Giving Thanks to
Our Little Helpers
The hustle and bustle of preparing a Thanksgiving dinner often means that our kids are relegated to the playroom or to an outing with one spouse while the other rushes about the kitchen getting ready. But with a little forethought, you can bring the kids seamlessly into the planning and preparation process.
It's easy to make them part of planning. Let them help you make the grocery list, and give each of them a section to be responsible for when you get to the store. Should you have a tablecloth? What plates should you use? Do you have enough of them for all of your guests? If there is a "children's table," make sure they are intimately involved in the table design (perhaps some pretty paper plates?) and have them make place cards, the centerpiece, and perhaps napkin holders. If you have a laminator, you can make an individual place mat for each guest, letting the kids glue clip art and stick holiday stickers, and write the names of each guest before laminating the work of art and placing it under the lucky guest's setting (see the one pictured above).
On The Day, a little organization can let your Little Helpers assist you with:
- Making salads...washing the vegetables, and adding the croutons as well as other salad ingredients are good for those little hands.
- Mashing potatoes. (Big bowls are helpful here to minimize spills.)
- Making recipes that need to be pulsed in the food processor, like cranberry relish...they love to mash things up!
- Trimming green beans.
- Making Jell-O molds and ambrosia.
- Dishing out the whipped cream on the pies for dessert.
- Setting the table.
- Finding creative uses for the leftovers! Let them experiment!
Thanksgiving Leftover Casserole
Stuffing
Mashed potatoes
Sweet potatoes (if you have them)
Green beans or other dinner vegetable
Turkey pieces
Gravy
On the bottom of a glass baking dish, layer any remaining stuffing, top with the leftover mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes too if you have them, then the green beans or other vegetable you may have had for your dinner. Now add the leftover trimmed turkey pieces that haven't been used in the famous sandwiches.
Top all of that with some gravy. If you don't have any left, open a can or jar of gravy and pour it over the top of the dish. I use a lot of gravy since my family loves it really moist so they can dip Italian bread into it. I have also been known to add the cranberries on top.
Cover and bake in a 350 degree oven for about 25 - 30 minutes or till heated through. This is a great way to use up left over Holiday meals.
Once the dish comes out of the oven, let the kids take all the credit for it. They will look forward to repeating this with other Holidays too. I started it with my daughter who is 7 now and she enjoys it a lot.
***********
Click here to get back to Chef Patti's recipe list.
Click here to access information about Chef Patti's personal chef service, The Delicious Gourmet.
To contact Chef Patti, email her at dgourmet@rochester.rr.com.
|
Featured article: