Thanksgiving Dinner

Due to the vagaries of the economy, we're skipping this year's annual trek to Texas for Thanksgiving with my in laws. I'm still ambivalent about skipping it, my family lives here in Georgia, so we see them pretty frequently. My husband's family can't travel to us, because they own a restaurant and can never take time off. Our Thanksgiving visit is really the only time we see them. But we're decided now and my mother in law, surprisingly, is cool with it.

My own mother (who will do anything to weasel out of cooking Thanksgiving) told me last weekend that they won't be spending Thanksgiving in Florida on the beach. My sister just got a new job and doesn't have the time off to travel, my other sister and my brother both have finals that week. So rather than attempt to get everyone down to Florida, they planned to stay home. And since I'm home, I offered to make dinner this year.

So now I get the challenge of making Thanksgiving for my picky siblings and my diabetic father. After some emailing back and forth with Mom, I seem to have worked out a menu.

Dinner...
Roast turkey with Cranberry Orange relish
Corn bread dressing
Roasted mixed potatoes (mix of different kinds, including sweet potatoes)
Green bean casserole
Spinach salad (baby spinach topped with red onion, bacon bits, chopped hard
boiled egg and silvered almonds)
Roasted broccoli


Snacks before dinner...
Raw veggies and dip
Baked brie with warm fruit compote

Dessert...
Applesauce cake (made with Splenda for Dad, since this is his favorite cake.)
Pumpkin pie

The heavy baking doesn't bother me. I've got the Wednesday off from school and I'll probably be home early on Tuesday. I may leave off the pumpkin pie if my sister decides to bring a pumpkin cheese cake. She's still deciding if she wants to do that or a pecan pie.

So even though it's a little early, I've got my plan. I'll be looking for sales on the ingredients I need, or searching out local/ organic sources for the next few weeks.