Thanksgiving shopping

I love Thanksgiving grocery shopping. Almost as much as I love cooking Thanksgiving dinner!



It was a lovely November Saturday, kind of brisk but sunny out. In my closet review, I pulled out a grey knit Old Navy vest from a few years ago, added a lighter grey Loft long-sleeved tee, a cotton black-and-ivory scarf, my Gap long and leans, and my silver Privos. When it got warmer out, I removed the scarf, but it all still worked fine.



Onto the shopping!

My first stop was Target, where I picked up general staples and brand items.



My menu includes a cranberry-pomegranate cocktail, thus the Ocean Spray. The gravy is for my mother-in-law; Hubby and I use the fresh cranberry sauce on our turkey, but she likes gravy and I don't know how to make it, nor do I have time in the heat of the preparations to make some from the drippings. She'll be happy to have one "normal" thing on her plate anyway. ;-)



Next stop was Whole Foods for the good seasonings and organic vegetables and eggs. Didn't like any of the Brussels sprouts at any of the stores, so they're still on my list for Tuesday night.



Jewel was quick and easy; they always have the size turkey breast I like, at the right price. A few more brand staples that they didn't have at Target too.



Last stop was Tony's Finer Foods for all the basic veggies. They had good prices on fresh herbs too -- sage, rosemary and parsley -- so I grabbed those to use instead of the dried versions I have at home.

So after all that, here is the menu:

Appetizer
Cranberry-pomegranate cocktail (either sparkling wine or vodka depending on what Hubby picks up)
Bacon-wrapped dates stuffed with goat cheese (inspired by Shopping Friend!)

Main meal
butternut squash soup (which I may make and serve on Wednesday night instead)
herbed roast turkey breast
homemade cranberry sauce
roasted Brussels sprouts with balsamic vinegar and thyme
roasted green beans with shallots
crescent rolls with roasted garlic and onion jelly (or butter, for the non- adventurous)
cornbread stuffing with sweet Italian turkey sausage (half of which will go to Shopping Friend)
cheesy horseradish mashed potatoes (or just plain roasted, Hubby is still choosing his preference)
slow-cooker spicy sweet potatoes (for me)

Dessert
pumpkin pie for MIL, apple for Hubby; hopefully I can find smaller tart versions because no one needs a pie to themselves.
(I don't like pie, so I save any remaining need for food for The Sandwich later that night.)

There are a couple of extra dishes in there than previous years, so I am not sure if I will keep them all. It's a crazy amount of food for three people, even if we are going to eat it for several days, and even if most of it is healthy and can be turned into other meals. I would love to ditch the mashed potatoes altogether; I can throw the sweets, green beans and turkey into a soup easily, but mashed potatoes are harder to turn into something else. I doubt MIL and Hubby will want to give them up, though.

We shall see what happens. I am already a day behind on preparations; I had planned to make the cornbread and a batch of oatmeal-pumpkin cookies on Sunday, but we got side-tracked on a different project. MIL is staying with us, so Hubby decided he needed to bring an old couch up from the basement to the spare room that he uses as an office. That plan did not work at all (he hadn't thought through how he was going to maneuver it through the kitchen and up the stairs without smashing everything in both rooms and ruining our new paint job), but instead I convinced him to deep-clean the office to make room for a new futon. He cleaned out closets and cabinets that had filled up with unused crap, and I tackled the various piles of paper that had become hidden into any corner we could find. In the end, we tossed about 10 bags of junk, I have a tub of paper to get shredded, and a trunk full of miscellaneous office things for donation. Then we got our new futon and put that together.



The futon cover is tan, Hubby bought a throw to cover it so the cats don't trash it too badly. Because we all know who will be using it more than the humans!



That shelf way in the back is all that remains of anything I used to store in the office. Thank you electronic bills; you have knocked down the amount of paper I need to have down to four little boxes. 

Anyway, today wasn't quite what I had in mind to prepare for Thanksgiving, but I think my MIL will be much more comfortable now than on an aerobed.

But! Lest you think I am some kind of amazing Thanksgiving planner/shopper, going to 4 stores with one list and preparing food for a week. Somehow I managed to do this:



Uh, didn't I cross it off the list after I bought it at...whoops, guess not. One will go in the freezer tomorrow.

I was proud that I did all that shopping and only bought this for myself as a treat:



Heh, I love my stories. (General Hospital is on a roll these days. All my favorite veterans are returning, hurray!)

What did you do this weekend to get ready for Turkey Day? Are you hosting or guesting? :)