- I don't know how I'm gonna do this.
I don't know if I'll be able to do this.
But if you can see me, I guess I did do it.
Wish me luck.
(upbeat music)
Hi, I'm Ayo and I'm a private chef
which usually means I have a massive budget.
However, today Tasty has challenged me
to create a Thanksgiving dinner for six people for $30.
I'm gonna go shopping and see what I can figure out.
(upbeat music)
Okay, we came in under budget.
Multiple stores, a few hacks here and there,
but I was able to get everything I needed
for my Thanksgiving dinner for 29.93.
I have a few pantry staples
that I can use today to help me out.
I have olive oil, and I have salt and pepper.
I don't know how I'm gonna do this.
I got a few tips and tricks.
I kinda have a plan, but let's get started.
(upbeat music)
I'm gonna start with dessert
because I'm gonna show you how to save time,
and show you how to save some money.
So I am going to make a cheater's meringue for a Patti Pie.
I'm using a Patti Pie because
I wanted to kind of stay true to my roots with this.
And I'm Southern, we do not eat pumpkin pie.
We eat sweet potato pie.
So I'm going to start with a pre made Patti Pie.
To jazz up this pie a little
I'm actually gonna make a cheater's meringue.
So I have three room temperature egg whites,
marshmallow fluff.
And I'm gonna whip this up into soft peaks
and then slowly add in my marshmallow fluff.
(beaters running)
It smells really good.
This is not my ministry
which is why we're doing a cheater's meringue.
So now I'm gonna add the marshmallow fluff,
and I'm gonna add it slowly, about a third at a time,
so I don't deflate the egg whites.
So this is shiny, we have some nice stiff peaks
which is exactly what you want.
I'm gonna take large chunks, pile it very, very, very high.
And then I'm just gonna create some little hills,
and valleys, some nice peaks.
Higher the meringue, closer to God.
It smells so good, you know, she's a big girl.
She got a lotta body.
So I'm gonna go put this in the oven at 350 degrees
for about 10 to 12 minutes, just to get it brown.
(big band music)
We don't have money for a whole turkey,
there's also only six guests coming to this dinner.
So I'm gonna use a turkey breast.
I got it preseasoned which saved me a ton of money on spice.
I won't say I don't trust that they fully seasoned it,
but I will say, don't judge me, or this turkey,
so we're just gonna give it a little extra.
I can hear a lot of the chefs
and foodies makin' this face about pre seasoned.
It saved us money and it's Cajun seasonin',
which I feel like is almost always a safe bet.
So now I'm gonna sear the skin side first
in a already very, very hot pan.
So inside this pan
I already have two tablespoons of olive oil.
And what you're looking for is just a nice,
golden brown, delicious crispy, crispy, crispy skin.
Make sure the meat is nice and dry
before it goes in your pan.
This is what we are looking for.
Crispy skin, golden brown, delicious.
(dinging)
So now I'm gonna add my aromatics to the pan.
This will help us out a lot later.
So I have three celery stalks that I cut into thirds.
Half of one large yellow onion,
and six garlic cloves peeled.
So I'm gonna take this guy to the oven at 350
for about 75 minutes until he gets to about 165 degrees.
But don't worry, our turkey's not gonna be dry.
I'm gonna baste it in it's own juices
about every 30 minutes or so.
So we're gonna keep her nice and moist, and ready to go.
And now we're gonna get into my favorite part
and my whole reason for going to Thanksgiving.
The sides.
(upbeat beat)
So the first thing I'm gonna make
is this cornbread dressing.
I know dressing versus cornbread is a whole thing.
I am Southern, we make dressing.
I've never actually had stuffing.
I always thought it was like stuffed
in the turkey and cooked that way.
And I never was interested in like bird butt bread.
So the first thing I'm gonna do is cook eight ounces
of pork sausage in this pan, I already have it hot,
I've added some olive oil to it.
So I'm just gonna start here.
My pork sausage also has some spice to it,
which is a good way to again save money on seasoning,
but get a little extra flavor.
So I'm gonna cook this sausage
for about seven to eight minutes,
just until I get it nice, and brown, and caramelized.
You want it cooked all the way
because it'll give us a lot of texture.
Okay, so now I'm gonna add in my celery.
That same onion we used earlier, and two garlic cloves
that we just minced up.
We're just gonna cook this until the veg gets soft
and everything starts to smell really good.
I'm also gonna salt this just a tad
as we're moving through it,
really kick up that spicy flavor that's in our sausage.
So my vegetables are all soft.
And now I'm gonna add my boxed cornbread stuffing.
Normally I would make this myself,
I'd make my corn bread first, it would be a whole thing.
But I had $30 and we don't have that much time.
Okay, this is lookin' pretty good.
So now I'm going to add a cup and a half of boiling water,
and four tablespoons of butter.
See, told y'all we was gonna make it taste good.
So now I'm going to cover this for about five minutes
and let it fluff up and absorb
all of that butter we just put in.
Okay, this is actually, surprisingly smelling pretty good.
I'm really impressed with this.
The one thing dressing and stuffing both have in common
is a nice crispy topping.
So I'm gonna move this from the stove top
to an oven safe casserole dish.
And I'm gonna boil it for about one to two minutes,
just to give it a little crunch.
(jazzy music)
All right so next I am going to make mashed potatoes.
The craziest thing about this entire dish
is that I got 10 pounds of mashed potatoes for $1.98.
And I'm only using about four pounds of potato.
So after you cook for everybody, your guest leaves,
make you some mashed potatoes for the next day.
And growing up, weirdly enough,
my family didn't do mashed potatoes.
I think we're more of a rice family.
But I love mashed potatoes
so when I started cooking, I think I was about nine or 10,
I brought the mashed potatoes.
I'm gonna use a mandolin because it's faster
but if this scares you which it should,
if you're not used to using it
you can absolutely use a knife.
The best way to cook these is to cut them very, very thin.
So I'm just gonna slice this entire bowl
and then we're gonna move on to boiling 'em.
So you always wanna start your potatoes off in cold water.
And I'm just gonna salt the water,
and I'm gonna turn this up.
All right, so my potatoes are cooked, they are strained.
And now it is time to turn them into mashed potatoes.
If you don't have a ricer, you can use a potato masher,
there's nothin' wrong with a little rustic potato.
You could mash them with a fork,
just whatever you have on hand.
But these are fancy, so I'm going to use this ricer.
So another great money saving tip, sour cream.
Typically I would add like heavy cream,
or buttermilk, somethin' to give you that tang
and the smooth mouthfeel you get from dairy.
We don't have money for that, y'all.
I have a cup and a half of melted, but yes,
a cup and a half, it's Thanksgiving, of melted butter.
And I'm going to add that to my potatoes.
I really like doin' it by hand
'cause you get to see it come together
and you cook it with a little bit of love.
Okay, so this looks really good.
We have turkey, we have sweet potatoes.
And honestly, I think we need some vegetables.
So I'm gonna move on to making us some green beans.
(techno music)
So the first thing we're gonna do is take three cloves
of smashed garlic, and we're gonna saute them in our pan
with the green beans.
For a Thanksgiving meal
typically I would make collard greens,
but we can't afford collard greens.
Not making GBC, I do not make casseroles, never casserole.
I'm just gonna hit 'em with a little salt.
And then I'm actually going to steam them
in this chicken stock
which is a great way to add a lot of flavor.
You don't wanna steam them till they're very soft,
you want 'em to still have a little bit of bite.
So my green beans look good,
they're nice and tender.
For the ooh la la part,
I'm going to zest one entire lemon.
And you wanna do this at the end
because you don't want them to get brown.
You want 'em to keep that bright, vibrant green color.
If you feel like you have a firmer lemon,
a good tip is just to give a little roll,
and add the lemon juice.
These guys are looking good.
Just give 'em a little toss,
and I'm gonna hit 'em with a little bit of salt.
I think we're ready to go.
(upbeat music)
Okay, last thing we're gonna make is the gravy.
I'm a dipper, I always need some sort of sauce.
And if you've ever had turkey,
you know it needs some sort of sauce.
Apparently so do the people who seasoned our turkey,
because it came with a pre made gravy pack.
I feel the judgment, but we saved our drippings.
And it's a Cajun gravy,
and I actually really think
we're gonna be able to make this happen you guys.
So I have one cup of my turkey drippings and water.
Basically drippings are just all those juices
we were basting the turkey in,
and all of those yummy smells from our aromatics.
All of that is in this dripping,
which is going to make this gravy taste
like we really put some effort into it.
So we're literally going to boil them,
boil out the water, boil out anything we don't need,
and everything that's left
is gonna be very highly concentrated.
It's gonna be thick, rich.
I think my gravy's good.
One thing I like to do is put a little spoon in it,
if it coats the back of your spoon,
it will coat your meat which means you are all good to go.
All right, this gravy's done.
I'm gonna go plate everything.
And we're gonna see if it actually tastes good,
or if it tastes like I spent $30, so let's go try it.
(jazzy music)
This is what $29.93 worth of food looks like.
I was able to make the mashed potatoes
with real butter, and sour cream so I got that tang,
I got my dairy in there.
I was able to make this stuffing which is surprisingly
really, really, really beautiful.
And we got a nice crunch to it.
It looked good, it looks like it took us a lot of time.
Green beans just to liven up the party.
We needed some freshness y'all,
we have to eat some vegetables.
And this pie.
Do y'all see this pie?
This pie is stunning.
It looks like I actually really, really took my time.
And as far as my guests know, I did.
Surprisingly I actually had enough money
to add a little bit of cranberry sauce,
and I just added some orange zest to it
to give it an extra oomph.
All right, so I got my plate, it's quality control time.
So I'm gonna give this turkey a try.
Okay you guys, this is not bad.
For the price point, this is actually pretty good.
Let me try my mashed potatoes.
(jazzy music)
Okay, those are amazing.
Anything with a cup and a half of butter
in it should be amazing.
And it is, I'm very proud of this.
I'm Ayo Cherry, let me know if you have
any other challenges you want us to do.
Thank you so much for watching,
and have a happy Thanksgiving.
- [Man] Oh yes.
(jazzy music)