Holiday meals often add even more stress to the every day strain of food preparation. Yet, the desire for my son to enjoy some of the traditional, familial flavors is greater than that obstacle. Over the years, I've tinkered with different ways of doing it, and this year's Thanksgiving meal was the most successful yet.
Allow me to share the components and main ingredients below. Then, you can plug n' chug into the ketogenic diet calculator (KDC) with your own ratio and calories.
Creamed Spinach - This was his favorite, and it is great because I can get a lot of the fat mixed in at once.
Chopped spinach (frozen, cooked, drained well)
Heavy whipping cream (only about 5g)
Butter (not a little bit)
Parmesan cheese
salt and a pinch of nutmeg
"Stuffing" - I have added onions and even garlic to this in the past, but he seemed to enjoy the simpler version just as much.
Celery, chopped small
Butter (3g or less)
Jimmy Dean Sausage, cooked (I had this frozen and ready to go)
Pinch of poultry seasoning and salt
Cranberry Sauce - Honestly, it tasted like normal homemade cranberry sauce! After refrigerating, though, the swerve became granular again (strange!?), so I will try powdered next time.
Fresh or Frozen Cranberries - 16oz
Swerve sweetener (powdered may be better) - 1 cup
Water - 1/2 cup
Turkey and Gravy - He got to eat from the same main ingredient as everyone else.
Dark meat turkey (15g)
My mom's homemade gravy (basically chicken stock, turkey juice, and cornstarch - no sugar) ~ just a small spoon of it (approx 4g)
Special Dessert
Whipped Cream with Swerve
Lily's dark chocolate chips
Strawberries, fresh
Other Notes:
This is a protein heavy meal, since we have both the turkey and the sausage. I had about 35g of protein total!
I also cushioned the ratio with a higher fat content to accommodate for the dollop of gravy, which was too difficult to include into the KDC.
I absolutely love Thanksgiving leftovers! So I decided to bulk prepare this meal for AJ, too. I am really glad I did, as it allowed my efforts to last a bit longer, and he gets to enjoy the meal days after! See my bulk meal prep blog for more info.
For example, I mixed all the creamed spinach ingredients really well, then weighed and divided it evenly into 10 containers total. I did the same with the cooked celery/butter/seasoning combo (weighing the sausage separately into each container).
I hope this is helpful to you! Please comment below for any other successes or stories you wish to share. I am all ears!
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