Countdown to Turkey Day November 18, 2010 One Week To Go

Heather says:

One week to go, we’re in the home stretch here. For those of you who have been playing along, there’s not that much left to do except cook. Don’t get smug, that draws the attention of the Fates¹.

Unless of course your serving ware has been stored for a year and you actually have good silver to use (do those people exist?). In that case, go ahead and start pulling it out and cleaning it up for the big day.

Well, that is if you’ve also kept up on your daily chores. If not, no worries there is still time before the invasive parasites I mean extended family arrives. Pick one room a day and give it a little extra love.

If you’re lucky enough that family and friends live in town, who won’t be spending the night, you can limit your deep cleaning to public areas and close the doors to the rest. There is a caveat to this plan, if your home has more than one bathroom all of them -and the paths to them- should be clean. Make sure there are clean towels, soap, and plenty of toilet paper available. Don’t question, just do it. If you don’t have kids and there will be kids visiting, plan for their entertainment, unless you want them juggling your breakables and pestering the dog.

If you’re just joining in on the annual Turkey Day Countdown here at Home Ec 101, you may want to read back through the other posts and play catch up.

So far we have:

• Located and cleaned off the dining room table
• Invited and confirmed our guests
• Planned the Thanksgiving Menu
• Created a Thanksgiving Day shopping list
• Planned what serving dishes and utensils will be used.
• Cleaned out the refrigerator to make room
  For some this means finding the cooler, too. Use the cooler full of ice to make room for the turkey which optimally should be thawing at 40F. It’s just safer to have it thawing in a controlled environment. Sitting in ice is too cold and without the ice, the cooler may get too warm.
• Figured out the Thanksgiving Day Cooking Timetable

A note about thawing your frozen turkeys:

Frozen turkeys need a full 24 hours per 5lbs to thaw in a 40F refrigerator. Once thawed the turkey can be held for up to 48 hours.

For example, an 18lb turkey will take nearly 4 days to thaw and should be used by the 6th day. Thanksgiving is 1 week away, so it’s time to start thawing those 20 plus pound turkeys. Don’t forget to keep that turkey in the very bottom of the refrigerator to prevent any cross-contamination through drips  and spills.

If you are picking up a fresh turkey, it should be cooked within 3 days of pick-up, so play it safe and pick it up on Tuesday or Wednesday.

What are you looking forward to most this Thanksgiving?

¹Calm down, I don’t actually believe that, it’s just fun to write. Call it dramatic license or warped sense of humor.