Ina Garten has long extolled the virtues of store-bought shortcuts to make cooking easier, and her mantra certainly applies to big holiday feasts. "Whatever you need to do to get Thanksgiving dinner on the table is OK," Garten told The New York Times, which tasked the Barefoot Contessa with creating a menu that employs premade pie crust, frozen mashed potatoes and bagged stuffing mix worthy of the holiday table.

Cookbook author Rose Levy Beranbaum incorporates cream cheese and apple cider vinegar into her pie dough to create flavorful, flaky pie crusts that hold their structure when formed into lattice strips and other shapes. The ingredients work together to create a dough with the right amount of gluten to be sturdy but not tough, and both contribute a tangy flavor.

In her new book "The Miracle of Salt," journalist Naomi Duguid covers the preservative qualities of salt, the people involved in its production, and its use in sweet and savory recipes around the world. Duguid's photographs document salt production in several countries, and she said she hopes the images communicate "that all of our ancestors and currently people in many places are working in these difficult environments to get this thing that we can't live without."

This recipe from Indigenous foods activist M. Karlos Baca adapts a squash dish typically cooked in a pit in the ground so it can be cooked indoors in a Dutch oven. The recipe calls for cushaw squash, but you can substitute acorn or butternut squash. The Kitchn

Brown butter and crunchy hazelnuts make a flavorful topping for silky mashed sweet potatoes. You can make the brown butter several days before assembling the rest of the dish. CIA Foodies

Apple, onion, celery and herbs flavor this classic stuffing made with challah. You can leave the cubed bread out overnight to dry, or speed up the process in the oven. Unpeeled Journal

Chocolate adds a slight bitterness that is a pleasant complement to sweet pecan pie. This pie can be served warm or at room temperature. CIA Foodies

Chef Barbara Alexander from The Culinary Institute of America shows us how to deep fry a turkey. Deep frying a whole turkey results in delicious, succulent meat with perfectly crispy golden skin that is well worth the extra effort. Before you begin, keep in mind that deep frying a turkey can be very dangerous! Improper frying preparation and techniques can cause fires as well as severe burns, so follow the steps in this video and proceed with extreme caution.

Thanksgiving menus contain a wide range of flavors, so having wines that work well with many different foods and appeal to many palates is important, according to Warren Leonard, general manager of Weygandt Wines in Washington, D.C., who recommends gruner veltliner from Austria and gewurztraminer from Alsace. Wines with a touch of sweetness, such as off-dry German rieslings and sparkling wines with some residual sugar, can also pair well with a variety of dishes, according to wine professionals.

The pandemic and the resulting supply chain and labor challenges have led many restaurants to pare down their menus, and recent research reveals menu trends are returning to pre-pandemic normalcy as eateries seek to meet current consumer demands, writes Datassential's Samantha Des Jardins. "Learning what consumers will want in the future and what they will continue to crave is an essential science that will constantly need to be adjusted with changing times," Des Jardins writes.

Mushrooms are surging in popularity among consumers craving foods and beverages that provide immunity-boosting properties and other health and wellness benefits, SmartBrief's Audrey Altmann writes. The most popular functional mushroom varieties are chaga, lion's mane and reishi, said Jamba Dunn, CEO of beverage brand Rowdy Mermaid, which uses mushrooms in its kombuchas as well as its fruit-flavored Sparkling Tonic with Adaptogens line.

If turkey isn't the centerpiece of your Thanksgiving dinner, or if you are looking for a vegetarian option for friends and family, this CIA Foodies recipe for Vegetarian Gravy can easily be made ahead of time for your holiday meal. It's just as rich as the gravy you would make with roasted turkey or chicken. It is thickened quickly with a cornstarch slurry, but you can use potato starch or a pre-cooked roux if you prefer. Make this gravy up to a few weeks ahead and freeze in a covered container. Get the recipe.

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In observance of Thanksgiving in the US, SmartBrief will not publish Friday, Nov. 25.