Roast bird with cavity empty. Steamed vegetables as a side to Turkey and mashed potatoes. Gravy on the side. Cranberry sauce with whole berries.
Instead of marshmallows for your sweet potatoes use marshmallo fluff - much creamier and better tasting. Use just a little and add more if needed.
Add dried cranberries to your stuffing and walnuts along with small diced celery.
Cracker Barrel
I always buy a Butterball turkey and roast it unstuffed in a large Reynolds roasting bag. A big turkey roasts in about 3 hours, no basting is required. The roasting bag conveniently collects all the juices and fat for making about six cups of home made gravy. I’ve been the family turkey roaster for over 20 years, my turkeys turn out perfectly, very tasty and juicy.
Yes, it is simply turkey and dressing on a bun, which technically makes it turkey and bread on bread... but with the right dressing - "stuffing," if you prefer - it is not bad. If nothing else, it can use up some of the leftover turkey and dressing in a way that is both easy to assemble and eminently portable.
Mr. niteowl77
Pumpkin Cake with Chocolate Bit Streusel!
Thanks...now I am freaking hungry!!!! Damn you sir!
Here’s the Weekly Cooking Thread if anyone wants to check that out. It’s focused on Thanksgiving also.
http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3602984/posts
Pair with big, buttery chards, but if you're a fan of the cranberry sauce, consider a nice pinot or grenacha based rosé. Complex, yet not too sweet.
I posted this last year. Been making it for decades.
Worth the effort if you like dressing.
http://www.cooks.com/recipe/571ho3vj/bess-burns-cornbread-dressing.html
With your cherry pie, have a nice scotch. They go together so well, one of my favorite things for after dinner.
Turk on the charcoal only, Weber Dome.
Vegis from the dirt along side
Fresh Cranberry Salad is a must in our house! It’s a Minnesota farm favorite during the Christmas season. My husband’s mother used to make this by grinding everything through a meat grinder. Thankfully, we now have food processors that can do the chopping much easier!
This salad needs to be made a day ahead.
Process in food processor until finely chopped. (I do each individually as each fruit takes a different amount of processing.)
1 bag cranberries, rinsed
1 navel orange, washed and cut into quarters (do not peel!)
1 Pink Lady apple
Mix the chopped fruit together in large bowl along with 3/4 c. sugar and cinnamon to taste.
As the salad marinates overnight, it forms a lovely red syrup. If desired, you can stir in some chopped walnuts before serving.
This recipe doubles quite easily.
My mom always put strips of raw bacon on top of the turkey. Flavors the skin and the juices. And it was always a pre-dinner treat.
Not a huge amount, just a shake or two.
Make the apple pie with caraway, grains of paradise and cardamom instead of apple pie spice.
Part of the problem most people have with the Thanksgiving meal is that there seems to be a sameness to the spices. Cinnamon being a predominate flavor. My husband is not fond of cinnamon so I experiment with other spices.
The Fairmont downtown. Make your reservation early.
Not exactly for Thanksgiving day, but the next day. We take our leftover dressing/stuffing, put it on a waffle iron, crisp it up, and then put turkey and gravy over top as a sort of open faced sandwich.