Thanksgiving Dinner 101; How to Cook Your First Thanksgiving Dinner

Here is a basic Thanksgiving recipe that should make the whole process pretty easy. The hard part is the planning. If you try to do everything at once, you are certainly headed for trouble. But if you plan and construct the meal in easy steps, starting a few days before, this should be a breeze. Any small side dishes such as green been casserole, sweet potatoes, and desserts are sure to cause a nightmare if trying to start them all from scratch on the big day. Here is an example of a delicious Thanksgiving meal and how you can divide the side dishes up, making the whole process a lot smoother.
Planning the thanksgiving Menu

• Fresh Cranberry-Orange Relish with Walnuts
• Green Beans with Shallot Butter

• Mashed Potatoes

• Rum Baked Sweet Potatoes
• Pumpkin Pie
• Madeira Pan Gravy
• Stuffing

Two days before your meal, make the following

• Pumpkin pie
• Sweet potatoes
• Cranberry relish
• Stuffing

The day before Thanksgiving do this:

• Was and trim green beans
• Make the shallot butter

On Thanksgiving morning:

• Whip cream for the pie
• Make the stuffing
• Roast the turkey

After taking the turkey out of the oven and it is covered, in the juice.

• Make the gravy
• Cook green beans with shallots
• Make the mashed potatoes