Thanksgiving Dinner with all the Fixin's!

Ready for that full Thanksgiving meal? I wasn't. In fact, this was the first time I had ever prepared one. Growing up it was my Grandmother. Then, as she got older and massive cooking became harder it turned into some combination of relatives and take-out. And then it became mostly catered from Whole Foods or Wegman's and then dumped into other dishes to look homemade. We've become adept at doing this very quickly.

However, this year turned out differently. Due to work schedules my boyfriend and I were unable to be with either of our families for actual Thanksgiving. Knowing how important the holiday is to him, I offered to make our own Thanksgiving in our apartment on the Wednesday before. Long story short, our schedules changed, we had many Thanksgivings that weren't on Thanksgiving, and it was beyond complicated. But our Thanksgiving happened about a week late and I cooked up a storm that took the two of us over a week to eat.

So do not worry if this is your first time! I'll walk you through step by step and soon you'll have a full Thanksgiving meal. It's not nearly as scary as it seems. I made the traditional dishes without going crazy since there were only two of us so below you will find: Turkey with Truffle Gravy, Butternut Squash and Leek Gratin, Bread Stuffing, Apple Pie, Pumpkin Pie, and Garlic Mashed Potatoes. I also simply microwaved frozen corn to complete the meal. Enjoy! And feel free to ask questions below - I love comments.

Turkey with Truffle Gravy
This was the part that scared me the most. After all, I had never made a turkey and I don't even like meat. This seemed gross and weird. But, I can hardly skip the turkey after promising a full Thanksgiving meal. I did some research and came up with a recipe to help me along my way. But first, I had to order my Turkey. Make sure you order in advance since the rest of the country is doing the same thing. I also strongly urge you to order a free-range turkey. Most of the meat in this country is treated horribly. Did you know they even cut the little curly tails off of pigs so they can pack them more tightly into pens? They do. Picture that next time you buy regular meat. But if you purchase free-range turkey (or pig or chicken or cow) then that means the animals were able to roam freely and were treated well during their life. So do the right thing and pay the extra buck!

And then you have to cook it. I followed the instructions rather broadly. First, you have to remove all of the stuff inside the turkey. To be honest, I wasn't 100% sure how to identify all of these pieces but basically just pull out everything that is inside the turkey. Then you can tie up the feet and follow the instructions for basting the turkey and sticking some herbs and onions inside. That's the easy part. Instead of following the cooking instructions given by this recipe, however, I went with the instructions printed on my turkey package. The turkey also came with a plastic pop-up temperature gauge but I still used a thermometer to make sure the turkey had reached the correct temperature. The good news is that once the turkey is in the oven, you are pretty much done with it!

But then you still have gravy. In this case I made the full-fledged turkey gravy... or mostly. I found myself staring in disgust at some of the innards. There were 2 pieces shaped a bit like wings that were okay, but then there was a gooey bloody mass. The neck, perhaps? Not sure, but I wanted nothing to do with it. I quickly tossed that and decided it wasn't necessary for the gravy!

Perhaps because I ditched the gross stuff or perhaps for some other reason, my gravy did not turn fatty. There was nothing to siphon off when I carefully let my gravy sit in the plastic bag, so I just used all of it. Not sure why that happened, but it worked out and tasted like gravy and didn't seem particularly fattening. So, um, good! The truffle oil definitely added a tasteful touch, however, and was worth $13 for a tiny bottle.

Butternut Squash and Leek Gratin
Ready for a delicious vegetable? My boyfriend, not always the biggest fan of vegetables, could not get enough of this. What was truly telling was that with so many favorites on the table, the first thing he wanted when he went for seconds was this squash. And if that's not a ringing endorsement then I don't know what is!

Ingredients:
butternut squash
butter
leek
sugar
black pepper
nutmeg
eggs
parmesan cheese

Preheat your oven to 375. Cut two butternut squash in half (long way of course so you have mirror image pieces) and cook for 45 minutes with the cut side down. When the 45 minutes are up they should be nice and soft. Cool just until you can touch them and then scoop out all of the squash yummy goodness inside and put in a large bowl.

While the squash is cooking you can saute the leek. Put a small amount of butter in a pan over medium heat. Cut up 4-5 leek (you want 4 cups) and add it to the pan. If you cut it in slices you can separate out the concentric circles as you dump it in the pan. Saute for about 25 minutes, stirring occasionally. The leek should be soft and browned by the end. Cool slightly and add the leek to the squash.

To the leek/squash mixture add: 1 tsp black pepper, 1/2 tsp nutmeg, 1 tbsp sugar, 4 eggs, 1 egg yolk. Mix well with a whisk until well combined. Using the whisk will help keep the gratin light and fluffy, incorporating some air.

Put the mixture into a greased glass baking dish. I used a 9x9 dish. Cover with foil and bake for 25 minutes at 325. Uncover and bake another 15 min. Sprinkle the gratin with 1/2-1/3 cup of grated parmesan cheese. Broil on high for 2 minutes and then enjoy! The cheese should be browned on top.

Bread Stuffing
A lot of the time people make bread stuffing from a package, but of course we would have none of that! I searched and found a recipe to make my stuffing from scratch. I also figured this would be a good way to cut down on excess salt since while I love stuffing it usually leaves me gasping for water by the end.

You'll find the recipe exceedingly easy to follow. The hardest part for me was keeping my boyfriend from eating the fresh french bread I'd brought home the day before. After all, it makes it far more difficult to make bread stuffing if you do not have any bread.

You can just as easily substitute vegetable broth for chicken broth here if you are interested in keeping your stuffing vegetarian. Also, keep in mind for your gratin and stuffing that you can prepare them and have them in their dishes ready to go and then wait to bake until the end so everything is timed to come together at the end.

Apple Pie
What would Thanksgiving be without apple pie? I mean, as far as I'm concerned all desserts should be chocolate, but if they aren't chocolate than fruit pies/crisps do come in a close second, especially when served hot with cold ice cream. I love ice cream. I love lamp.

So here is the pie! Except I definitely had to make a few changes to this one. For one, I didn't have enough crust. Make at least 1.5 times the recipe. Despite efforts to roll the crust as thin as possible I didn't have enough dough to cover the sides so my pie had a top and bottom but no side. I declared it to be a modern side - like a sofa without arms at the end. (The kind I like, after all.)

But while the crust didn't provide enough, the apples provided far too many. I had two pies worth of apples. I'm not sure if my Braeburns were absurdly large or what, but it didn't work out and I had to make an extra pie and freeze it after lugging all of those apples home from Whole Foods in my backpack. My suggestion? Just buy 4-5 of them..

Get your apple pie all ready to go and then toss it in the oven as you sit down to eat your meal. That way it is hot and fresh for dessert!

Pumpkin Pie
Would you believe that I don't really like pumpkin pie? I don't - but it's part of Thanksgiving and my boyfriend loves it. Also, it's incredibly easy to make so you don't really have a good reason not to do it. This easy. You are literally dumping pumpkin, evaporated milk, eggs, and a few other things in a bowl and mixing it up. We don't get a lot easier than this. However, I really appreciated the amaretto whipped cream that they suggested in this recipe. It adds an interesting twist that made even me sample some pumpkin pie.

However, you'll see they tell you to buy a crust. What is with that? That's not how we do it in the Julia kitchen! I whipped up some pie crust that should look very similar to the one for the apple pie. And like the pie it also didn't provide enough, leaving me side-less. So again, make more than the recipe calls for!

Because pumpkin pies are served chilled anyway I made this the night before and put it in the fridge. This gave me one less thing to do on "Thanksgiving Day."

Garlic Mashed Potatoes
Last but not least, we come to the garlic mashed potatoes. A simple yet pivotal part of any Thanksgiving meal.

Ingredients:
garlic
olive oil
potatoes
milk
salt
pepper

If you've ever made mashed potatoes before, it's the same idea here but just healthier. Remove excess white papery skin from the garlic head and wrap it in foil. Bake at 375 for an hour. This provides delicious roasted garlic! Resist spreading it on bread and eating it immediately.

Wash your potatoes well and cut them into quarters. I enjoy the skin in my mashed potatoes and leave it on, but you could remove it if you prefer. Boil a large pot of water and dump them in. Boil the potatoes for 15 minutes (they should now be soft.) Drain and put in a large bowl.

Use a potato masher to mash your potatoes until they are the normal consistency for the dish. Heat 1/2 cup of milk over medium low heat in a small pan but do not let it boil. Add it to the potatoes. Stir well.

Separate each of the cloves of garlic and squeeze the roasted garlic into the potatoes. Add salt and pepper. Stir well and serve hot.