Holy Poop! It’s the Monday before Thanksgiving and you ain’t got shit ready. Totally no worries, dude. ES isn’t only about meals made for foodie snots, we’re also here to help you, the procrastinating omnivore. Here’s a quick and dirty guide to help you throw together a totally cheating Thanksgiving dinner.
The Frozen Dinner
There is nothing more lovely that an elegantly set table: white linen tablecloth, delicately rolled cloth napkins, votives encircling a centerpiece of brightly colored gourds and large china dinner plates on top of gunmetal chargers. And if you set that scene, no one will ever notice that everyone has been served their own Lean Cuisine. ES recommends their Roast Turkey frozen dinner:
Tender slices of roasted turkey tenderloins in a traditional gravy with stuffing,whipped potatoes and green beans accented with cranberries
And at a mere 250 calories, no one has to feel bad snacking on that store-bought pumpkin pie. (Photo: Freezer Burned)
More cheating post jump
The Frozen Bird
If you don’t mind whipping up a few side dishes, but just don’t feel like messing with a turkey, then this is the new Tgiving gimmick for you. A totally ready frozen-to-oven bird. The Jennie-O “Oven Ready Home Style Whole Turkey” is really just that. Get home, put a few slits in the bag and then pop in the oven. I mean, there’s just no need to get all up in the giblets and mess up a manicure for a stupid dinner. (Photo: AJC)
The Restaurant Approach
Maybe the Thanksgiving meal should be more like a night out at a restaurant. No cutting, no dicing, no slicing. Only deciding between dishes that someone else cooked. Whole Foods of course offers up their *gourmet* services to the public, letting eaters chose between natural free range turkey, organic turkey and bone-in turkey breast (for the intimate crowd.) There are tons of appetizers (smoked roasted salmon platter), sides (creamy succotash with bacon) and desserts (pumpkin congac cheesecake) to choose from, but for the supremely lazy, you can simply choose one of their predetermined meals. (Photo: Naval History Center)
Also on ES
An Elitist’s Thanksgiving
The Top 10 Foods Only American Could Have Invented
Who Cooked It Better? Thanksgiving Turkeys
I’m so going to trick my parents and have the Turkey lean cuisines out when they come over
I am cheating a bit and getting an oven ready turkey from whole foods though (I still have to cook it in the oven though!!)
woah woah woah, Liza – you are cooking for the parents this year???
OMGosh, I am dying, cheating with Lean Cuisine. I didn’t realize I was a procrastinating chef until seeing all the Tweets re: getting ready a week or two early. We just wing it day of.
Thanks again for making me laugh.
I am getting emails from my sister (whose house will host thanksgiving this year) about what I am making in addition to the gdamn turkey. WHAT ELSE DO YOU WANT, WOMAN?!?!?! I’m making this thing at my tiny apartment to lug to her house in LI. WTF? Gravy and cranberry sauce, you told me not to f*cking make the stuffing because YOU wanted to make it, I AM NOT MAKING ANYTHING ELSE. Go *%(#&($*&#$(*#
Sorry. Is my stress showing? Let me tuck it back