A side of thanks

Thanksgiving isn't all about turkey. Side dishes are just as important. I went a little overboard this year by taking on 4 dishes, but I survived and it only took me 3 days to finish the dishes. (Dear Santa, please bring me a dishwasher, I promise to be good... next year) I stuck to the staples this year and might try incorporating something a bit more exotic in the future. I was a little too busy to take step by step photos and too excited to eat to take finished product pics so you'll have to just accept what's here. Oh, and no measurements, since I was cooking for 20, it's all ridiculous amounts of everything.

Acorn Squash

Cut squash in half, remove guts, bake @400 for 40 minutes to an hour, or until squash is soft and when pierced with a fork, meets no resistance. Since I had a lot going on, I let them cool before scooping out. Wow, no burned fingers, who knew?! After removing all skins/scooping out squash, top with butter, brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg,  pumpkin pie spice, s&p, mix well. bake @ 350 for 20 minutes or until hot.

Green Bean Casserole:

Does this even need instructions? Well, if you've never read the back of a Campbell's Cream of Mushroom soup can...  I used french style cut green beans, cream of chicken and mushroom AND cream of mushroom and garlic Campbell's condensed soup, and French's cheddar fried onions. Combine beans (drain first) and soup and half of onions. Bake @375 for 20 minutes or until hot, top with remaining onions, at last 5 minutes. Thanksgiving isn't complete without this dish.

Sweet Potato Casserole:

I'm not a big fan of this dish because once you eat the scrumptious toasted marshmallows off the top, the rest is just kinda boring. So after consulting my 4 year old nephew we came up with a solution... put marshmallows IN it! Brilliant I tell you.

 Peel and cut up sweet potatoes, place in baking dish with some pads of butter and s&p. Bake @400 for 45minutes to an hour or until potatoes are soft. Mash potatoes add a few marshmallows, some cinnamon, nutmeg and a little bit of brown sugar, stir until the marshmallows melt. Top with pecans, brown sugar and marshmallows to cover. Return to oven, bake until marshmallows are nice and toasted, about 5 minutes, but don't burn them please!

The pecans and brown sugar under the marshmallows add a fabulous crunchy chewy caramelized layer that is too die for!

Bacon Mac N Cheese

I can't believe we have never had mac-n-cheese at our Thanksgiving before. Seriously, how did we survive? I used this recipe from Panera because they definitely do it right, and doubled it. (Holy macaroni that was a lot of macaroni!) I topped it off with pepper bacon bits which I found at my local grocer (1lb of pepper bacon, chopped into tiny pieces, fried until crunchy). Yum. I heard my Grandma was raving about it, which is the greatest compliment since she is the greatest cook :)

I am thankful that everything turned out and everyone loved everything. There's no better feeling than making people happy by feeding them massive amounts of food.