Apps We Love – Tech for the Holidays!

Gizmodo gave its Gold Medal award for Thanksgiving apps to CHOW Thanksgiving Dinner Coach, so you know it must be great. CHOW provides a selection of Thanksgiving recipes, but that’s just the start. Choose the recipes you want to make and CHOW provides the shopping guide and also a step-by-step game plan to help you get all your dishes on the table at the same time!

Nothing says Thanksgiving like Butterball, and West Wing devotees will remember President Bartlet’s call to the Butterball hotline to discuss the safe temperature for stuffing. You can download the complete Butterball Cookbook Plus app and find recipes, how-to videos, information on special cooking tools, and, yes, the ability to click and call the official Butterball Hotline.

Not sure which wine to serve with which course? Let the Food & Wine Pairing Guide with Cooking Recipes relieve the stress. You enter information about your food selection, method of preparation, and the seasonings you’ll be using, enter your choice of red, white, rose, sparkling, or dessert wine and preferred price range, and the app gives you suggestions. On top of that, there’s a store locator to find where you can make your purchase.

Expecting holiday guests with special food requirements? Yummly scours the food blogs for best recipes based on your taste preferences – you can search for recipes and get a full ingredient list, calorie count, and instructions. You can use search filters to seek out recipes that are gluten-free, vegan, and low-sugar. There are how-to cooking videos and daily recommendations as well. Save recipes for later use. Click ingredients from any recipe to add to your shopping list.

Sometimes it seems there is an app for everything. If you’re trying to juggle multiple items in the kitchen, remember when to leave to pick up family at the airport, schedule an exercise break, check on the elderly neighbor, water the plants – you can set multiple simultaneous timers and stopwatches with Timer+. Times can be set by the hour, minute, or second, and you can set up repeating timers for recurring events. So put that casserole in the oven, run an errand, do your yoga, pay the bills, and get the kids to practice without missing a beat.

For those of you with children who will be curious about Santa’s activities leading up to Christmas, take a look at the official (North American Aerospace Defense Command) NORAD Tracks Santa app which has been tracking Santa since the 1955. Starting on December 1, you’ll see a countdown to Santa’s flight along with his progress around the world. Particularly interesting is the information about holiday traditions around the world.

Do you need a little background music for your holiday celebrations? Download Christmas Radio or Christmas Radio+ for nearly 100 channels streaming Christmas music. We guarantee you’ll be tired of The Little Drummer Boy by the time the holidays are over.

Whether you’re celebrating Kwanzaa or curious about the celebration, download Kwanzaa 2016 for quotes, wallpaper, images, information and history. The app is heavily saturated with ads, but the information is solid.

The Jewish Museum has created Light My Fire: A Hanukkah Guide which contains history, dates, blessings for each night of the celebration in both English and Hebrew, and a menorah which you can light virtually. Chanukah Guide from Saber Design provides prayers in six languages, social networking capabilities, and a timer features with alerts. You can even play a virtual version of the Dreidel game.

Finally, many of these holidays entail gift giving, so take a look at GiftPlanner, an app that helps you store names of recipients, gift ideas, shopping status updates, shipping and tracking information, photos, and links to your favorite online shopping sites. This is a year-round app, so keep track of birthdays, anniversaries, and any other gift-giving events all in one place.