Last Minute Tips for Stress Free Thanksgiving
The holidays are stressful, but that doesn't mean that you have to take on this stress in order to have a great Thanksgiving dinner. Even if you are planning your dinner at the last minute, you still have options to successfully host a delicious Thanksgiving dinner party. Here are some tips that will hopefully help you decrease the stress of planning a Thanksgiving spread.
Simple menu
One of the easiest ways to make your Thanksgiving dinner more stress-free is to create a simple yet elegant menu that adheres to some traditional Thanksgiving food items. For example, instead of doing all of the preparation that comes with a turkey, you might consider cooking the turkey in small portions to decrease the cooking time. If you do not feel like being too traditional, you could make a rotisserie chicken instead. A simpler menu might be a welcome change from some heavier items that take more preparation and work to make. Your guests will still appreciate the effort.
Buffet style
Serving the food buffet or 'family' style is a great idea if you are going to have a lot of guests and a big spread of food. Each person can serve him- or herself, and people can get the food that they want to eat. You will be able to cut down on waste since people choose the food that they want to eat. Not only that, but serving food family style can help relieve you from the job of serving everybody. You can sit back and relax and spend valuable time with your guests, instead of worrying about who gets what food.
Choosing the type of food to serve would make this style of serving much more efficient. For example, casseroles are great for buffet style because people can get their own portions.
One good tip to remember is to try to prepare the ingredients and the components of each dish beforehand so that when Thanksgiving day comes, all that you need to do is put items in the oven, or put the components together to complete the meal.
Another good tip is to serve the food with actual dinner plates. This way, you cut down on paper waste and you can have everybody put their plates in a big pan, ready to go into the dishwasher or into the sink. You won't have to worry about people figuring out which plates or utensils can be recycled.
Thanksgiving dinner is going to involve a lot of work, but these tips will hopefully get you through the planning and through the actual day without a hitch.
