Some fun Turkey Day links:
- 59 Cheap and Healthy Thanksgiving Recipes;
- Mark Bittman’s Mimimalist Thanksgiving (or, at least some of it) turkey and some sides, all under THREE hours;
- Food safety experts say the turkey can go from FREEZER to OVEN;
- Kaylyn’s Low Carb Thanksgiving/Leftovers Recipes; and
- Bryant Terry’s ecological Thanksgiving recipes*.
And of course -holiday-friendly Dude, Where’s the Stove? recipes:
- My Third Grandma’s Cranberry Salad and Sauce;
- No Added Sugar Tropical Fruit Salad;
- Chocolate Almond Bark;
- Kohi Kanten (amazing vegan coffee pudding);
- Delightfully Easy Cream Puffs;
- Roasted Portobello and Asparagus; and Roasted Cauliflower;
- Delicious and Inexpensive Three Bean Salad; and
- Umami Overload Shiitake Stuffing.
* I have such a book crush on Bryant Terry. I received a copy of his new hit, The Inspired Vegan – I’ll have to post a review once I’ve done more than just drool over the recipes!
In the spirit of gratitude, I thought I’d share what I’ve learned about food banks this year. My town has a hotline people can call to find out what food banks are open each day. And this year, I helped a few friends visit them. By help I mean – making a phone call and driving people around. Not much, but, something, right? It turns out that one my friends never got any sort of help from family during a rough patch. Not a penny, not a can. Nothing. It meant the world to her that I picked her up in my car, waited in line with her, and visited the food bank a few times. I had no clue it made a difference.
So what are these food banks like? One local non-profit with an ecological bent distributes food to seniors who pay a small flat fee each year, to get a weekly grocery bag full of lettuce, carrots, mushrooms, potatoes and other veggies that are a shade past their prime, as well as a loaf of bread, saving them from the trash heap. A church distributes twenty-pound sacks of onions, cauliflowers, potatoes, carrots, and other veggies as part of a USDA program. Another place shares a mixture of canned / packaged foods and some fresh veggies as part of a food distribution non-profit.
So, anyways, I am giving thanks, to anyone who has ever given food, money, time, anything to any of these food banks. Thank you for helping people in their time of need. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!! And may we all have a wonderful Thanksgiving!
Photo credit: my friend who worked like crazy making turkey cake pops!