"how fast is light speed?"

the food: Thanksgiving prep
the song: "Lightspeed" Matt & Kim

Busy, busy, busy! The husband and I are headed to San Antonio tonight for the opening of the new Alamo Drafthouse. Tomorrow, we have our first CD release since I joined our record label. But on Sunday I'll be able to start devoting my time to the specifics of the Thanksgiving meal we're hosting on Thursday.

Seriously, is anyone else giddily excited about getting to spend some time in the kitchen next week? I've got 2 days to go with the wee ones, then my life becomes cleaning and scheduling and planning and cooking. It sounds crazy, but I've been dreaming about butternut squash. I'm psyched.

Some fantastic websites out there have started doing Thanksgiving posts, and I thought it might be helpful to link to some of the most useful ones I've found here.

Thanks, Boing Boing, for this LEGO turkey. I love this girl. All she needs is something brown and foamy in that glass, and we'd be set.

Today, the Kitchn posted a wonderful mediation on the meaning of Thanksgiving. They also have a great roundup that has everything from table decorations to traditional recipes to tryptophan.

Our Thanksgiving dinner will prominently feature beer (surprise, surprise), and this Beer Pairings link from Serious Eats provides some great suggestions for where to start. They are taking their cues from Garrett Oliver, afterall. We can't get all the beers mentioned in Texas, but they do an awesome job describing the subtle flavors so you can pick something similar.

This NY Times article on Going Vegetarian for Thanksgiving makes a good argument that creative side dishes are the best part anyway.

Thanksgiving for Every-vore- another one from the Kitchn provides an amazing looking main dish to feed everyone at your table. I love the idea of one meal done in a way to accommodate everyone. How unifying! If I ever cook meat, I hope I can do it like this.

Thanksgiving recipes, both vegetarian and vegan from 101cookbooks. Not sure if she's going to do another one this year, but Heidi's recipes and photographs are so inspiring. Anytime I'm needing encouragement or ideas, this is where to start.

10 vegetarian main dishes from Chow offers lots of creative ideas that in no way attempt to resemble meat. Meat can be our friend, and it's not nice to mock it.

These are just a few of the many links I'll be referencing over the next week. The countdown has begun! Much, much more to come!

~eeg