OK...I'll bring it up...Thanksgiving Recipes
 

This is a tough holiday for us. We want traditional foods of the holiday, but we also want to try something new. I'm insisting on doing the spread this year so that I can have all of the family and friends there that I love. It's full on tradition this year...no funny stuff.

appetizers to be determined

Turkey
dressing
oyster casserole
mashed potatoes
gravy
sweet potatoes
biscuits, butter and jam
cranberries
brussels sprouts
salad

pumpkin and apple pies
limited amount of wine and beer
non alcoholic drinks
espresso coffee

I'm definitely limiting the alcohol this year. There's always someone who drinks too much and says things that they shouldn't. It's going to be hard. One family member works at a winery and when I say, don't worry about bringing any wine, he thinks that I means only bring 5 or 6 bottles. I'm stashing it as soon as he walks through the door with it.

I'm waiting for the cheap turkeys to go on sale. I usually stock up on them. I've got to empty out my freezer asap so I'll have the room for them.

When my daughter's house was built she took over hosting the Thanksgiving meal. She cooks all traditional foods as her husband grew up with traditional foods too. He likes to deep fry the turkey. I think it's a guy thing. It sure is good.

Try putting drained cherries, tiny cut up celery and walnuts in the hot cooked cranberries. cool at least a day to develop the flavor. My family loves it. Parker house rolls instead of biscuits.
Other than that, I would say you have all the dinner items to a T.

We go to son and daughter in law. We fly on Thanksgiving and have our meal on Friday. It works out great for all of us. We have mostly a traditional meal and sometimes we tinker with it. I used to make the turkey using Amy Vanderbilt's champagne basted turkey recipe. Then the almost grown grands wanted to try a spatchcocked turkey. I was all in and it was amazing, plus less work for me. Fun cooking with the grands, two boys one girl. Daughter in law does a dessert bar. She loves baking and there are some family favorites and each year she adds one more. the only drinkers are me, daughter in law's sister's husband (he brings the wine) and sometimes Mr stitchnripper. Now that two of the grands are of age, sometimes they drink the wine too. We don't get drunk. But a nice glass of wine is good. Daughter in law makes her late mother's stuffing recipe and some of her dessert recipes. We don't have biscuits being that they are in the PNW. I make the gravy. Then the next day Mr stitchnripper uses the turkey carcass as a base for gumbo which we eat on Saturday night and they freeze the rest in meal serving sizes. We are very lucky that the son picked us a fabulous daughter in law.

I consider Turkey, potatoes, gravy, buns and sweet corn (from my garden) to be my responsibility. The guests can provide everything else.

I actually bought a 10# turkey yesterday for 77 cents/lb. Today I cooked it “Military Style Turkey”. a method I recently heard about.

Military cooks don’t have space to defrost dozens of turkeys so the FROZEN bird is put in a large cooking pot and covered with water (be sure to leave headroom or it will cook over & mess the oven. Add half bunch of celery, cut in 1/3 rds, generous chunk of onion, 4-5 bay leaves, minced garlic (from a jar), salt/pepper. Put lid on and cook in oven 30 minutes at 450. Lower temp to 250 for about 6 hours. Let sit 15-30 minutes. Remove bird from broth (it will fall apart - be careful. I will package up the turkey meat and vacuum pack for hot dishes etc. I
Cool broth overnight, skim off fat then freeze in containers for soup etc. Tasty.

My sister, mother and I don't really care for turkey or maybe just the dark me as we don't care for white meat. So I used to stock up on the Jennie O turkey rolls that came with both white/dark plus gravy and it was just enough for the 3 of us with little left over. Well Jennie O got sold to another company and they put out these turkey rolls for a year or two and then quit. I used up my last turkey roll last year and now we're trying to figure out what else to have to T-Day. My sister thought maybe duck but we're still churning the ideas around.

Anyone else not like turkey?

I like wild turkey better than the farm raised. My husband, son in law, and grandsons are hunters. Something is always in season. The rule is if it is hunted or caught it has to be eaten so we will be having pheasant for Thanksgiving this year.

One year we did seafood, After all, the first settlers were near the coast!
This year is not planned yet.