I did Thanksgiving here last year for my husband's family, so also 8 adults. I really tried to keep things simple. I just did the basics:
- Four small trays of hors d'oeuvres
- a 15 lb turkey
- mashed potatoes & gravy
- sweet potato casserole
- green bean casserole
- stuffing
- corn casserole
- cranberry sauce
- spinach salad
- homemade dinner rolls
- pumpkin pie & pecan pie
I thought that was pretty conservative, really. No ham. No baked beans, fruit salad, jello salad, or potato salad. Nothing with multiple layers. No cheese ball or BBQ meatballs. Only two kinds of pie. In fact, I was worried that there wouldn't be enough. I'd forgotten one, simple fact:
My own family is
not normal.
My own family (which, to be fair, has about 5x more people), would have fallen upon all of this like a plague of locusts, and would have taken home any of the leftovers without prompting.
Unfortunately, I don't think my husband's family had ever seen that much food in one place in their lives. They were not prepared, and really didn't know what to do. They just sort of looked at it all and weren't sure what to do, or where to start.
I've had them all over at least once since then, so I'm hoping that by now, they've sort of gotten the hang of my dinner parties. This time, they'll know enough to start fasting a few days ahead of time. :p
So, all kidding aside, the only thing I would say is think in terms of the overall quantity of food. Go nuts on the variety, if you want, but just make smaller amounts. People are perfectly happy just trying a little bit of lots of different things.
