Much To Be Thankful For... -

I think this is my favorite decoration I own.

I hope everyone had a fabulous Thanksgiving!!

Seeing as I’ve become obsessed with cooking since the summer, naturally I must share all the goodies I made for Thanksgiving, along with some other things!!

There are a few food items I forgot to take pictures of, terrible I know, but I’m adding the recipes below in case you want to try them out!

I hosted a Friendsgiving in my apartment before I drove back up to Jersey for the holiday. Needless to say it was filled with amazing food and tons of wine. I made the turkey, spinach gratin, sourdough/mushroom/bacon stuffing, cranberry-pumpkin muffins, and caramel apple cheesecake. [Click links for recipes]. Thank you to my Food Network app and my favorite person on earth the Barefoot Contessa, for teaching me how to prepare a turkey, I couldn’t have been more happy with the way it turned out!

My friends all bought something, we had a lovely cheese plate, sweet potato casserole, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, pecan pie, and brownies. It was an amazing night that ended with spiked pumpkin eggnog, enough said.

Back at home…

In NJ we always have Thanksgiving at my house and this year I did more in the kitchen than I ever had before. I was in charge of cocktail hour and then I made cranberry sauce, parm-garlic mashed potatoes, and thyme popovers for dinner. For dessert I followed Paula Deens recipe for a pumpkin cheesecake.

Pigs in a blanket, deviled eggs, roasted shrimp cocktail, mozzarella/tomato/basil
and the main attraction…

I really wanted to have a cured meat and cheese platter as the main appetizer. I went to Whole Foods and matched up meats with cheeses to create this! It was so good and the best part is there are leftovers I never even put out! =]

Meats: Coppa, pepperoni, prosciutto, salami
Cheeses: Manchengo, Brie, Gruyere, Raschera, Unie Kaas Robusto