Thanksgiving Planning

We've started our countdown (actually a countup, I guess) to Thanksgiving with a turkey. Turkey gets a new feather each day. I first saw this on Candace's blog, and then somewhere else, and I think the idea was to take a feather off, but then you get to Thanksgiving and you have a bald turkey instead of a nice feathery decoration, so I'm doing it this way.

Each year we do a big Thanksgiving dinner at our house for the three of us. We do this on the Sunday before Thanksgiving and then eat the leftovers all week until we go home for official Thanksgiving with the rest of our family. This will be the fourth year we've done this, and I've just about gotten it down to a science.

I start by finding the smallest turkey I can. Jay thinks there is some kind of correlation between the smallness and the juiciness. This year's turkey is 12.07 pounds. And we're not eating that piece of cheese that has apparently jumped to the bottom of the fridge back there. Did I mention that when I clean out all of the leftovers the fridge gets a good cleaning?

After the first year I made a master list: all the dishes, where to find them, and their ingredients. With a few exceptions, I make the same things each year. This list has helped save a lot of time with shopping lists. I also got smart and copied the recipes I use over and over and put them in a binder so I don't have to go hunting down all the different cookbooks anymore.

Now all I have to do each year is calculate my cooking times. I usually make the sweet potatoes, dessert, and cranberries on Saturday and everything else Sunday morning.

Last year's final result!

This year's menu includes:

• Turkey
• Gravy
• Rolls (I usually use the frozen Rhodes Rolls)
• Green beans
• Corn
• Sweet Potato Souffle (my aunt's recipe)
• Stuffing (I use Stove Top because I hate picking out celery from real stuffing)
• Cranberry Pineapple Salad
• Pumpkin Pie (my grandma's recipe)

The cooking starts in less than 24 hours!