It’s after Halloween and I’m behind on my Thanksgiving planning. Life and deadlines took over the past few weeks, but it’s never too late to so some pre-planning for Thanksgiving (and maybe other holidays like Christmas and Hannukah). That way, if you have the time and money, you can buy some of your food/supplies early and won’t have to get caught in the rush closer to the event.
So this week’s homework is pretty easy. With your Legal Pad 2 (Food and House Inventory from week 1 homework), take a blank page and mark it with a page flag. First, note if you’re having any visitors around the holidays. Mark the dates and number of people. Include the college kids coming home because they eat a lot!. Then, once you have an idea of who’s coming home when, decide how many large and small meals you need to make. (If you’re not entertaining or cooking a large meal, are you going to someone’s house and want to bring an appetizer or a dessert? If so, mark that down.)
If you’re not doing any cooking or entertaining or bringing anything to a party, you’re don’t need to do the next activity. But if you are hosting any of these things, use the legal pad to jot down any meal ideas besides the big ones like Thanksgiving dinner. Are you doing a dinner for guests the night before Thanksgiving? Breakfast on Saturday or Sunday? Or on Friday night after a long day of shopping? Or will you be snacking while watching football games? It doesn’t matter the meals look like–write down any ideas.
Before we start, here are some printables/downloads to help you get started with other holiday prepping, including a servings/portion chart on how to decide how big of a turkey to buy and how much stuffing to make.
Here’s a brief example of my meals idea list that starts Tuesday before Thanksgiving and ends on Sunday night:
Note: many of these recipes are included in The Hungry {Romance} Writer recipe collection.
Tuesday night: Turkey and Sweet Potato Chili party around the fire-pit (6 adults)
Wednesday: Breakfast is pumpkin muffins and eggs & lunch is sandwiches (4 adults). Dinner of Ham & Potato Soup and homemade sourdough pumpkin & rosemary bread (8 adults)
Thursday: Breakfast is an asparagus quiche (4 adults) Thanksgiving dinner, including apps and dessert (18 adults & 2 children under 8)
Friday: Dutch Apple Pancake (8 adults) for breakfast, lunch is leftovers for the men (3 adults) while the women go to Thanksgiving Tea. Dinner is leftovers (10 adults)
Saturday: Breakfast is whole wheat waffles (6 adults), Lunch is sandwiches/football snacks for the men (5 adults) while the women go thrifting and have a pub lunch. Dinner is crockpot pink salt pork sliders and leftover apps and desserts.
Sunday: Brunch at our favorite cafe (11 adults). Dinner is leftovers (6 adults)
So…. that’s a lot of meals to plan for!
Now, still using Legal Pad 2, itemize all of the meals and do a quick ingredient list. Once you have your list of ingredients, check the pantry, freezer, etc to see what you have or what you can use, even if you end up changing your menu plan. Once that’s done, take another blank page and make a shopping list.
Once you have your shopping list, highlight the ingredients you can buy now. Canned goods, meat you can freeze, baking goods, etc. And make a separate list for last minute items like fresh veggies. There’s no getting around buying fresh veggies closer to the date unless you can have a farm/CSA deliver them to you. Meanwhile, if you collect coupons or sales flyers, begin to look for the best prices and start shopping. Now, I don’t mean run out and buy everything all at once! If you do that, you may miss out on sales that happen closer to the holidays. What I mean is take your list and your coupons and every time you go to the store, see if there’s anything on your list you can pick up now. If the shelves empty again, you’ll be happy you started now.
Prices are going up and I do love to use coupons. So sometimes I play roulette with supply and price, where I’ll wait to get something so I can use a double coupon the next week. But this year I’m marking my shopping list with things I MUST have and buying them when I see them. Not everyone has that option, but if you figure out what you need now, and start shopping around, you’ll have a better chance of getting it at the best price. If you can’t find things at a good price, you’ll have time to determine how important each ingredient/food/drink is to your celebrations. But by making this list early, you’ll have more controlled flexibility over your decision-making. And that’s the goal of Prepping & Planning!
Okay. So that’s this week’s assignment. Figure out your menu for the next month or two (depending on the holidays you celebrate and all the things/visitors you have planned). Make an ingredient list and, from that, make a shopping list. Don’t forget to include any cleaning supplies that you might need (from last week’s list), especially any specialty or seasonal items like silver polish and lysol. Good luck!
