Dylan Dreyer’s Thanksgiving ‘rehearsal’ dinner is absolutely genius

When it comes to hosting Thanksgiving, Dylan Dreyer leaves nothing to chance. After her son Calvin was diagnosed with celiac disease in 2023, she began orchestrating a Thanksgiving “rehearsal” to test new gluten-free recipes before the big feast.

“Thanksgiving is my husband and my favorite holiday. Like, I just love everything about getting the family together and cooking a big meal that everyone gets to enjoy,” Dylan tells TODAY.com. “My husband gets very anxious because he wants dinner to be perfect, because it’s his favorite meal of the year.”

She said cooking a feast comprised of entirely gluten-free dishes is a challenge since so many recipes call for flour.

“Stuffing has to be a little different because you can’t use bread, and gravy has to be a little different because you can’t use flour. Rolls have to be a little different,” Dylan explains.

With mounting pressure and excitement for the big day, Dylan’s husband Brian suggested doing a rehearsal to ensure that every recipe comes out all right.

“He always wants me to just do a rehearsal just to make sure the gravy is perfect, the stuffing is perfect, the mashed potatoes are just right,” Dylan says.

Dylan says that Brian and her three kids will taste her recipes and provide feedback so that she can tweak each dish before the holiday.

“The feedback on the gravy for rehearsal was it was a little too watery but the flavor was good. The stuffing was too dry, so I have to add more chicken broth. So, you know, I’m taking notes on what I need to fix,” Dylan says. But the rehearsal was far from a failure — “The apple crisp turned out perfect.”

Of course, trying to feed her entire extended family, including her three little ones, always presents some challenges. From organizing the logistics of the holiday to feeding picky eaters, Dylan finds it necessary to plan her menu weeks in advance.

“The problem is, like, Calvin will eat everything. Ollie and Rusty, my other two, don’t really like anything about Thanksgiving. They don’t love mashed potatoes. They don’t love sweet potatoes. They don’t love gravy. They don’t love stuffing. And they don’t love carrots. So there’s a lot of stuff that they just really don’t like. So now I’m also thinking, what else could I make that they can at least have a nice meal without having to cook a whole separate thing for them?”

Because she has a child with celiac disease, Dylan needs to prepare all of the food in a gluten-free environment, and can’t have anyone else bring anything, as it would risk cross-contamination.

So, in lieu of a potluck-style Thanksgiving, Dylan prepares as much food as she can in advance to save time. “Like, in my stuffing, I put in celery and onions, so I chopped the celery and onions on Tuesday and put that in a Ziploc bag so that’s ready to go when it’s time to make the stuffing,” she says.

In the past, she has created detailed lists that help her keep track of what dishes to make — and when.

“This is my list for Thanksgiving — labeled with what I can cook on Tuesday, what I can prep on Wednesday, what I can wait until Thursday to do prep, what I still need to get at the grocery store,” Dylan revealed on the 3rd Hour of TODAY.

Even if you don’t need to adapt traditional Thanksgiving dishes, Dylan thinks all hosts can follow her example for a stress-free holiday.

“I think it’s very helpful if, let’s say, you’re going to make roasted carrots for Thanksgiving and you’ve never done it before. Maybe tonight with dinner, if you have chicken, make a side of roasted carrots,” she explains. “Kind of pepper in these little recipes within your regular dinners over the course of the next couple weeks. This way, you can perfect each thing and you’re not as stressed out because you just have to follow the recipe and the way you did things when it comes time to actually make the full meal.”

This article was originally published on TODAY.com