My family says the snacks turned out great! I ground my own venison and used High Mountain Original & Hickory jerky seasonings. The first 3# batch I split in thirds using the 3 different tips that came with my jerky shooter so I could test them all out; round tip, wide flat tip, and double slotted flat tip (makes 2 narrow strips at a time). The round snacks win hands down as my family's favorite. The round ones held their shape just fine. I don't think I care fore the texture you get when a cure is used. The next several batches I make I may try recipes w/o cure, but then the round sticks may not hold together as well, as you mentioned, dirtguy50.. I would like to try the NCHFP recipe for ground jerky, but I've made a similar one in the past and do not care for the worcestershire. Does anyone know if that is necessary, or is it just there for flavor?

Cereal mix, Rice Krispie treats, popcorn. How about making some homemade cookies (if you're short on time, just turn your favorite recipe into a bar cookie and cut into squares, rectangles or diamonds). Mini Muffins. You could get hoagies and cut into 1" wide slices so they're appetizer sized. Pizza is inexpensive to make, and again, cut into small pieces since everyone usually wants to try many different things. Pepperoni bread is easy and inexpensive. Just roll out purchased frozen bread to a thin rectangle, cover with pepperoni, grated mozzarella and add a sprinkling of Italian seasoning or oregano, roll up, let rise and bake. Serve warm, sliced about 1" thick. Everyone loves it. You can put out a bowl of warm marinara sauce for dipping, if you like.

Hmmm. We don't really do formal sit-down meals. Although we sit down together to eat, we tend to make plates in the kitchen and take each plate to the DR. Although I have nice china (a set of 12, even), it's pretty much for looks and has really only been used 3-4 times over the span of a 13-year marriage. Our everyday dishes, glasses and "silverware" are all of the Costco-Phalzgraff-Target-earthenware variety because we tend to overload the DW, drop and chip with frequency and I want to be able to replace as needed. I can't really see myself or anyone else in my family carrying dishes on a tray (or storing said tray). Maybe it would be best to store the dishes near the DW to make clean up easier, and just make the longer walk for prep/snack? Nobody will be making snacks at the same time as cleanup, so I can't see anyone getting in the way of cleanup at that point, and when we do have formal holiday dinners (all parties are informal buffet/bbq style), we generally clean up dinner before serving dessert so that everyone has a chance to digest and chat before moving to the next course anyway.

My girls don't live far away, one lives within a mile, the other about 35 miles away. Everyone shows up about an hour before the meal is eaten, and we never serve alcohol of any type but I always have coffee, tea, soft drinks, sparkling juice, whatever. I spend a lot of time making dinner but we still have a cheeseball, homemade sausage or salami, a tray of olives and pickles and deviled eggs, some hummus or spinach dip or something and my mother always brings a tray of raw vegetables and sometimes fruit. Everyone talks and has a bite of this and a piece of that and adults talk and kids play while last minute things get done. We sit down to our meal, laugh and chat, sometimes the kids eat and sometimes they don't, but I don't really care. It's my holiday and I only care that my family is around my table, not what they consume. Plus I like the Thanksgiving leftovers, so more for me. (grin) My mother also likes the leftovers, and she's the one that tends to fill up on "munchie" things and dessert and takes a couple of meals worth of leftovers home with her. She's says that now she's 82 and she's going to only eat what she wants to eat. Since her blood pressure is good and she has no health problems that we are aware of, and she weighs about 90 pounds, I don't argue, she eats what she wants and then has seconds. Plus coffee, LOL. After the meal anyone who wants dessert has some, but some wait and have it later and some never do have dessert, they just eat more of the cheese and sausage or dip and that's fine too. We all tend to drink coffee until late afternoon, so I've been known to make a carafe full of some foofoo coffee drink and we have that with dessert or instead of dessert or after dessert, whenever the mood hits. You can see that, although I have a "sit down" meal which takes me two or three days to fully prepare, I tend to be somewhat relaxed. It's Thanksgiving and I know exactly what I'm thankful for. I'm thankful for the food on the table, of course, but I'm mostly thankful for those gathered around it. Annie