If you're worrying about how to do Thanksgiving a week from today, I highly recommend trying Alton Brown's Thanksgiving recipes. His roast turkey is spectacular! We've made it for friends for the past five Thanksgivings, and this year we're making it for family. The two keys to the turkey are: 1) brine, and 2) don't stuff it! The stuffing sucks the moisture out of the turkey and of course there's the whole threat of food poisoning (Brown has an alternative 'stuffing' recipe). The first time we made this turkey, we were blown away. I never knew that white meat could be so moist and full of flavor! Plus, it only takes four hours or so to cook rather than all day.

To understand how Alton makes his turkey, your last chance to watch his special, Romancing the Bird, on Food Network is on November 23rd at 11 am. If you can't wait that long, the full transcript of the show is here. There's also an Alton Brown Fried Turkey recipe on YouTube.