Nicki and I will be sharing the cooking duties. We started a couple of years ago not doing a whole turkey, and we’ll go that route tomorrow, too. I know that may sound sacrilegious in some circles, but I’m not a big dark meat fan, and although we’ve had some good turkeys over the years, we’ve had many more dried-out turkeys.

So what works for us is just doing a turkey breast. We sauté the breast and then bake it with all the seasonings and everything, and let me tell you, that breast comes out plump and juicy. That way you don’t have to fight with the undercooking versus drying-out issue that happens with big turkeys.

And yes, we do stuffing in the Rubin household, which is one my favorite parts about Thanksgiving. Nicki calls it dressing—must be some Kentucky thing—but she has a point because we’re not stuffing anything. What we do is make a stuffing out of three different types of bread. We use sprouted-type English muffins, whole-grain yeast-free sourdough bread, and millet-and-brown rice croutons, all whole grain. We toast everything up, butter them, and then we tear all the breads into crouton-type pieces, except for the millet-and-brown rice croutons, of course.

In a food processor, we dump cut-up onions and celery, add a bunch of spices, and then the various breads. That gives us a wet mix that we mush, mush, mush and then put into big muffin tins so they look like big stuffin’ muffins. We used to add cranberries, but the plain version is so good. We bake 12 stuffin’ muffins, which leaves us a few left over, which is great because Nicki, Joshua, and I love ‘em.

So we have our organic, free-range turkey, stuffin’ muffins, and mashed potatoes. We’ll also do sweet potatoes, with the top caramelized from pecans and Rapadura, which is like an organic unprocessed sugar, minus the marshmallows, of course. We’ll also do oven-roasted peas, carrots, garlic and onions, although we may do an onion pudding or corn soufflé. That will be a game-time decision.

We’re still deciding what dessert will be: apple pie or pumpkin crisp. Last year we had pumpkin pie truffles, which is where we took a pumpkin pie, cut it up, then mashed it and put the mashed pumpkin pie into an oversized wine glass. Then we added a layer of organic whip cream, followed by another layer of mashed pumpkin pie and more whipped cream. To me, that’s unnecessary. Might as well go for the pumpkin pie and whip cream straight up.

So what will Samuel and Alexis eat? That’s a great question. Their diet is pretty simple at this stage. Maybe instead of pureed chicken soup, we’ll throw in some turkey, but one thing Nicki and I have learned is that trying a new food on a baby is not the best idea. So I imagine Thanksgiving Day will be a combination of watching, playing, and sleeping for them.

We like to do our Thanksgiving meal early in the afternoon. My sister, Jenna, and her husband, Christian, plan to drop by toward the evening for our “second meal,” so it will be nice to see them. They live in Atlanta, but they came to South Florida to see Christian’s father as well as our family. That will be nice.

I can tell you this about Thanksgiving: Speaking personally, I have a lot to be thankful for this year.

I’m thankful for my relationship with God.

I’m thankful for my beautiful family of five.

I’m thankful for my Garden of Life family—more than one hundred loyal partners in empowering extraordinary health.

And finally, I’m thankful and amazed that thousands of people read what I write, listen to what I say, and follow the journey along with me.