Starter

Full of fiber-rich garbanzo beans, an Indian staple, this healthy dish from Maneet Chauhan is an ideal side or starter. Add grilled shrimp or chicken to make it a meal. You can use the marinade recipe from our tandoori tilapia with hearts of palm salad .

Editor's note: The recipe and introductory text below are from Ted Allen's The Food You Want to Eat. For Allen's tips on throwing a Thanksgiving party, click here. I can't have cocktail hour without great, fresh olives — and
I don't mean the rubbery, tasteless black ones from a can.
I mean the real deal: kalamatas, niçoises, gaetas, picholines— the more variety, the better. Most good supermarkets these days feature an olive bar—that is, a variety of loose olives available in bulk. And that is a very, very good thing. Some of these places include among the selection a batch of olives that have been seasoned with herbs and other flavors, too. But it's more fun to do it yourself; you can buy different kinds of olives (be sure to get different sizes and colors, which looks great in the bowl), select the flavors you like the best — say, thyme, cayenne, garlic, grapefruit zest, whatever — and you can control the spiciness. You'll have a great collection of olives for your next impromptu get together, or an excellent addition to an antipasto platter. And they're almost no work at all to make. When you serve, remember to put out a small dish so guests have some place to put the pits.

Editor's note: The recipe below originally appeared in One Potato, Two Potato by Roy Finamore with Molly Stevens. It was reprinted, along with the introductory text included here, in The 150 Best American Recipes by Fran McCullough and Molly Stevens. __ Probably the most frustrating part of preparing Thanksgiving dinner is the last-minute potato mashing and gravy making. If you have this recipe in your arsenal, you can knock off the mashed potatoes 2 days ahead and have them sitting pretty in the refrigerator, ready for a last-minute heating. But that's not the only time you need these potatoes; they're also great for a buffet or for any crowd. These luxurious mashed potatoes have a couple of other virtues, too. They're light and fluffy because they're whipped with an electric mixer, and they're incredibly luscious because they have sour cream and butter, plus cream cheese to give them a little edge. __

This soup combines two separate recipes attributed to the agriculturalist and linguist Varro. As a remedy it could be drunk to aid the digestion, and it also served as a soup with the chicken included. I choose to leave the meat in, to give some texture to the soup. The dish is quite unusual in not using fish sauce. The sweet/savoury balance is surprisingly good.

A beautiful bright orange, this soup has the sweetness of carrots and the aromatic nuttiness of caraway.

This layered salad is definitely stacked: Michael Taus, executive chef and owner of Zealous restaurant in Chicago, has piled in all the vitamins C and B12 you need for the day, as well as 50 percent of your daily requirement for vitamin A.

Fork to the bottom of your bowl and you'll put away six servings of veggies! You can thank Michael Dunn, chef at Yankee Pier Santana Row in San Jose, California.

Shake up your standard skewer with a smoky, tangy marinade created by Elissa Meadow, chef-owner of Solar Harvest in Beverly Hills, California. This recipe fills 40 percent of your daily potassium needs and supplies vitamins C and B6, as well.

You can serve this soup hot or cold, says Carl Schroeder, chef at Arterra in San Diego. It's loaded with beta-carotene and is wonderfully rich.

This starter, from Colby Garrelts, chef and co-owner of Bluestem in Kansas City, Missouri, is ideal for any summer get-together. For only 72 calories per serving, you'll get nearly 30 percent of your daily requirement for vitamin A, plus 4 grams of fiber.

This creation from Salvatore Marino, chef at Il Grano in Los Angeles, is the perfect finger food: tasty and healthy.