Thanksgiving Dinner, Stout Style

One year, I can't tell you which one, I was pretty smart and organized. Since I feel like I'm regularly losing brain cells, it must have been quite a while ago. Anyway, I typed in our Thanksgiving menu into the computer. I also added the recipes, and on the second page I added the shopping list. For the last few years I simply hit print and my menu comes out, along with the shopping list.

~The Stout's Thanksgiving Menu~

Appetizer platter: stuffed celery (cream cheese or peanut butter), carrots, pickles, nuts, Aunt Christina's eggs

Roast Turkey

Stuffing with onions, olives and celery (Nana Hill's recipe)

Plain Stuffing (for the picky)

Cranberry jelly (out of the can, for Don's comfort)

Cranberry Jell-o Salad (Nana Hill's recipe)

Green salad with raspberry dressing, dried cranberries and pralines

Spinach and Artichoke casserole (from the year the Crouch's didn't have a kitchen and this was their favorite and we didn't want them to miss out, but we thought we should adopt it as a regular)

Carrot/Cheese casserole (Nana Hill's recipe)

Macaroni and Cheese casserole (Nana Hill's recipe)

Green bean Casserole (Mom Stout's recipe)

Sweet Potato Souffle (Grandma Hattenfield's recipe)

Pumpkin soup (My own recipe!)

Garlic mashed potatoes (for my niece, Christen's delight)

Turkey gravy

Cranberry juice with 7up (Nana Stout's mixture)

Egg nog (A recipe I adopted while in college from my Campus Crusade for Christ staff member)

Fresh baked bread

Pumpkin Pie

Apple Pie (I prefer Dutch Apple or French Apple, so I make one of those, and then a traditional for everyone else!)

Each year, we host a different crew. And I see, as the years go on, that it will continue to be different people for the rest of my life. Tomorrow we are hosting 21. But every year is different. I input all of the casserole recipes into a calorie counter a few years ago, and figured I ate 3100 calories in one meal! On Monday of this week, I boiled and peeled everything. Yesterday I mashed everything. Today, with the help of Priscilla, Philip and Andrew, we mixed everything. Tomorrow we will put on the toppings and bake everything, after the turkey is done, resting and waiting to be carved. I love to have a clean kitchen when I serve dinner. I like the dishwashers to be empty and ready to be loaded with the dinner dishes before we eat dessert. That's why I trash my kitchen the day before! Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!