HU - Well....look at that, I forgot all about this old thread. 8 years ago? Wow! So, you are happy for Thanksgiving....what are you looking forward to? So, do you have family somewhere that you are not going to be able to get together with? We will not be able to get together with our family. First time in our lives that will be the case. Not one Thanksgiving or Christmas that we haven't been able to get together for a holiday dinner. So I'd say that is something to be VERY thankful for. And I'm a lot older than you are. [g]. And I hadn't thought about it that way until just this minute. So you did me a favor to bring this thread up. We are going to be making dinner, which we enjoy doing. We will have dinner ourselves but we will be delivering Thanksgiving Dinner to a couple of our kids. A small, easy, traditional dinner. I just got through making a food order. I looked at a weather forecast and it may rain on Thanksgiving, which would make it difficult to even have a short visit outdoors with anyone, but the forecast is wrong a lot, especially when it's an early one. So, what are you looking forward to HU?

We moved 1200 miles last week, so still unpacking, I spent an hour today searching for the good silver, which I had cryptically labeled for the move and then forgot the label. However, I made the dressing earlier because it freezes well and it made the move still frozen solid in DH's Yeti. DD lives next door and made a carrot soufflé and two pies last night and will make the green beans and Mom's rolls (I'm a pretty fair cook, but that particular skill skipped a generation and besides I haven't located my cookie sheets yet). I made the cranberry orange sauce tonight, along with spiced tea and an asparagus casserole. Tomorrow will be the turkey, ambrosia, mashed potatoes and boiled custard --all easy -- and I'll set the table (just realized the napkins are still MIA). I might also cook a ham to have with leftovers. It still should be manageable because we aren't planning on eating until 2 o'clock. There will only be six or eight of us, plus the baby.

Oh yes, we are also having homegrown potatoes from our winter storage, but mine this year are Kennebec and Pontiac, LOL. I did grow the blue potatoes last year and we mashed some, they kind of became a lovely lavender, which did look a bit unappetizing when covered with the turkey gravy and looked even odder when the leftovers were used for shepherd's pie! Mother's raspberry pie will contain the raspberries that I picked, a cupful at a time, and froze so I would have enough, and the cornbread stuffing will use some of my dehydrated leeks and our homemade Italian sausage. We'll also be having deviled eggs with eggs from my hens and peach cobbler with peaches from last year's harvest, the final bag left in the freezer. I also grew those purple carrots and you're right, they aren't purple all the way through, they're orange in the middle, but if I can them, they're all dark. Zombie Carrots, the grandkids call them. Happy Thanksgiving. Annie

Artemis_Ma, that sounds like the stuffing I make now that was my Mom's recipe. Here's my recipe: My Stuffing (or Dressing depending on your frame of mind) Growing up, our family always used to stuff the turkey. Thus, it was stuffing. However with all the concern about bacteria and under cooking, I started cooking it in a casserole dish. Thus, it is no longer stuffing, but dressing. Ingredients 16 cups of assorted mild flavored stale bread 1 onion, chopped fine 3 stalks of celery, chopped fine 1-16 oz tube of sausage (I like Jimmy Dean regular or sage) 2-4 cups chicken broth 6 oz sliced fresh button mushrooms 6 tablespoons butter Poultry seasoning (parsley, sage, rosemary, thyme, salt and pepper) Whenever I have ends of loaves of bread, or we don’t finish a loaf of bread, I’ll put them in a freezer bag and throw them in the freezer until I’m ready to make stuffing. You want to use mild breads (any white bread, hamburger or hot dog rolls, whole wheat, multi grain, sour dough, Italian, French, etc, work well. Breads that have a strong flavor like rye bread, pumpernickel, garlic bread, etc, will overwhelm the flavor of the stuffing. Don’t use these.) Toast bread in the toaster until golden brown. Tear bread into bite size pieces and put into a large bowl. In a large skillet, cook the sausage until no longer pink. Do not drain. Put sausage (grease and all) into bread bowl and crumb sausage. In the same skillet, melt 2 tablespoons of butter. Sauté onion until translucent. Add to bread and sausage (do not drain). In the same skillet, melt 2 tablespoons of butter. Sauté slice mushrooms until tender (until they start to sweat). Add to bread and sausage (do not drain). In the same skillet, melt 2 tablespoons of butter. Sauté celery until tender. Add to bread and sausage (do not drain). Heat the chicken broth (start with 2 cups) until boiling and pour over the bread and sausage mixture. Add two heaping tablespoons of poultry seasoning. Mix everything with your hands. The mixture should be moist but not soggy. If the mixture is still dry add a little more chicken broth. If stuffing the bird, stuff the bird and cook according to roasting directions for the bird. If making dressing, place the stuffing in a greased casserole dish (or two. I use two smaller casserole dishes. A 13x9 baking dish can usually accommodate it.) Bake covered at 350 degrees F for 1 hour.