Turkey Day Errands!

Earlier today I felt almost like Santa Claus. I made my list and I checked it twice. However, my list was for groceries. I had this brilliant idea to get my turkey day shopping out of the way today versus waiting until tomorrow. Tomorrow the stores will be slammed! I'm happy to report I won't be one of the thousands rather millions of people that will grace the doors of a nearby grocery store tomorrow...I hope! As long as I didn't forget anything that is! Like I said I've checked my list twice before I went and once after I got home. So I think I'm set!

We will be taking an appetizer, a side dish, and a dessert to Thanksgiving with my boyfriend's family. For the last two years I have baked an apple pie. I even got an early plan in my head as to the things I wanted to do different with this year's apple pie. But then in is family email I noticed that his family was requesting a cake for dessert too. So cake it is! I'm more comfortable baking cakes! I will be trying something new with this cake and hopefully it all turns out well. Here's the worst part about baking a pie, there's no sampling it or checking to see if it's done. With a cake you can taste the batter to get an idea of the finished product. Plus there's plenty of ways to make sure a cake is done. With an apple pie until it is sliced up you can't tell if the apples are really as tender as you want them. Pies can be tricky, so I'm certainly not disappointed I don't have to deal with that concern. For the cake the idea of a rocky road inspired cake rolled through my head. After lots of looking through recipes nothing completely fit my cake idea, there was similar stuff but I'll still have to improvise to attempt to make what I was envisioning. Despite the fact that rocky road ice cream is typically made with almonds, I will be using pecans...it's a Texas fave and it's what my mom sends us. Pecans it is! A little bit of AZ will be included in this cake! No fancy decorations on top I think it will look delicious if it can all turn out the way I'm picturing it in my head! Wish me luck!

As for the appetizer and side dish, we'll take a spinach dip and a green bean casserole. I've made French's version of green bean casserole many times as that is the recipe my mom has used for numerous years. Last year I used a new recipe I found and this year I will be using another new recipe. This year the recipe seems like a great combo of some fresh elements with some canned elements. We'll see how it goes! My spinach dip I especially look forward to making. I use elements of 2 different recipes for my spinach dip, so much fun to make! I had to go to 2 stores before I found the right bread that I use to serve it inside of, other than that small issue my shopping was a breeze.

I think I was brilliant by going to Target and getting all items I could then going to a grocery store just for produce items on my list. I figured the grocery store would be busy and Target would not be too bad. Both were rather easy to get in and get out of! Tomorrow won't be the same! The only bad news of the day is that I spent my afternoon tending to the "Human" errands so the trip to Petsmart was postponed until tomorrow. Sorry Sime! But I did get you some treats while at Target so you'll survive!