I remember my very first Thanksgiving, or at least the one that I cooked myself. It was my first year married and I was working at Honey Baked Ham with my father and sister. So were were guaranteed a free ham, in our case 3 hams. I still bought a decent sized bird because there were going to be about 8 or 9 of us. I don't remember how big it actually was but it was over 10 lbs.
I had worked all day at Honey Baked and if you have ever been there during the holidays you know what it is like, constant chaos but more or less it was kinda fun, I thrive on that a bit. So I worked all day and had to go home and get some prep work done for the next day. The first thing I did was to make the pies. Now Tim and I are not fans of pumpkin pie so we just buy a store bought one but I like apple. So there I sat, peeling and cutting up about 20 apples for 2 hours. NEVER AGAIN! The following year I bought the apple-peeler-corer-slicer from Pampered Chef, cut my time by ALOT! But I made the pies and I was ready for the next day.
I slow cooked the turkey all night on low so I could sleep in in the morning. That was nice. But I finally got up and started to get everything ready. Tim helped by cleaning up the house and getting the table set. I stood in the kitchen most of the morning and early afternoon getting it all done.
Finally it as time to eat....25 minutes is all it took to eat all the food that I cooked all day and night. 25 minutes...sad really but what are you going to do. So then the clean up and the phone calls began. Tim called home and spoke with his family and they asked all the normal questions, but there was one that I was not expecting. "What kind of pasta dish did you have?" I asked him, who the hell has pasta on Thanksgiving! He said, "Italians." I said, "Oh, well next year if I cook I will be sure to make a pasta dish of some sort for your/our family tradition."
So each year that I cook, I always cook a pasta dish. It is usually lasagna because everyone loves it and this year will be no different. Lasagna it is. Speaking of which, I need to start making the sauce today or tomorrow so it will be ready for Turkey Day.
Now My Menu
- Turkey (of course)
- Ham (from Honey Baked Ham, first one in 7 years)
- Lasagna (because we are Italian)
- Green beans with shittake mushrooms
- Cranberry sauce (the canned one, why mess with a good thing)
- Mashed Potatoes
- Corn
- Sweet baby carrots
- Stuffing (going to try homemade this year, I have Stove Top for a back up)
- Crumble top apple pie
- Chocolate Pudding pie
- Taco dip (for an appetizer)
- Stuffed mushrooms (another appetizer)
Yes it is a lot of food for just 3 people but I do not intend on cooking at all for at least 3 days or at least not cooking without the above ingredients for 3 days. Going to get the last minute/fresh vegetable items today so I don't have to fight crowds on Tuesday and Wednesday.
One more thing that I'm excited about, we get to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade. Super excited about that too. Yeah for Turkey Day!
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