clark recipe

TIP FOR NON-TURKEY EATERS: I figured out that mahi-mahi fish is dense enough baked and then diced after it's cold from the fridge that it works just like chicken or turkey chunks in recipes, so I use that fish in this recipe now instead of turkey and it's great! (Steve buys our fish at Costco and it's excellent quality.) You can also use chicken, of course.


Kathryn Bechen dining nook

Will you be traveling for Thanksgiving? Yikes! We have long ago given holiday traveling up and instead prefer to be in our favorite cozy and blissfully quiet place: our home. This year we will have our celebratory holiday meal here in our newly-spruced-up at-home bistro, a.k.a. our corner cafe. :) We bought new dining chair cushions recently which are soooo comfy and were on sale, which we loved, of course. Similar. We also bought this nice arched bookcase (also on sale!) which works much better than the baker's rack we had there before that was too deep for comfort when getting out of my chair. I was tired of hitting my elbow on it so we chose something less deep and it was a bingo! Steve assembled it and anchored it to the wall for safety.


Steve Bechen assembling bookcase

Steve loves to assemble and fix things and he does all of that for us. I am grateful for his handyman skills every day. xxoo


Kathryn Steve Bechen Arizona Secret Garden Patio

After we have our non-turkey dinner we will enjoy coffee and dessert on our Secret Garden patio. We set this up like this about 2 1/2 years ago now and have really enjoyed it. It was just a plain ol' carport before we dolled it up!


TRUE CONFESSION: All the plants are faux. Yep, fake. Those grow great in the desert! :)


Kathryn Bechen sake set new

When I searched recently for the term "small-size beverage set" on Amazon, I found out about sake sets! I'm like a kid in a candy store with these now and I don't even drink sake! Steve told me what it is as I had no idea, but I found these sake sets great for apple juice or flavored spritzer water or a small amount of grape juice. They are beyond cute in person and most are $25 or under so sake sets are my new dollarwise way to take a pretty beverage break without going to an expensive restaurant/coffee shop. This red floral set I bought is now on a great sale and I think this set would be so cute for Christmas! (Hint hint, Santa!)


BONUS:  The sake set cups work great as votive candle holders too like I did above.



Kathryn Bechen Bible new

After I am done with our "faux sake" break on Thanksgiving Day, I'm going to take this new book, which I love because it's organized by topics of life to help us know the best ways to live.


Kathryn Bechen B&B style bedroom makeover

And here is where my book and I are gonna take a nap in our spruced-up bedroom that we dollarwise decorated (again!) like a bed & breakfast inn this year which has long been our bedroom decorating m.o. since we started staying in inns together when we travel, way back to 1987.


If you have a hankering for an "at-home-getaway" here are my tips for dollarwise decorating your own bedroom at home like a lovely bed & breakfast inn.


Wishing you a wonderful Thanksgiving Day, however you and your family choose to celebrate it!


Kathryn :)





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