🦃 One-Butt Kitchen Thanksgiving: Tackling Holiday Cooking in the DR Galley!
Welcome aboard! If you’ve been following our journey, you know that liveaboard life often involves trading spacious kitchens for, well, a “one-butt kitchen.” This week, we found ourselves facing a monumental challenge: making a full Thanksgiving dinner onboard SV Agua Azul.
It was a full-on holiday survival mode: testing old eggs, developing new recipes, and fitting a 4-foot Christmas tree onto a 41-foot sailboat. Here’s the story of the chaos, the hacks, and the delicious success.
The Great Galley Cook-Off (Why We Stress)
When you’re cruising, every large meal feels like a marathon in a closet. Space is nonexistent, power is precious, and every ingredient has to be vetted.
This holiday, we tackled two separate but equally challenging cooking sessions. Not only did we execute a full Thanksgiving dinner, but on a separate day, Danielle managed to put a new slow cooker recipe through its paces for testing! These challenging sessions proved that even in the smallest space, you can develop and execute complex meals—it just takes planning (and usually a lot of sweat!).
Our “turkey substitute” this year? Juicy Chicken Legs! They cook faster, take up less space, and most importantly, they fit in the slow cooker or the small oven perfectly. You can find the basic recipe index here: Chicken Leg Recipes.
🧀 The Appetizer that Saves the Day (And Your Gut)
No holiday is complete without the classics, and our Taco Cheese Ball is a staple. It’s budget-friendly, travels well, and is perfect for sharing (or hoarding, we don’t judge).
We’ve got 13 different cheese ball recipes—perfect for any occasion or space constraint—and you can find the index for all of them right here: All Cheese Ball Recipes.
💡 The Crucial Boat Life Hack: Testing for Bad Eggs
Before we dove into the holiday cooking, we had to face a grim reality: checking our stored eggs. You absolutely cannot risk food poisoning on passage or far from shore. This simple, non-negotiable life hack is a must for any liveaboard.
How to tell if an egg is bad? The Float Test!
If you place an egg in water:
- It sinks and lays on its side: It’s super fresh!
- It sinks but stands up: It’s a week or two old—still fine, but use it soon.
- It floats: TOSS IT. The air pocket inside has grown large enough that bacteria are likely thriving. Never gamble on a floater!
🎄 From Chaos to Cozy
Amidst the cooking steam and egg testing, we managed to squeeze in our first bit of Christmas cheer! We unpacked our 4-foot tree and placed our beloved gnome on it, proving that you don’t need a house to make a home feel festive. That small dose of decorating helped pull us out of the stressed-but-blessed energy and put us right into the holiday spirit.
What’s Next & How You Can Help!
Thank you so much for following our adventures. If you loved seeing how we tackle these challenges, please check out the full video below!
We just launched our Patreon as a way to share more of our day-to-day life. If you have ideas for future projects, recipes, or repairs, we want to hear them!
👉 Support Our Journey & Share Your Ideas: https://www.patreon.com/Chris_does_what
Happy holidays, and we’ll see you on the next adventure!
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The camera color grading looks natural.
Thank you