All products featured on Self are independently selected by our editors.
However, we may receive compensation from retailers and/or from purchases of products through these links.
The most celebrated meal of the year shouldn’t also be the most nerve-racking.
Jamie Grill / Getty Images
Prepare to be prepared with updated classics, no-bake desserts, and more in theThanksgiving 2015 guidefrom Bon Appetit.
Here are 20 smart ways to kick-start your meal.
(Not to mention that you’re grouchier and more susceptible to those predinner cocktails.)
We promise you won’t run out of room.
Kitchen prep can be all yours, but don’t forget to delegate other tasks.
Ask the kids to draw place cards for the table.
(That way they won’t sneak pie before dinner.)
Everyone helps, everyone wins.
Can it be a party without dip?
But for this special meal, ranch or blue cheese ain’t going to cut it.
Try ourLemony Smoked Trout Dipand serve it with our favorite crackers (see #5).
Which of the 10,000 varieties of crackers at the store are going in your cart.
Fortunately, we’ve made the choice for you:Carr’s Table Water Crackers.
You remember the opening Thanksgiving scene inHannah and Her Sisters?
OurSherry-Tonic Punchis flavorful but low-octane, guaranteeing hours of easy-breezy sipping.
Can’t find your uncles?
They’re over by the cheese plate.
So be strategic about your nosh placement.
Don’t want people crowding the kitchen?
Then don’t put the nuts there!
It’s not who starts, it’s who finishes.
On this day, they are the enemy.
You could open a can of store-bought mixed nuts and the world would not come to an end.
Or you could show everyone you care by making theseSweet-and-Spicy Mixed Nuts.
Get the Recipe:Sweet-and-Spicy Mixed Nuts
It’s not just about the food.
Set the table the night before.
(Never wait until the last minute.)
Wash china and wine glasses.
Pull down all of the serving platters and bowls and decide what food goes where.
Figure out the perfect locations for your candlesticks.
It’s probably the most dressed-up your table will get all year, so really turn it out.
Get the Recipe:Pickled Vegetable Lettuce Cups
So you knowexactlywhen more food is coming.
Give the kids something fun to drinkSan Pellegrino sodas or some fruit-juice spritzers.
It makes them feel special, too.
It’s an appetite deathtrap.
So serve cheese, but follow these rules.
Something hard, salty, boldthe kind you nibble, not the kind you schmear.
And make it American because, well, they don’t celebrate Turkey Day in Savoie.
The nutty Manchego-esqueSan Andreasfrom Bellwether Farms in California ($33 per lb.
