Thanksgiving Prep
This is the current situation at my house. I have washed the good china, and just finished polishing the silver. I’m not going to use our good crystal glasses this year, they are too fragile and I don’t want to risk them getting broken. Back when we got married, almost 30 years ago, couples registered for china, silver, and crystal. We don’t use them often, but we do use them a couple of times a year. Sometimes for Valentine’s Day, always for Canadian Thanksgiving, and then if we have Christmas or U.S. Thanksgiving here. We celebrate two Thanksgivings, just because it is fun. Ted was born in Canada, though his family emigrated moved to the United States when he was 1. They were from Guyana, South America, and lived in Canada for a few years.
Anyway, I’m in full on prep mode. We will have 8 people, which is the maximum our table can handle, and also is how many sets of silver we have. Why didn’t we buy more? 10? 12? Who knows.
Ted’s brother brought over the turkeys. We always have 2 turkeys for Thanksgiving, so there will be sure to be enough for leftovers. They’ve been sitting in our neighbor’s freezer, since she is out of the country and doesn’t need the space, and I don’t have room in my freezer for 1 turkey, talk about 2. I’ve decided that I am going to do as much cooking on Wednesday as I can, so on Thursday I won’t be harried. I’m going to roast one of the turkeys on Wednesday, and cut it up and portion it out. I’m pretty pleased with myself that I thought about this. On Thanksgiving I will just have the one turkey to roast. I’ll make the dressing, the gravy, cranberry sauce, and sweet potato pudding. Maya is going to make a pumpkin cake with cream cheese frosting. Family will bring mashed potatoes, rolls, a delicious Brussels sprout salad. I’ll make some shrimp cocktail for an appetizer, and am toying with the idea of cheese and crackers as well. I found some yummy looking Roquefort at the store the other day.
Do you celebrate Thanksgiving? What do you like the most about it? The least? It is probably my favorite holiday, though this was certainly not always true.
16 Comments
Elisabeth
The food – it all sounds so delicious. And I love that you go the extra mile and use silver and china. Such a great way to elevate the experience and make it extra special. It sounds like you have a great plan in place, which over a week out must feel relieving. Thinking through logistics – to me at least – is a big part of the pressure of hosting a big event.
I live in Canada and we have Thanksgiving in October, so Christmas is the next big holiday for us!
J
I enjoy the planning part of it, it doesn’t feel too stressful to me. My husband has Wednesday off too, so he will help with cleaning and so on, which is FABULOUS.
San
Oh good china and silver – that really reminds me of holidays way back when at my grandparents’ house. They always had the good china and silver out for special occasions. Seems to be such a thing from the past – so I was glad you’re doing that still 🙂 It sounds like you’re very well prepared for the upcoming holiday weekend.
Jon and I won’t see family for Thanksgiving, so it’s just going to be the two of us. I’ll be running the Turkey Trot in the morning.
J
We lived in Philadelphia for a couple of years in the early days of our marriage, and though we came home to California for Christmas, we did not for Thanksgiving. Even though it was just the two of us, I cooked everything, all of our favorites. Will you do that, or go out somewhere, or maybe make a chicken?
Jenny
YOU POLISHED SILVER??? I’m very impressed. Our Thanksgiving is a little more… casual. It will just be the four of us, but we still cook a lot of food. I’m looking forward to it.
J
I’m impressed too, that I remembered about the silver. Generally I would not think about it until it is too late, while setting the table. So it hasn’t been polished in awhile. It wasn’t bad, actually.
Nicole MacPherson
I’m Canadian so we do celebrate Thanksgiving, but as you know it’s not like in the US. That silver is fancy! I have a set of fancy silverware and I never use it, it is probably black and in need of polishing.
J
I enjoy pulling out the good silver once in awhile. 🙂 I don’t think we got any as wedding gifts, though we did get crystal and china, so we bought it ourselves. My everyday flatware is almost the exact same pattern, though clearly not as fancy.
Oh, and mine is silver plate, not sterling, so it was more affordable, and doesn’t get quite so black.
nance
Polishing silver is no joke. Kudos to you for going all out.
I like Thanksgiving because it’s one day, and it does not involve a lot of gift shopping and falderal. It’s about good food and getting together. I dislike all the prep and cooking because it unfailingly falls to me, but at least roasting a turkey is easy to do. Once the dressing/stuffing is made, everything else seems less worky.
(I’m still astonished that it’s already Thanksgiving Time. Wasn’t it just Independence Day a few weeks ago?)
J
Nance, what is your dressing recipe? We have some vegetarians in our group (which makes the fact that we will have 2 turkeys even more ridiculous), and some Hindus, so there is no sausage in the dressing, which a lot of people seem to love. So I’m going to cheat and use Stove Top. I found a recipe where you dress that up…saute some onion and celery, mix in, and put it all in the oven. I’m going to give that a try.
nance
I’ve never put sausage in my dressing. I use bread, cornbread, sauteed onion and celery with a couple cloves of garlic, a few eggs, some stock or broth (you can use veg), a glug or two of milk, and then some chopped up parsley and sage from my herb garden. I don’t really have a recipe, I’m afraid. I do use an ungodly amount of butter for the saute. I make balls of dressing so that each person gets a bit of the crispy parts and so that it’s already in individual portions. I put the balls in buttered baking dishes, cover with foil, and bake at 350 until mostly done, then refrigerate and bake off the rest of the way on Thanksgiving, uncovered.
J
Nance, thank you for sharing your recipe, it sounds amazing! Perhaps I might try it next year. At this point there is no way I’m going back to the grocery store, sure to be a mad house today.
Ally Bean
I haven’t used good silver like yours in years! I suppose I could get it out, but truth be known I don’t much like Thanksgiving. Sorry about that J. I’m not a fan of the traditional turkey dinner, but I’ll make it this year & it’ll be delicious… if you like turkey and all those carbs. For Thanksgiving it’s going to be Z-D and I so this will be a very casual affair.
J
Ally, it is surely better to not have all of those carbs, but I confess that I love them. The turkey is generally the least important part of the meal to me.
Meike
We are visiting our friends for Thanksgiving and will do the whole turkey meal and then some food prep with them. It’s actually the same friends we had our first Thanksgiving in the US with. It’s probably one of my favorite holidays because it’s mostly about hanging out with people you care about – at least for me – with less expectations (like presents for birthdays or Christmas).
J
Meike, I agree, it’s a wonderful holiday! It was a rough one when I was a kid, because my Grandfather was a grouch and my Grandma a terrible cook, and not even any gifts to temper it. I’m very happy that it is a joy now, though!