Thanksgiving is an energy-draining affair that comes with a lot of stress. Thus you’ve to prepare and prep dishes before it’s time to dine.
This article gives you a detailed timeline with a breakdown of the most efficient schedule for preparing everything from starters to desserts.
The Soup
An excellent starter for Thanksgiving Day is the fall soup. These types of soups can be made a week ahead of the party. Get a batch of your favorite and freeze it and on the thanksgiving morning, get it out, reheat it on the stove, and it’s ready for serving.
The Gravy
When it comes to turkey gravy recipes, you’ll be spoiled for choice. There are tons of these which don’t require you to use Turkey parts, and you can buy giblets, turkey wings, and necks available in many butcher shops. That means you can buy and have them frozen some two weeks before the material day.
To boost flavor, you can use some parts of the actual bird and whip up the gravy two days ahead.
On the thanksgiving morning, you can reheat the saucepan and then pour over the sliced turkey. It’s such an ingenious way of spicing up the broth.
Turkey
The crown jewel of your Thanksgiving table will and should always be the turkey. Thus you’ve to time it and think ahead of time. It takes up to five days for a 20- pound turkey to thaw in the fridge. So for every four pounds, you’ve to spare a day. And when using brine, you need up to 12 hours for the bird to marinate.
Depending on the size, it will take you 2-4 hours to roast the unstuffed bird. For the breast met, ensure the thermometer reads something like 165 degrees F and 170-175 degrees F for the thick thigh part before getting it out of the oven.
Use a foil to tent it and allow some 30 minutes before slicing. That will ensure that nobody complains about dryness.
Stuffing
If you’re thinking of a homemade stuffing recipe, you’ve to think ahead. You need to cube the bread and set it out stale some two days before the day. You can also bake the cornbread and leave it at the counter for stuffing. And if you’re serving stuffing on the side, assemble everything a day ahead and refrigerate until the time you want to bake.
The Desserts
Looking forward to the top dessert recipes for your Thanksgiving? Baking is a bit time-consuming, especially when you’ve to host an extended family and friends. A dessert can therefore be made way ahead of time. Making pie dough a week before makes things easier, then you can portion it into disks and freeze.
Like two days before, you can move the dough to the fridge and defrost, so you wait for the thanksgiving eve to bake up a storm. You can refrigerate pumpkin pies and custard overnight, while apple pies and pecan work perfectly at room temperature.
Before you declare yourself ready for the day, get ready with the drinks for the day. The wine bottles should be chilled in the fridge the night before, or if you live in a cold area, you can put them on the back porch.
Be creative in what you do in preparation for the Thanksgiving. Give the menu your best and be ready with everything on time. A good plan should ensure everything is set the night before Thanksgiving with only a few touches to be done on the material day- have a great thanksgiving!
