Let’s face it. Making Thanksgiving dinner can be overwhelming. After all, there’s only so much time to prep and meet the showtime deadline.

To get a handle on how to tackle the job sanely, we turned to Brother Luck, the nationally award-winning chef and owner of two eateries, Four by Brother Luck and Eleven18 Latin Tapas Bar.

“Most of my early years as a chef I worked in huge hotels where I prepared holiday banquets for hundreds of guests,” Luck said.

With more than 20 years as a chef, Luck has the plan for turkey day mastered. And, with his wealth of knowledge, he spilled the beans on how to get the turkey dinner on the table in an orderly manner at one of his recent Turk-torial cooking classes.

He kicked off the class saying, “Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday as a chef. I love having the family around the table to dine together.”

His goal for the class?

“I want you to walk away from this class with all the information you need to have a successful turkey dinner,” he said. “Last year when I went to my mother-in-law’s home for Thanksgiving, I was planning to fix dinner for about 20 people. When I got to Phoenix, I learned I would be cooking for 52 people. She must have told all her friends a chef was going to be cooking.”

Luck didn’t let his feathers get ruffled.

“Knowing my wife’s mother, I wasn’t surprised,” he said. “I had brought a circulator and was able to cook four turkeys in seven hours.”

Luck was referring to an immersion circulator, which is used for sous vide food preparation. In sous vide cooking (French for “under vacuum”), food is vacuum sealed in a bag and cooked in a precisely controlled low-temperature water bath. The circulator regulates the temperature of the water. For the class, Luck did not use this method for cooking the turkey. The bird was roasted in an oven, just like home cooks would be doing.

The strategy

“First, look at the menu and plan an order of operation,” Luck said. “Plan a timeline and then get your mise en place prepared.”

Mise en place in French means “everything in its place.”

“In cooking, it means preparing for everything you need before cooking starts. Most of the tedious work is already done and all you do on Thanksgiving Day is actually firing the food,” Luck said. “Have your equipment ready to go. Have your ingredients ready to go. Don’t just wake up on Thanksgiving Day and start cooking. You’ll just end up grumpy and not have any fun. Stage the food preparation so the menu is 60-80% prepped. You’ll need to start two to three days ahead.”

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Luck offered tips for setting up a timeline:

• Potatoes can be peeled and cut into chunks, covered with cool water and stored in the refrigerator for up to three days.

• Green beans can be trimmed and blanched and stored in the refrigerator for a couple of days.

• Bread for stuffing can be sliced, toasted in the oven, cooled and bagged several days ahead.

• Cranberries can be made ahead, chilled and refrigerated until serving time.

• Allow a day (24 hours) per 4 to 5 pounds of frozen turkey to defrost in the refrigerator. Or purchase a fresh turkey.

• Brine a defrosted whole turkey 12-24 hours before roasting.

• Make stock with turkey neck the day before Thanksgiving for the dressing and gravy. Store in refrigerator.

“With all this prep done, on Thanksgiving all you’re going to be doing is mixing a few things and firing them,” Luck said.

For his menu presented at the class, Luck roasted one 15-pound turkey ahead of the start of class and used another defrosted turkey to demonstrate trussing and brining. He carved the cooked turkey to serve to the class.

“For turkey day, figure out what will take the longest to cook besides the stock and dressing. That is what you want to start to finish preparing first,” Luck said. “For this menu that will be the dressing, which takes 45 to 60 minutes.”

For the cooking demonstration, Luck started preparing the dressing. He quickly broke the toasted bread slices up in a bowl and set those aside. Next, he sauteed the sausage, diced onion, celery and garlic. Those ingredients were added to the bread along with enough stock to soften the bread, plus eggs, fresh herbs and seasoning.

Potatoes came next. “I have some sneaky tricks for making mashed potatoes smooth and not lumpy,” Luck said. “Use a ricer. Every kitchen should have a ricer. And start the spuds in cold water and bring it to a boil. Immediately, turn the heat down and let the potatoes poach in simmering water.”

Luck explained that when potatoes are cooked hard in boiling water, they release a lot of starch into the water.

“That results in gooey, clumpy potatoes,” he said. “When the potatoes are done, drain off the water and return the pan to the heat to evaporate the rest of the moisture from them.”

Then he put the potatoes through the ricer and started whipping the milk and butter into the hot potatoes.

“Now is when you want to release the starch in the potatoes,” Luck said.

The result was beautiful, silky smooth mashed potatoes.

Luck started the cranberries cooking so there would be plenty of time for the cooking liquid to reduce and get jammy.

“Homemade cranberry sauce is so much better than anything you find in a can,” Luck said.

Now that the potatoes and cranberries were simmering away, Luck switched gears to talk about brining.

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Brining: It’s science

“Brining flavors, moisturizes and tenderizes meats,” Luck said. “It happens through osmosis.”

Luck explained the process of brining, which is done by a process known as osmosis. This entails soaking the turkey for several hours in a chilled solution of salt and water. The salt and water within the meat cells balance with the salt and water in the surrounding brine, which results in a tastier bird.

To stuff or not

“Don’t put the stuffing inside the turkey. It will never get hot enough to kill the bacteria,” Luck said. “Instead, fill the turkey cavity with oranges, lemons and herbs. This adds flavor to the meat juices and the turkey will cook more evenly.”

Carving

“Let gravity show you where to cut the turkey up,” he said, as he pushed the drumsticks and thighs away from the body of the bird. “Now you can cut the thigh and drumstick apart at the joint next to the carcass.”

Luck did the same with the wings, pulling them down and away from the carcass to expose the joint. Then he sliced the breast meat away from the carcass following the rib cage.

Gravy

Luck poured white wine into the roasting pan to deglaze the turkey drippings in the bottom of the pan. He also added some of the stock he had made the day before.

“My trick for making smooth, non-lumpy gravy is to make a slurry of corn starch and cold water,” Luck said. “Bring the stock in the roasting pan to a boil and add about half of the slurry, stir and add more slurry, and continue cooking until the gravy thickens enough to coat the back of a spoon.”

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Finishing touches

“Now it’s serving time,” Luck said. “Melt butter in a sauté pan and toss the blanched green beans in with some sliced almonds to heat through. And you’re ready to serve. As much as Thanksgiving can be intimidating, it doesn’t need to be. Just plan and stage.”

As for dessert, pumpkin pie is the quintessential choice and can be purchased or made at home ahead of feast day and refrigerated.

Happy Thanksgiving!