What does your Thanksgiving menu look like?!


Question: After Mom & Dad passed away, we gradually began creating our own traditions. We're just a few, so now I don't buy that huge turkey. Instead, I prefer that my turkey is free range and organic, so I go to Whole Foods, and have the butcher butterfly a large turkey breast. I make my stuffing, lay it out on the breast, then roll it jellyroll style. Then I tie it several times around and once the length with baking string, put it in the roasting pan with some big chunks of onion. I make my stuffing from scratch, by first crumbling whole wheat bread, adding lots of seasonings and herbs, tossing with a little olive oil, and bake at low temp. until crispy. That's my base which I make way ahead of time. I grind some of that dry stuffing mix to crumbs, add more herbs and spices, mix with enough olive oil to make it stick together I press that "crust" onto the outside of the turkey breast. I make a foil tent over the roasting pan. The whole thing takes about 1-1/2 hrs. to cook. I baste a few times, and take the foil off the last 20 mins. I put in an extrat dish of stuffing. I also buy a turkey neck, put that in a pot with some water, add lots of onion and other goodies to make a nice stock for the gravy. The breast still makes some wonderful, brown juices to add to the stock to.

My daughter is vegetarian, but eats fish. For her I make crabmeat stuffed fish fillets. I don't put the egg in this stuffing as I wan't it a little lighter, less firm than the turkey stuffing. That's topped with herbs, with white wine and butter & lemon poured over the top.. used to baste while baking.

So here's my menu:
Stuffed turkey breast - jellyroll style
Baked, crabmeat stuffed fish fillets
red new potatoes mashed with skin on
rosemary baked sweet potatoe slices
Steamed broccoli & cauliflowerr casserole with cheese sauce
cranberry sauce
Hungarian cucumber salad

When the turkey is ready to slice, I remove the string, and slice up enough for all. The jellyroll style when sliced is a sight to behold... and that crust?? Incredible! If I had a larger group (there are just 4 of us), I think I'd still do the breast in this same manner, but would add a few nice big turkey legs and thighs to the roasting pan.

Dessert: Undecided. Maybe pumpkin cheesecake. I found this wonderful recipe for "pumpkin rolls", a jellyroll style cake with spiralled with a cream cheese filling. I was thinking of serving that with ice cream on top with home made hot fudge and whipped cream.

(Sorry this is so long)


Answers: After Mom & Dad passed away, we gradually began creating our own traditions. We're just a few, so now I don't buy that huge turkey. Instead, I prefer that my turkey is free range and organic, so I go to Whole Foods, and have the butcher butterfly a large turkey breast. I make my stuffing, lay it out on the breast, then roll it jellyroll style. Then I tie it several times around and once the length with baking string, put it in the roasting pan with some big chunks of onion. I make my stuffing from scratch, by first crumbling whole wheat bread, adding lots of seasonings and herbs, tossing with a little olive oil, and bake at low temp. until crispy. That's my base which I make way ahead of time. I grind some of that dry stuffing mix to crumbs, add more herbs and spices, mix with enough olive oil to make it stick together I press that "crust" onto the outside of the turkey breast. I make a foil tent over the roasting pan. The whole thing takes about 1-1/2 hrs. to cook. I baste a few times, and take the foil off the last 20 mins. I put in an extrat dish of stuffing. I also buy a turkey neck, put that in a pot with some water, add lots of onion and other goodies to make a nice stock for the gravy. The breast still makes some wonderful, brown juices to add to the stock to.

My daughter is vegetarian, but eats fish. For her I make crabmeat stuffed fish fillets. I don't put the egg in this stuffing as I wan't it a little lighter, less firm than the turkey stuffing. That's topped with herbs, with white wine and butter & lemon poured over the top.. used to baste while baking.

So here's my menu:
Stuffed turkey breast - jellyroll style
Baked, crabmeat stuffed fish fillets
red new potatoes mashed with skin on
rosemary baked sweet potatoe slices
Steamed broccoli & cauliflowerr casserole with cheese sauce
cranberry sauce
Hungarian cucumber salad

When the turkey is ready to slice, I remove the string, and slice up enough for all. The jellyroll style when sliced is a sight to behold... and that crust?? Incredible! If I had a larger group (there are just 4 of us), I think I'd still do the breast in this same manner, but would add a few nice big turkey legs and thighs to the roasting pan.

Dessert: Undecided. Maybe pumpkin cheesecake. I found this wonderful recipe for "pumpkin rolls", a jellyroll style cake with spiralled with a cream cheese filling. I was thinking of serving that with ice cream on top with home made hot fudge and whipped cream.

(Sorry this is so long)

all things TexMex
less stress more family time

Turkey, Ham, Mashed Potatoes, Cannied Yams, Apple Stuffing, Mac and Cheese and cheese broccoli so far. Im sure people will be requesting more things as it gets closer! Im trying to stay positive about being chained to the kitchen for 3 days straight! Happy Thanksgiving!

Turkey, Stuffing, Gravy, Mash Potatoes, Milk, and Biscuits...

Turkey
Dressing
Ham
Mashed Potatoes
Gravy
Tamales
Rice-Broccoli-Chees Casserole
Green Bean Casserole
Corn
Yams
Cranberry
Broccoli/onion/tomato/cucumber salad
Rolls

Peach Cobbler
Apple, Pecan, and Pumpkin Pies
Orange-Pineapple dessert

Wine
Beer
Sodas
Tea

I have 34 people coming for Thanksgiving and this is our menu:
Two 20 lb. Turkeys deepfried
Ham
Sweet potato casserole
Mashed potatoes with gravy
stuffing
Cornbread Stuffing
Apple Nut stuffing
Corn Casserole
Coleslaw
Rolls
Whole Cranberry sauce
Jellied Cranberry sauce
Cheese Tray
Veggie Tray
Deviled Eggs
Veggie Pizza
Cherry Crisp
Pumpkin Pie
Chocolate Silk Pies
Pop
Wine
Beer

Do you think I have enough?!

Big family get-together... we split up kitchen duties and everybody brings a couple of things.

Turkey breast/gravy
Ham
Rolls
Dressing
Jellied cranberry sauce (for my dad)
Cranberry jello salad with pineapple and nuts (for everybody else)
Mashed potatoes or white and wild rice
Green beans
Broccoli with cheese sauce
Buttered Corn
Sweet Potato dish (either chunks of sweet potato with pineapple, mandarin oranges, pecans and marshmallows, or the whipped spiced type topped with nuts and brown sugar; we alternate these)

Appetizers: Pickles, celery sticks with cream cheese filling, Spanish olives

Desserts:
Pound cake with homemade custard
Pumpkin pies
Pecan pies
Applesauce cake with black walnuts

Okay... so we go a little crazy with the variety... When I cook Thanksgiving at home it looks like this:

No appetizers
Turkey breast and/or ham; gravy
Rolls
Dressing
Sweet potato casserole
Cranberry jello salad
Green beans
Pumpkin pie

My mother-in-law has cheese ball with crackers for appetizer, trades rice pilaf for sweet potato casserole, and makes asparagus casserole instead of green beans. And bakes frozen apple pie instead of pumpkin because she doesn't make good pumpkin pies (and admits it).

There will be 5 of us bringing food to feed 14 family members, Heres the list:
Turkey
Ham
Roast Venison
Candied Yams
Green Beans
Potato Salad = 3 Kinds
Corn Salad
Sausage balls
7 layer bean salad
Mac & Cheese
Rolls
Biscuits
Cherry Surprme Cake
Coconut Pie
LemonPineapple Cake
Iced Tea
Coffee
Kool-Aide
Soda

Turkey
sausage and apple stuffing
gravy
mashed potatoes
sweet potato casserole
squash
creamed peas
cole slaw
cranberry relish
jell-o salad with cottage cheese & pineapple
big fluffy rolls & butter
pickles & olives
pumpkin & apple pies
brownies
mixed fresh fruit bowl & nuts

turkey, spiral honey roasted ham, corn bread, potatoe salad, sweet potatos with marshmellows, bake mashed potatos, stuffing, cranberry sauce, roasted carrots, mac and cheese, french fries, green bean casserol and some kind of pie yet to be decided

Turkey,ham,mashed potatoes,green beans,pies and sweet tea.....

pretty good...i think i'm going to have a traditional southern dinner of a small turkey, a small honey baked ham, cornbread dressing, collard greens, candied yams, green beans with smoked meat, cranberry sauce, baked macaroni & cheese, dinner rolls, gravy, and cinnamon apples. for dessert, i think i'm going to have devils food cake or german chocolate cake and probably some jamocha almond fudge ice cream.

Turkey
Ham
Dressing: cornbread dressing and country ham dressing
green beans
sweet potatoes
mashed potatoes
corn: sweet corn and pickled corn
cole slaw
deviled eggs
homemade rolls

desserts:

pumpkin cheesecake
apple pie
holy cow cake

Smoked turkey, Southern Comfort Ham, green bean casserole, smoked sweet-poatoes, mashed potatoes, pumkin pie, pecan pie.

ham , mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, gravy, pumpkincreamsheese roll, mac and cheese and tea too





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