Holiday Meals & Entertaining: Expert Guides and Resources

Holiday meal planning often includes a main course of roasted turkey, a Thanksgiving favorite baked to a golden bronze and served up with richly flavored and piping hot stuffing. Cooking and carving your turkey can be simple tasks, with these easy-to-follow instructions. ©Africa Studio / Adobe StockIn this recipe, the stuffing is baked separately, not in the turkey.

To decorate for Thanksgiving, you can choose from a variety of colors and styles aside from the typical, traditional theme for decorating. Choose from the many colors, items, and accent pieces in the following table to get ideas or inspiration for your Thanksgiving decorating. Because Thanksgiving is centered around celebrating a bountiful harvest, preserved flowers and displays of fruit fit into the decorating scheme.

Even the cook should get to enjoy a stress-free Thanksgiving. So, if you're hosting this year's holiday festivities, follow these tips to help take the stress out of getting ready to cook a Thanksgiving meal: ©Lordn / Adobe Stock Make a plan: Poor planning is probably the greatest stressor when you're trying to execute a large meal, particularly Thanksgiving dinner.

This cake is a fun centerpiece to any Halloween party. After you bake two recipes of the Chocolate Cocoa Cake and whip up three batches of stiff decorator frosting, follow the steps below to finish a ghostly Halloween creation. Delight your little tricksters with this Halloween spooky mansion cake. Chocolate Cocoa Cake Tools: Two 9-inch round cake pansPreparation time: 15 minutesBaking time: 35 minutesYield: 12 servings 3⁄4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder 2 teaspoons baking soda 1⁄4 teaspoon salt 3-1⁄4 cups sifted cake flour 9 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature and cut into 1⁄2-inch pieces 2-1⁄2 cups granulated white sugar 1-1⁄2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract 4 eggs 2 cups whole milk Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

You’ve worked hard deciding what foods to serve on Thanksgiving and have chosen the finest ingredients. On Thanksgiving Day, why not create some visual impact with the food you’re going to serve? Try these following tips for adding flair to your Thanksgiving table. ©Evgenyb / Adobe Stock Make your own dip bowls: When serving a vegetable tray with dip, try making a bowl out of a red, yellow, or green bell pepper.

If you are serving dinner to a Thanksgiving crowd you will need to include room in your budget for drinks. Plan on offering hot and cold drinks, decide whether you will serve alcoholic beverages, and always be sure to offer water. Also, don’t forget to have plenty of ice on hand. ©Mark Stout / iStockphoto.comWhen serving soft drinks, it’s important when planning your menu and looking at your budget to decide whether to serve them from cans or 2-liter plastic bottles.

Do you want to socialize with friends and family while spending as little money as possible? Your guests will appreciate the quality time together as well as the frugality of these events. Here are a few ideas that are proven winners: Covered-dish dinners: Hosts provide the main course, and guests bring side dishes and desserts.

It's Halloween. Either you're getting your kids ready to go trick-or-treating or you're preparing for the onslaught of little candy hounds at your door. Hopefully, you've read the following ten tips beforehand so you'll have a fun, triumphant trick-or-treating night! ©Seanlockephotography / Adobe Stock Stock up: You don't want to be known among the neighborhood kids as the people who ran out of candy early in the evening.

Bûche de Noël is French for Christmas log. This dessert with the fancy name is found in every pastry-shop window in France during the month of December. It’s simply a yellow sponge cake rolled around a white chocolate and cherry filling. You can start this the day ahead and let it sit overnight. Preparation time: 45 minutes; 8 hour cooling time Cooking time: 20 minutes Yield: 10 servings Yellow Sponge Cake for Bûche de Noël 1/4 cup whole milk 2 tablespoons (1/4 stick) unsalted butter 1/2 teaspoon vanilla 3/4 cup cake flour 1 teaspoon baking powder Pinch salt 3 large eggs 3 large egg yolks 1 cup sugar Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.