To paraphrase Kathryn Stockett:
"You is good. You is kind. You is going to have an amazing Thanksgiving."
In other words, you're gonna ace this Thanksgiving! Whether you're hosting this year or blissfully not in charge of any food at all, we hope that our coverage here at The Bitten Word has provided you with a healthy dose of holiday inspiration.
Trust us. If we can host a Fakesgiving for 24 friends in our tiny apartment and a shoebox-sized kitchen, making nearly 20 dishes for the first time, then you've got this Thanksgiving in the bag!
If you're still looking for a sure-fire, last-minute dish, check out our (just updated!) Favorite Holiday Recipes.
And for those of you have gotten lost in the Thanksgiving blur of the last month, here are all the dishes we made this year. We asked the friends we had over for Fakesgiving to rank all of the dishes. (Yes, there was an actual electronic survey involved. You gotta sing for your supper Chez Bitten Word.)
Here's every dish we made this year, ranked in order of our friends' preferences, on a scale of 1 (poor) to 10 excellent):
RATING DISH
10.00 The Barefoot Contessa's Goat Cheese Mashed Potatoes
9.00 Cornmeal-Creme Fraiche Spoon Bread
8.79 Curried Carrot Apple Soup
8.29 Maple Syrup Pie with Creme Fraiche
8.14 Black-Bottom Peanut Pie
7.92 Moroccan Spiced Turkey with Onion Jam
7.69 Turkey Roulades with Fontina and Sage
7.57 Sweet Potatoes with Crispy Rice Topping
7.57 Knockout Punch from 2 Birds 1 Stone
7.54 Cornbread, Chorizo and Cherry Stuffing
7.43 Navy Bean Pie
7.43 Sautéed Collard Greens with Caramelized Miso Butter
7.38 Brussels Sprouts with Horseradish and Pomegranate
7.31 Chocolate Mousse Pie with Phyllo Crust
7.25 Cherry-Port Cranberry Sauce
6.64 Harissa and Maple Roasted Carrots
6.38 Pumpkin Tiramisu
3.85 Old Fashioned Cracker Dressing
3.83 Roasted Citrus Relish
Now it's your turn.
Please share Your Thanksgiving with us: If you make something we've posted about, report back by emailing us or commenting here! If you're social media-minded, tag us on Instagram (#TheBittenWord), Facebook (#TheBittenWord) or Twitter (@bittenword).
And if you fall into a Thanksgiving crisis, contact us any time. We're here to help.
We'll leave you with photos from our Fakesgiving that will hopefully inspire you but may very well terrify you, too.
See you after Thanksgiving.
~ Zach & Clay
We only have one dining room table, but we compensate for big gatherings by using two cheap folding tables that can each seat 6 guests. In all here, we fit 24 seats into our cramped dining room.
Guests have arrived, but here's Zach in the bedroom, still snapping last-minute photos.
Friends in the backyard, where we sequestered them until it was time to eat:
A harried Zach with turkey:
Zach (left) and Clay walking guests through the menu:
Post-dinner chit-chat:
Here's a little Behind the Scenes shot for you. Yes, those are dessert plates literally sitting our bed and precariously balanced on a wooden board. (What in the world were we thinking?) We decided to plate dessert this year, since so many of the pies were hard to slice (plus we wanted to make sure everyone had a chance to try everything).
Zach's sister Cassidy, sous chef extraordinaire, helping to finish some dishes.
Thanks to our friends Jeff & Ken for snapping these day-of photos!
