Creating the Perfect Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is a big deal for me. It is one of those holidays that centers around the kitchen and where I can try out new recipes on unsuspecting friends and family!

For me, a great dinner party starts with a plan. Anyone who knows me knows that I am a hyper-organized person and usually can be found with list in hand. For the second time this year I have tried out a new organizational technique: printing out a cooking plan that includes all the recipes I'm going  to prepare, in the order that I will be making them. I then store them in plastic sheet protectors and use them to refer to during the cooking of my holiday meal.

This turned out to be a useful tool for a few reasons. First, it was easy to create a shopping list for what I would need for the dinner when all of the ingredients are printed out for me in one place. Second, having the recipes on hand, in one place, made it easier to keep track of what I still had left to do. I would simply use a dry erase marker on the sheet protectors to cross out steps as I went. Thirdly, I often get asked for copies of my recipes and hey, I just happen to have a handy printed out copy to hand over right then and there.

Sure, I may have gotten a few askance looks from friends and family, many of them shaking their heads in mock pity over my apparent "going over the OCD deep-end" moment, but that sure didn't stop any of them from enjoying the sumptuous banquet I laid out for them!