After all the shopping and prepping and cooking you did last week, you probably don't want to step in the kitchen again for a long, long time. But a guy's gotta eat. And use up those leftovers sitting in the fridge in the next couple of days.

Here are a couple of recipes for quick sandwiches, that are perfect for doctoring up leftover turkey. (Or use the fresh stuff when that runs out. Or goes bad.) They're from Santa Barbara Bay, and both feature their Caramelized Onion & Roasted Garlic Ranch Dip, a great alternative to using plain old mayo or mustard on a sandwich. (It's available at supermarkets nationwide.) For more recipes, and to see their line of party dips and spreads go to www.santabarbarabay.com.

Southwestern Deli Wrap
2 large whole wheat or sun-dried tomato tortillas
1/3 lb. deli-sliced turkey or ham (or leftover turkey)
Santa Barbara Bay® Caramelized Onion and Roasted Garlic Dip
Sun-dried tomatoes ...More

If you're looking for a stocking stuffer that keeps on giving, drop in a BK Crown Card.

It's a rechargeable gift card that works at participating Burger King locations, and you can load it up (and keep reloading it), with any amount from $5 up to $100. ($100 at BK can last what, a year?)

For any of the guys on your list you don't know what to get, the gift of flame broiled meat is a decent choice. And your starving college-student nephew will love you for it. (Just as long as that creepy King character doesn't show up to deliver it.)

Buy in-store or online at www.bk.com

You've gotta have stuffing at Thanksgiving. It's tradition. But stuffing is made from bread. Bread is loaded with carbs. If white bread is used, it's processed. And many stuffing mixes contain a ton of sodium. Not exactly the healthiest thing on the table. But you can enjoy a healthier version of it, if you make your own and use the right ingredients.

Here's a recipe for stuffing (or dressing, as they call it in some parts of the country), made with whole grain, organic bread and low fat ingredients. It comes from the bakers at The Baker Organic, who use only the finest whole grains, stone ground by them, right at the bakery. They also let the dough rise naturally, meaning no chemical yeast enhancers are used. The resulting bread tastes like nothing you find in the supermarket. And this stuffing is nothing you'd get out of a box. The bread used is The Baker Organic Yoga Bread, which contains cranberries, sunflower seeds and pumpkin seeds, which gives it a helluva lot more flavor than white bread stuffing. The health conscious people at the table won't be the only ones who love it.

To get bread from The Baker Organic go to www.thebakerorganic.com

Whole Grain Stuffing
Makes 8-10 servings ...More

Every guy knows nothing adds flavor to meat like the right marinade. Turkey is no exception. Those who love to cook have taken to roasting, baking, smoking or basting their bird in apple cider, orange juice, white wine or even soda. All good choices. But in the modern guy's kitchen, beer takes precedence.

As an alternative to the boring, non-alcoholic bird, here's a recipe that calls for a generous dousing of full-flavored Tecate Light along with some chilies to provide some moisture to the normally dry turkey meat, and up the flavor quotient.


Tecate Light Thanksgiving Turkey
1 whole turkey, about 15 pounds
3 - 24 ounce cans of Cerveza Tecate Light
6 cloves of garlic
8 sweet chilies
4 tablespoons brown sugar ...More

T-Day is all about the food. And most of the things on a traditional Thanksgiving menu are fairly healthy: turkey (without the skin), vegetables, salads. But the desserts? Not so much.

Indulging in the fattening stuff once or twice a year isn't so bad, but just in case you're still honoring your New Year's resolution from January (I was almost able to say that with a straight face), or if there are people on the guest list trying to cut down on fat and calories, here's a dessert recipe for Applesauce Cheesecake from Jenny Craig that's easy to make, and won't add to your already bulging gut. Each serving has only 211 calories, 31g of carbs and 6g of fat, with 7g of protein. The ladies at your table will love you for it.

Applesauce Cheesecake
[From Jenny Craig’s 30 Meals in 30 Minutes cookbook]

1 (8-oz) package ROYAL No Bake Lite Cheesecake
1/2 cup margarine, melted
1 cup 1% lowfat milk
1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce ...More

You probably only see most of your relatives around this time of year. With good reason. Because they are a pain in the ass. Uncle Joe is showing anyone within eyeshot by how bad his excema is. Nieces and nephews are tearing around the place, destroying everything they get their sticky little hands on. And Grandma's in the corner complaining about various medical problems. In extremely disturbing detail.

Take the edge off by creating an entire Thanksgiving dinner using Maker's Mark bourbon. Here are the recipes for: Make Your Mark Turkey, Maker's Turkey Gravy, Happy Cranberries (with Kentucky bourbon in there, everyone will be happy), Sweet Potato Casserole, and some Spiked Cocoa for later.

I know the alcohol cooks off, but at least you can fantasize about sending your family into a bourbon-induced stupor so you can enjoy the holiday stress free. Or at the very least, have some on the rocks while you prep. A little for the turkey... a little for you... Makes the dinner so much more tolerable.

For more recipes (like a great one for bourbon chicken), go to www.makersmark.com

Make Your Mark Turkey
1 12-15 lb turkey
2 cups orange juice
2-3 cups Maker’s Mark Kentucky Bourbon
1/3 cup molasses
2 oranges (quartered) ...More

If you're having people over to your place for Thanksgiving, you're going to have more to worry about than cooking. Sure I'm putting turkey recipes up every day, but if you're green as Gumby in the kitchen, the stress of prepping a turkey, along with organizing everything else, can put you over the top.

Jennie O sent me one of their ready-made, seasoned, frozen turkey that goes right from your freezer to the oven. No thawing. No cleaning. Which keeps you hassle-free and able to drink and mingle.

It doesn't matter if you've never cooked anything before, let alone a turkey for you entire family. It's pretty much foolproof. The 11-13 pound birds come in their own cooking bag. You preheat the oven, cut some slits in the bag to let it vent, and put it in a roasting pan. The pop-up timer tells you when it's done. No basting. No constant checking. No chance of overcooking. (Unless you get involved in the game and ignore the pop-up.) And the taste is good enough to fool most of your guests into thinking you did it all yourself. (Mom will probably know you didn't. You can't fool mom.)

Jennie O offers a Homestyle Whole Turkey, a Butter, Garlic & Herb Whole Turkey ...More

If you're going to a Thanksgiving dinner you might want to bring (or be ordered to bring by mom) a side dish to serve with the turkey.

Here are three simple recipes for classic side dishes from Butterball. (Yes, they do other things than just sell turkey.) There's Golden Mashed Potatoes with Chives, New England Cran-Maple Chutney, and Heartland Vegetable Medley topped with muenster cheese and crushed crackers.

Really impress mom and make all three. They won't take long to make, and don't require a lot of skill. Yet they're delicious enough to make her smile. If you run into any problems, or have any questions, you can always call the hotline at 1-800-BUTTERBALL or click www.butterball.com to watch one of their TurkeyTalk podcasts.

New England Cran-Maple Chutney
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Total Time: 2 hours, 30 minutes
Makes: 8 servings (3 cups total)

Ingredients:
1 12 ounce bag fresh or frozen cranberries
1 cup sugar
1 cup maple or maple-flavored syrup ...More

Turn up the heat at this year's Thanksgiving dinner with this recipe for a cajun fried turkey from Popeye's restaurants. A healthy helping of cayenne pepper, garlic and onion get seared in through deep frying in peanut oil, giving this bird some bite.

It takes some planning and requires some special tools and equipment, so if you're not up to the challenge, but still love the idea of a hot and spicy turkey dinner, you can pick one up ready made at any Popeye's near you. I won't tell. (Head to www.popeyes.com for locations.)

At-Home Recipe Cajun Fried Turkey
Serves 6-8

Ingredients:
3 tablespoons Salt
3 tablespoons Black pepper
1 tablespoon White pepper
2 tablespoons Cayenne pepper
1 pound Butter
1 10-12 pound whole turkey
1 recipe Seasoning mix (see recipe below) ...More

Many people believe the best way to prepare the juiciest, most flavorful Thanksgiving turkey is to deep fry it. The outside gets dark and crispy, while the inside stays moist. But there are some inherent problems with deep frying.

One is the health issue. A lot of people won't eat fried foods anymore. Another is the expense of buying the oil needed to submerge the bird. And most importantly, the danger of cooking a large turkey in gallons of searing hot oil is a concern for a lot of guys.

An alternative way to get that deep-fried flavor, but without all the hassles, is to use an infrared cooker, like The Big Easy from Char-Broil. It uses no oil, but delivers the same moist, crispy results as frying - just as quickly, roughly 8-10 minutes per pound. A helluva lot faster than your oven. Which helps if Thanksgiving dinner is your responsibility and you got distracted by the game and forgot to start the turkey.

Just drop the turkey into the basket and lower it into the cooking chamber. The included meat thermometer will tell you when the turkey's done, so you get perfect results every time. No need to ...More

If you're worried about her ordering the most expensive thing on the menu, don't take her to the Serendipity 3 Restaurant on New York City's Upper East Side. There she might be tempted to order the "Frrrozen Haute Chocolate", a $25,000 dessert that has been certified by Guinness World Records as the most expensive in the world.

How do you turn what looks like your average, everyday chocolate mousse into a retirement-account-draining record setter? Add gold. Lots of it. At Serendipity 3 they start the Frrrozen Haute Chocolate by taking a dessert glass and coating the inside with 18 karat gold leaf (which is completely edible). Then they pour in a chocolate mixture made with 28 rare and exotic cocoas from around the world, add shaved black truffles and whipped cream (I'm guessing freshly whipped, not Cool Whip), and top it off with 23 karat gold shavings (which is the same stuff Trump sprinkles on his breakfast cereal every morning).



A delicacy this indulgent can't be eaten with a déclassé silver spoon, either. So it's served with a solid gold one instead. And to add some class to the dessert glass, a gold and diamond crown is used for decoration. Which you get to keep. (Along with the gold spoon your date stashed in her bag.)

So how does a $25,000 dessert taste? Samplers described it as "just like a frozen hot chocolate". That's it? For 25 large it should put you in a multi-orgasmic culinary euphoria that could possibly result in a coma.

I'm a breakfast guy. One of those people who can't function worth a damn unless I have some food in the morning. And I can appreciate a big breakfast. Couple of eggs. Some protein. Maybe a pancake or waffle. (I'm pro-carb.) But the people over at Swanson charged with whipping up the Hungry-Man meals have just gone full-blown bat-shit crazy.

Their "All Day Breakfast" is basically an early morning heart attack you heat up in your microwave. According to the nutritional facts, this one dish serves up over one day's worth of saturated fat (21g), almost two and a half days of cholesterol (690mg), and a mind-blowing 2,090mg of sodium, 87% of what you should eat in an entire day. Top it off with a quarter of your daily carb intake, 22g of which are sugar. If there is any positive, it's the 36g of protein it packs, but by time your body fights stops twitching from the effects of the other stuff, it's useless.

Note to Swanson: Yes, I'm a hungry man. But I'd like to live to eat lunch.

For a play by play of one guy's foolhardy decision to actually take this out of the box and cook it, click over to X-Entertainment.com

[Thanks to Kyle for link]