Dish management is the secret to a successful Thanksgiving don’t you think?
For a while I thought it was oven management – the flow chart that dictated when each baked dish would slip into the oven so that everything was hot and ready at roughly the same time.
But a Thanksgiving day a few years back, cooking alongside my younger brother, changed my perspective. He was and is a master of making sure the sink never fills up with dirty bowls and utensils. Dish management ensures you always have the tools you need, but more importantly, at the end of the day, when you’re exhausted from cooking and feasting, it ensures that you don’t have a massive task ahead.
There are tasks in my composition and arranging work – articulations, lyrics, copyist work, etc. – that I tend to save for the end. But with big projects, I try to remember to treat the job like Thanksgiving dinner and focus on “dish management” as I’m going along. In the end, I’ve saved time, effort, and ended with a cleaner final product.