Prepping for Thanksgiving

Light blogging over the next couple of days, I suppose.

I've been busy all morning in the kitchen. I always do a brined turkey, so I got that underway first thing this morning. I use Emeril's recipe and it has never failed me (I double it because this recipe is for a 6 lb. turkey breast and I'm cooking a 12 lb. turkey.)

We do traditional cornbread dressing around here, so I made three pans of cornbread and got the celery and onions cut up for that. All ready to go!

I made a pecan pie; my mother has two pecan trees in her yard and every day for the past two weeks I'll fill up a bag of pecans when I go over there to check on her and give her the daily meds. Every night Steve shells them! Quite a deal! We runneth over in pecans this year, so this is the first of probably many pecan pies. Pecan pralines at Christmas. Roasted & salted pecans. Pecans in cookies. Lots of pecans.

I made an apple pie, too, because I had some Granny Smith apples here that needed to be eaten. It's in the oven now.

I've made my annual "Double Berry Congealed Salad" which is cranberries & raspberry jello, celery and pecans. Sounds odd, but it's great! Very pretty at Christmas.

Tomorrow I'll have a couple of casseroles to put together which I can do while the turkey cooks.

So, I think I've got Thanksgiving in hand, barring some crazy disaster.

Beyond that, I've got 50 research papers to grade before I go back to work on Monday. They are in the trunk of my car where they have been since last Tuesday. I'm not making much headway. Tomorrow I will probably bring them in the house and start on them while everyone else naps off dinner.

I'm just over halfway done with the Ayn Rand biography. I'm finding it very interesting but she was, well, let's just say 'different'. I recommend the book though, if you're interested in her at all. Heller spends a little too much time giving plot summaries of Rand's novels - I could do without that, but she does reveal a great deal about her life and what many believed to be an odd marriage.

So, what are YOU doing for Thanksgiving?