Cornish hen will be my meat, I think. But the meat is the only thing I am not SUPER demanding about. I could do a pork loin or even pork chops or a Turkey breast.

The sides are what it is all about and I am going to be trying out homemade dressings - have never been happy with one.

I just did a pork loin last night... and ate the leftovers for lunch, yum. Garlic buttery w/ Italian seasoning type thing.

I'm not sure we'll do turkey either, but maybe. If so, not a whole bird. But I am going to research for some good GF stuffing recipes, because that will be key. And Matt likes cranberry sauce, so he's figuring out whether to make or buy. I'm not a fan, so I have no opinion. It'll be fun.

You can get turkey thighs. A couple of those provides a small meal plus leftovers. I love turkey thighs.

Our good friends will be coming to Thanksgiving, and the weather should be conducive to eating and socializing outside for just the 4 of us. We've hung out with them a few times at breweries/bars in outdoor spaces. I've started thinking of them as "safe" although there is no reason for that to be the case. They do know how crazy anxious I am about Covid and are very respectful of that. Though they were puzzled when I put my mask on when we were seated outside after finishing eating and drinking (still at our table) so that concerns me.

I am losing my shit for a variety of reasons. I actually made a reservation at an indoor restaurant that I really love, before I realized how insane that was and cancelled it. Ugh.

Also our new insurance won't cover my anti-anxiety medication which seems to have now left my system and that's some terrible timing for my brain.

I don't know a way to get dark meat without doing a whole bird.

TJ's had a prepackaged (maybe precooked, I forget) braised turkey leg thing available one year and it was delicious. I have sometimes found turkey legs available just in the meat department, and smoked turkey legs pretty reliably. I bet you could ask the butcher counter for turkey legs earlyish in November, although the price/lb would probably not be as low as for a whole bird.

Some years we don't do turkey at all, sometimes we do a whole turkey and I get a ton of leftovers (my parents are mostly vegetarian but they are getting a little more permissive lately), I think last year my dad actvely wanted turkey so we did a turkey breast. One year I made a turkey soup with stuffing dumplings and that was really good although it somehow seems like more of a leftovers-after-Thanksgiving meal than day of. One year back in the day when my DH was not yet my DH and his family went out to eat on Thanksgiving and did not invite me I just made a whole meal basically for myself although he was happy to have leftovers.

Haven't done a full on whole family meal since my mother's 75th birthday and even then I don't think my sister came. Maybe we will Zoom this year, now that everyone is used to doing that.

Oh, sorry about the meds, Nora, that is unfortunate!

I've talked my family into doing duck instead of turkey this year (I can get them from a local small farm even!) so at least if we have to cancel the medium-sized gathering I can put the extra ducks in the freezer instead of being stuck with a whole preordered turkey.

The good (?) thing about starting work at 6 means that I'm done now.

Mmm, duck.

We did heritage turkeys a couple times, which are more expensive, typically smaller, and truly delicious. I don't have my local hookup for that any more...oh, wait, maybe I should check if the order online pickup at the farm ad hoc CSA has turkeys...

I'm done for the day also. And the texting group has no texting and the QC stuff I do is all on hold because the tracking documents are not tracking things correctly. WAH!

Thanks for the ideas, Nora & -t, I'll have to start looking/asking around.

I've never heard of heritage turkeys; I'll have to see what my CSA comes up with next month.

Oh, that sucks about the anxiety meds!