We planned our party for Friday the 20th since we would be flying to Tasmania on the real holiday, and after all, we'd be the only ones who'd notice we weren't celebrating on the real day. About 10 days beforehand we started some of the planning by inviting our friends and coworkers and coming up with a menu: turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, green bean casserole, cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie, and pumpkin bread. A few weeks prior to that I had ordered a large can of Libby's pumpkin from a store in Melbourne that imports U.S. foods (http://www.usafoods.com.au/). I'm very very particular about pumpkin, so I splurged and spent the money - about $8 for the pumpkin and $10 for the shipping - for the real deal. Besides, you can't find canned pumpkin in Australia and I didn't have the time nor the tools to make it from scratch. And I wasn't about to spend a Thanksgiving without a piece of Mom's/Nana's pumpkin pie.
A few days later Matt went to our local butcher to scope out turkeys. Turkeys, it turns out, can be hard to come by here (the exception being within about 2-3 weeks of Christmas). And large American-sized turkeys just don't exist. So instead of a 10 pound turkey we had to settle for two 2.8 kg turkeys (about 6 pounds each). Perfect for our group, which we figured would be about 8 or so.
Well, as the days passed and our party approached we got a few more RSVPs, bumping our head count to 11. We were starting to get a bit concerned we wouldn't have enough turkey. But after consulting a handful of websites with turkey calculators that help you estimate how much turkey you need for a given number of people, we realized we'd be okay after all. About 2.5 days before the party we tossed the turkeys into the fridge to thaw.
The day before the party Matt and I did the rest of the shopping: cranberry sauce from the jar, stuffing from a box (a very good match to StoveTop in my opinion), potatoes, butter, milk, etc. Our friends would be bringing other things like wine, beer, candied yams (yum!), and appetizers, so the shopping wasn't too overwhelming. That night I made the pumpkin pies (one of which had a homemade crust), and we made the fried onions for the green bean casserole (our substitute for French's fried onions). The pies turned out beautifully.Friday rolled around and the standard Thanksgiving stress set in. A few more RSVPs came in last minute and our head count was up to 13. We were convinced the two little birds wouldn't be enough. On top of that, it was our first turkey cooking experience and we were both becoming terrified we'd screw up, thereby ruining Thanksgiving.
I think we consulted roughly 30+ websites before we settled on a cooking style (breast down for about 2 hours then flipping for the remaining 45 min, rotating the turkeys after an hour b/c we were doing two at a time), cooking temperature (about 160 C), and cooking time (2.5 hrs or so). I also sent Matt out for a meat thermometer, which would ultimately help us determine whether the turkeys were really done. Call it cheating, but we had 11 other people to impress.
We pulled out the turkeys in the early afternoon and despite the fact we had given them ample time to thaw, there was ice inside them. Following a small panic session, we decided to give the turkeys a quick bath in our large utility sink in the laundry - this thankfully did the trick and we were back in business.
After Matt prepped the turkey (rubbed with butter and seasoning salt, stuffed with some lemon halves and spices) and put it in the oven, we got the mashed potatoes and stuffing going and the tables cleaned and set.
Party time arrived and ultimately we had 14 for dinner. Together our friends brought handfuls of bottles of wine, dinner rolls, ginger bread cookies, a delicious seafood bruschetta appetizer, a spicy pineapple appetizer, candied yams, and ice cream. Seated around the table were people from all over the world - Australia, Germany, Sweden/Poland, Trinidad, and of course the U.S. :) Dinner was a huge success. The turkey was PERFECT and we had plenty to go around, probably because most of these people weren't used to the idea of filling themselves to the brim with turkey. And I think everyone seemed to enjoy the idea of a holiday that celebrates being thankful for what you have. And who doesn't like an excuse to hang out with friends/family, eat delicious food, and drink delicious wine?
A few other friends joined us later for dessert, and we all called it a night around 2 am. Now that's a good Thanksgiving. And yes, the pie was worth the $18 pumpkin.
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