Fallen Souffle

As of Monday, Evan and I will be hosting Thanksgiving for his side of the family. This was a last minute change in plans due to his brother and family moving from Georgia to Wilmington, NC and his parents doing some renovations to the house. So we are throwing a last minute meal at our place. I am excited and stressed at the same time…10 people over and a full Thanksgiving spread, and because I am such a perfectionist everything must be perfect. So the menu is:

Roasted Turkey
Ciabatta Stuffing with Pancetta
Garlic Mashed Potatoes
Whipped Sweet Potatoes with Carmelized Apples
Roasted Broccoli
Fresh Cranberry Sauce
Yeast Rolls

Pumpkin Roll with Caramel Sauce

Because I don’t want to be running around all day Thursday I have made a plan to do a few tasks each night. Last night was the all important grocery shopping which Evan and I did at 9:30 last night. It was kinda strange going in that late to do our Thanksgiving shopping but then again it was great because there were only 4 other people in the whole place. I did feel bad for the guy behind us in the checkout line (you know they only keep one open) he has a gallon of milk and some lettuce and as were halfway through unloading our cart before I realized him, otherwise I would have totally let him go.

Tonight, after a meeting, I came home and baked the two largest sweet potatoes I have ever seen, they weigh almost 2 pounds each no joke. They will probably take 3 hours to bake. I am also roasting the garlic for the mashed potatoes and I made the caramel sauce for the desserts. I must say food is a cool thing, if you are ever bored, go make yourself some real caramel sauce..it is fun and easy!

Tomorrow I will make the dough for the rolls, bake the cranberry sauce, and set the table. If I am feeling ambitious I will prep the veggies.

My biggest concern right now is the bird. We wanted to smoke it because that would be different and would keep the oven free. But because it has been so windy and cold, and is expected to continue the smoker can’t keep the temperature up so we are afraid it will take too long to cook. So I am dusting off my portable roaster and will be roasting it in there. I have never cooked an entire turkry but I imagine with Evan on basting duty we should be ok.

So that’s what my week has been like. Be sure to stick around the day after to see the result…because I will NOT be out on Black Friday this year. My Christmas shopping is almost done

If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 21st, 2006 at 6:23 pm and is filed under Holidays. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.