On the Thanksgiving Table #weekendcooking @BethFishReads

Thanksgiving time is a foodie delight, and I always have a zillion recipes I want to try. So we stocked up on squash, pumpkin seeds, sage, and dried cranberries and were ready to start. We’ll keep the menu simple this year!

But we can’t forget the turkey, ingredients for the stuffing, and also we need a vegetarian stuffing. Plus a vegetarian main course as an alternative to turkey and several traditional sides as well as some new recipes I want to try. We’ll skip the rolls because everyone is counting carbs, but we need cornbread for the stuffing. Then there the three different kinds of cranberry sauce, the sweet gherkins (Just realized I forgot to serve these, I bought them so far in advance!), and, of course, pies and other sweet treats for dessert.

We also need our fruiturkey — a Thanksgiving tradition started by our oldest daughter who thereby doomed herself to having to recreate it every year.

We always start Thanksgiving Day with pumpkin pie for breakfast. We DO put whipped cream on it!

The pie crust is homemade using King Arthur Flour’s Measure for Measure gluten-free flour.

I tried a new recipe for Cornbread-Sausage Stuffing this year from America’s Test Kitchen’s How Can It Be Gluten-Free cookbook, and I will definitely make it again! You can find the recipe here.

 I divided half the recipe to make it vegetarian and also used vegetable broth instead of chicken broth for the whole recipe. The sausage helped keep the stuffing moist and I cooked the vegetarian ones in muffin tins, so they were crispy and delicious fresh from the oven, but got a little dried out when reheated for a later meal.

Another cookbook I used was New England Invite by Kate Bowler of the Domestikated Life blog. She visited our library’s Cookbook Club in September and I bought a copy of her cookbook.

I made her recipe for pumpkin butter, but instead of serving it with Brie and pecans, I spread it on cream cheese and sprinkled it with those ubiquitous pumpkin seeds and dried cranberries to make a spread for crackers or Granny Smith apple slices. Delicious!

I was pretty proud of this pumpkin butter cheese log and appetizer plate, but check out Kate’s Pumpkin Grazing Board on her blog. She definitely outdid me!

Can’t end this blog post without mentioning another recipe from a cookbook club author. We couldn’t sample any of the alcoholic beverage recipes at the library, but the Aperol Spritz from Lidia’s Celebrate Like an Italian cookbook by Lidia Bastianich was delicious at home on Thanksgiving night with baked brie and savory apples.

Happy Weekend Cooking!

Linked to Weekend Cooking, a weekly feature on Beth Fish Reads. Click/tap image for Weekend Cooking posts from other bloggers.