Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving - everyone (well almost everyone) wants to have a bang up meal. It's tradition, doncha know?
Honestly, it has always been an expensive endeavor for me in years past. I don't have hordes of people gnoshing at my table. It's always just us. Sometimes I can cajole a relative to eat with us but most often, everyone has their own plans.
I have created a Thanksgiving Monster. Gotta have those dishes you grew up with. Gotta have more food than the NFL team of the year could pack away. Gonna have to relegate your menus for days to revolve around T'Day leftovers. Yeah the leftovers may save you cash for another meal but my goodness, one can only eat so much Turkey and stuff, no matter how you disguise it. Is it really a savings? Well yeah, if you do it the right way (heh - my way).

This year I have decided to scale back. I am going to use what I have on hand and really deep discount shop.
Here's my menu and the broken down cost:

• 12 # Turkey Hen - $5.88. I'm gonna grill that bird and add some peach wood to the coals. Baste with some honey every now and then. (Got this bird on a deep sale)
  

• Dressing - we here in the South call it dressing. We don't stuff the butt of the bird. Why would anyone eat anything that came out of a butt? Anyways - cornbread - a pan full . Bread crumbs - day old bread or whatever you have on hand cut up and toasted. 1 Onion, 1 stalk of celery, 1/2 a bell pepper all chopped up and saute'd in butter. Toss in some salt and pepper, some chicken broth and bake that puppy in a pan till it squeals. Um - maybe about $2.50, could be $4.00 depending on where you get your "stuff".

• Corn - a bag of frozen whole kernel corn, simmered with butter, milk and honey, some salt and pepper. Costs me $1.29 (no name brand, 1#)

• Taters - Well that's a taste thing there - I like sweet taters but everyone else likes plain Russet smashed taters. So I'm going to just do the Russets. Peel and boil until dead, drain, add butter, milk, salt, pepper, and a dollop of sour cream. Smash until there is nothing left to smash. For us - that's probably about $1.00

• Green Beans - what Southerner would have a Thanksgiving spread without Green Beans - Casserole that is.

Me - I simmer garden beans (we grew them and snapped them and froze them) in beef broth until just tender. Drain, toss with fresh chopped onions, cream of mushroom soup, and bake until just right. Add some of those cholesterol killer french fried onions on top and bake some more. Mmmmmmmmmmm Boy! I'm guessing about $2.00.

• Pumpkin Pie - Well the Halloween Jackolanterns didn't give us our pies. Hmmmph - at $7 a piece they should have............... Anyways - I use canned pumpkin and a premade shell. Add the spices and it tastes just yummy. I'm too lazy to make my own shell. Total cost about $3.00
•  Bread - I toss some ingredients in the ABM and let it do its thing. Hmmmm....never thought about it but maybe about a buck?

Leftovers - if you are lucky you can have another full meal. After that, nobody wants to eat leftovers. Here's what I do:

• The turkey gets stripped - all the meat I can pull off goes into zip lok bags for another meal a month from now. 
• The turkey carcass goes into the stockpot and gets simmered until it almost disappears. That's some good broth. Save it after it's cooled and strained and plop in the freezer for a pot of soup later down the road.
• Corn and carrots go in the freezer to become part of turkey soup.
• Dressing, if any is leftover, gets left out to dry. I grind it up and make breading out of it for other meats. Kept in the freezer it lasts a good while. 
• The goat loves leftover green bean casserole so that's where that goes.
• Instead of soup I may make a potpie but I still have that broth to use later.
• If there are leftover taters (rare here) I freeze them and use as a thickener for creamed soup bases.
  

Let's look at overall cost - for a really good spread in my house -

$20.00.

Yep, that's it. That includes everything, spices, additions, etc. Take it a step further and you can break it down even more - into meals. I get at least 4 meals out of Thanksgiving dinner. $5 a meal ain't none too shabby. Feeding 4 people for $5 a big meal is wonderful in this economy. Having Turkey Broth in the freezer is even better. I don't know about you but heating up a pot of broth when you are feeling puny is a great thing for us.

Here's hoping you all have a great Thanksgiving Feast!