Thanksgiving 2012

It is Thanksgiving week.  We have shopped and now are ready to start cooking.  I made cranberry sauce using a mix of fresh and dried berries with sugar and oranges.  Mmmm, tasty.  Wednesday was pie making day.  I invited any of the Young adults that wanted to make pies to come.  Ronny, Vanessa, and Yvonne came to help.  Sisters Larson and Child also came to help.  We made 11 pumpkin pies.  The girls mixed and rolled pie crust, mixed pumpkin filling and baked pies.  They smelled wonderful.  After the clean up was done, we decided to fold the napkins for each place setting.  Ronny went on line and found a bunch of folded napkins.  We picked one that didn't look too hard, and proceeded to fold 80 napkins.  They looked like little swans or crowns, I can't decide which.  Dan had sat up all the tables, so we added the dishes and napkins and then went home.  It made it a lot more fun with the young adults there to help.

Thanksgiving Day!  Lots to do to get dinner ready  for 75 people.  First, the dressing.  I mixed it together and then put it in the crock pot to cook.   I had never cooked it in the crock pot before but had instructions and went for it.   Next, the green bean casserole.  You can't buy cream of mushroom soup in Germany, so I had to make my own before making the sauce for the green beans.  The next project was the homemade rolls.  I made 90+ rolls.  I will warm them before we eat.  Now it is time to go take a little rest before cooking the turkey.  Turkeys in Germany are small and ovens are small.  It was a better use of space and time to cook turkey breasts.  I seasoned them them same way I always do and put them in cooking bags to pop in the oven at 5pm.  After the turkeys were in the oven,  I got the potatoes ready to go.  I used potato flakes, I just didn't have the time or inclination to peel and mash potatoes for 75 people.   When the turkeys were done, drained off the liquid and made a gallon of gravy.  They have this gravy thickener her that is wonderful.  It doesn't lump!  I will have to go to the German market to buy this when I get home.  The beans are hot, the rolls are hot, the turkey is sliced up, it is time to eat.

We had an assembly line to serve the dinner.  Several of the young adults helped serve making the line go faster.  It seemed that it would never end.  I was beginning to get worried that the food would run out, but we had just enough.  Everyone was full!  It was nice to serve a traditional Thanksgiving dinner, just a lot o work.

Now, my least favorite part, Clean up.  Most of the kids helped do dishes, take down tables and put chairs away.  We were all done by 1030pm.  Elder Johnson and I went home tired but happy to have spent a nice Thanksgiving with our new friends in Germany.