I just found out I’ll be hosting this year, since my son’s family is staying in town instead of going to his (half)sister’s. 4 adults and 13 and 6 yr old granddaughters.
The menu:
Turkey, supermarket (probably 16-18 lbs because leftovers!)
Cornbread dressing
Giblet gravy
Mashed potatoes
Sweet potato casserole (my DIL loves it, ugh)
Green bean casserole (maybe fresh, my son has been making it from scratch)
Broccoli/wild rice casserole (a tradition I would love to stop, but my son loves it)
Fresh cranberry sauce
Rolls
Pies of some sort
And macaroni salad for my older granddaughter - who just asked me for my recipe! Not traditional at all.
Plus appetizers… sausage stuffed mushrooms? And there must be deviled eggs. And crudite.
We’re going here for 3 nights over T-day (and my birthday ) https://snowbirdlodge.com/ Room rates include all meals, and they do a really nice Thanksgiving day spread.
No cooking or cleaning for me, a lovely big fireplace, comfy chairs to slouch in, beautiful walks if the weather’s good, nice and quiet because there’s a 12? yo age limit on kids.
“Yukon Gold” doesn’t mean they’re really made from gold. Around here three bucks will net you a five pound bag, and that’s a lot of mashed potatoes. The real butter and heavy cream usually cost more than the potatoes.
Not much this year, since I’ve decided to skip the all-the-trimmings dinner and do a fancy tea instead: turkey and cranberry chutney sandwiches, pear and blue cheese sandwiches, some dark grapes, some dainties, perhaps a scone or two. Probably around $50.
Since my mom died, I’ve ordered turkey dinners from Shaws. Costs about $60 for a complete meal (although I’ll cook a second pie) for 3 people, and give Dad and I plenty of leftovers.
Could I cook it myself for cheaper? Sure. Do I want to? Nope.
So I have to ask, is it that common for people to have to go specifically buy pantry stuff like sugar, onions, flour, garlic, spices (sage, etc…) for Thanksgiving?
I’m pretty surprised at how much stuff people list is stuff that I thought most non-bachelor types kept on hand - like onions and/or garlic. Just about every recipe has one or the other, and if it doesn’t, it probably has shallots or leeks. (My MIL is allergic to alliums, so it’s always an adventure to cook when she comes to visit).
I keep sugar and flour, and dried herbs on hand all the time, so I don’t need to buy them just for Thanksgiving unless I am low. I also have onions, celery, and carrots on hand all the time because I figure I’ll use them for something. But I get more of everything for Thanksgiving, plus fresh herbs. (There are a lot of things on my shopping list above that I don’t actually have to buy especially for Thanksgiving but the OP was about how much it costs, and it costs money to use it even if I didn’t buy it that week.)
Really thanksgiving is one of the cheapest meals when you come to think about it. Turkey, dressing, potatoes, and pie and such - nothing really expensive there. I guess it can if you do oyster gravy or have wine. We have in the past taken our turkey to be smoked which is kind of pricey but man, does it make a tasty bird.
Anyway, I guess I was misinterpreting the OP- I was thinking about it like “What are you going to go buy specifically for Thanksgiving” as opposed to what amounts to a cost accounting exercise in trying to figure out the value of a typical Thanksgiving dinner.
That’s why I was curious- our pantry has most of the stuff we might need, save fresh produce without a long shelf life and whatever turkey/beef/seafood we may have this year. I’d guess it’s more likely that we’ll end up doing a post-Thanksgiving restock trip than anything else.
A change in plans means everything’s is still on the normal cooking schedule, just being done where I’ll be going. That adds $100 for them to get a (cheap) smoker & $25 for shipping the snausages (too long in transit if I bring them), plus more turkey & snausages because we now need to split the not-eaten-Saturday jambalaya, so about $300 for the two meals.
Turkey @ $0.67 a lb, came to about $10
Two boxes of stuffing = $2
Two packages of mashed potato mix = $2
other ingredients to add to mashed potatoes and stuffing = $1
Pumpkin pie and other desserts = $8
Casserole ingredients = $3
package of rolls $2
including drinks (which added a few extra dollars) it came to about $30.
Our family Thanksgiving has evolved in such a way that my contribution is to bring wine. I don’t drink wine myself and know little about it so I pick a couple bottles with interesting names, red usually, and that’s it. I usually buy one bottle of red that’s about 20.00, one about 15.00 and one wildcard, maybe white wine, maybe something else, might be cheap or 20.00 plus.
I spent a bunch of time online a few years ago asking for wine suggestions for Thanksgiving. Waste of time. I never have gotten any feedback on the wine I bring. Zero. No idea if it is being drunk, re-gifted or poured down the drain! Wine is most definitely being drunk at these gatherings but no idea if it’s what I brought or not. Honestly, I don’t care. My cost of admission to the family feast is about 50 bucks
It’s after Thanksgiving, but I just noticed this thread.
We celebrate with Mrs. Homie’s side of the family. They crowdsource the event, and we are in charge of pies and a couple of other things.
When the dust had settled, maybe $30. The pecans (pecan pie) were the biggest chunk of it, taking up a solid $20. About another $10 for the corn syrup, plus the green beans, cream of mushroom soup, and fried onions for Mrs. Homie’s green bean casserole; and the canned pumpkin for my pumpkin pie. Already had the sugar, eggs, flour, spices, and other piddling stuff, so I’m not counting that.
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