Add These Side Dishes to Enhance Your Thanksgiving Meals
There’s a lot to think about this Thanksgiving. I understand. Simply getting food to the table is a feat of engineering, logistics and emotional resilience. Small things may slip through the cracks, but still don’t place plates naked on the table. Decorating Thanksgiving plates isn’t just pretty – it gives each dish something special. (What is Thanksgiving if not special?) Here are three easy ways to get a win.
Add a little flair
A garnish is a dash, dot, or lightning bolt at the end of the plate that adds color to the dish. It should add some color, texture and flavor. Yes, it should be edible.
Citrus fruits have many benefits in terms of garnishing. It has a rind that is hard enough to hold the texture, but contains tons of citrus oil that smells wonderful and adds a little kick to the dish when grated (sprinkled with zest). Moreover, not many products have fantastic colors that citrus fruits can play with: light green, bright orange, sunny yellow.
If you don’t grate, use a vegetable peeler to remove the long skein and either use it as is on the side or top of the dish, or place it on a cutting board and cut into long strips to garnish the dish.
Citrus fruits can be molded into many shapes, but it is a lot of work. Even a wedge of lemon is wonderful on a plate, especially with a little lemon juice on top for a refreshing touch. Cut the lemon into wedges and be sure to remove all the seeds before covering. But also consider a squeeze of lime, orange, or grapefruit instead of something else.
A reliable move is the spinner. Slice the lemons into ½-inch slices and remove the seeds. Make one cut along the radius of the pinwheel, and then spread it apart with your fingers so that it lies vertically on the plate. You can also use this on the rim of a glass.
Herbal supplements
What else can you do with greens besides chopped parsley? If you have access to fresh greens, you can place them whole on your plate. Turkey on a plate is good. The turkey is photo-worthy surrounded by sprigs of rosemary, thyme, oregano and other herbs. Simply place the cut branches along the edge of the plate in one direction to create a wreath.
Herbal flowers and leaves can be used individually very effectively. The thyme flowers float beautifully gracefully on top of the mashed potatoes and give them a subtle depth. Deep-fried sage leaves make a great addition to any mushroom dish—sage and mushrooms naturally pair together. If you’re making stuffed mushrooms or anything with a thick filling, stick a few onions in vertically to create a nice visual effect.
Finish with fancy salt.
Fact: Anything will benefit with a little salt. And if you choose right, it’s not only delicious, but it also adds color, crunch, and a nice visual effect from the crystals.
The key here is what kind of salt you use. Fleur de sel is the gold standard for great flaky salt, but you can buy flaky sea salt at the grocery store in the baking aisle. In France, markets often have entire stalls of flavored and colored salts – a magnificent rainbow of options. You can sometimes buy lavender or lemon salt here, but it’s absurdly expensive. Make your own using Claire Lower’s formula , adding any flavor (and color) to the salt. Sprinkle the flake crystals over your food just before serving. A light spray is sufficient; you want to see the crystals, not be overwhelmed by them.
You don’t have to think too much about adding color, flavor, and texture to the plates that go out to the table. A side dish, the period at the end of a sentence, can make the difference between a holiday and a boring dinner.