Every year my grandfather spends about three days making the perfect turkey for Thanksgiving: He picks out a bird carefully, brines it in his own special salt mixture, seasons it, and lovingly places it in the oven. He even has special oven mitts that can only be used on Thanksgiving, by him (warning: do NOT try to touch them). Seven hours after he’s delivered it into the fire, it emerges, bone-dry and ready to scratch our throats with its parched flesh.
There has to be a better way! And fortunately, this year, there is. Here are seven new-school ways to make old-school Thanksgiving favorites, with the most cutting-edge devices on (and off) the market.
Turkey
First get yourself a connected oven, which you can preheat from your phone and which boasts sensors that calibrate oven thermodynamics and help cook your bird evenly. Just in case, test the meat with a nifty connected thermometer, which is much fancier than you really need but is actually pretty fun to use.
Or if you’ve gone the tofurkey route in the past, treat yourself with some SuperMeat, created by culturing a biopsy of an animal so that everyone can stay happy and alive.
Sweet Potatoes
Make sweet potatoes easy by putting whole potatoes in a pressure cooker and letting them go. They’ll come out soft and supple, ready to be combined with some browned butter and whipped into oblivion.
Stuffing
Why stuff breadcrumbs inside a bird when you can stuff them in a plastic bag and tepid water? Grant Achatz from Alinea prefers to sous vide his stuffing, and we’re totally on board.
Pumpkin Pie
Leave the whipped cream in the past and top your pie with sage foam, made by putting fried sage leaves and water in a sous vide, then whipping the mixture into stiff peaks.
Cranberry Sauce
Cranberries should not be can-shaped. Modernist Cuisine’s recipe turns the traditional one on its head by putting fresh berries and juice in a sous vide and then carbonating them in a siphon charged with carbon dioxide. Tangy and bubbly!
Gravy
No one likes lumps in their gravy. Use Dave Arnold’s new centrifuge to maximize flavor and create a smooth, silky texture.
Green Bean Casserole
First grow your own green beans and onions with a SproutsIO system, which helps you become a green thumb by giving you a nifty device that fits in your home, guiding you through the process, and monitoring your success. Next, dehydrate those onions with a DIY connected food dehydrator. Combine with centrifuged cream of mushroom soup and bake in your connected oven for about half an hour. Easy!
Butter
Start with great butter. Then make the butter-passing robot from Rick and Morty. Last, spend the entire Thanksgiving meal moving the butter away from your obnoxious brother-in-law.
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