Despite what the above blurry cell phone photo might suggest, the feast was a success! So the Legendary Dressing was so epic that it didn’t quite fit in the stove! Nothing an inventive husband, merry family, and good Chardonnay can’t cure!
Better, no Botulism Bird and all Parental Units had a fine time, as did the Offspring.
“Better than Cats!”
Five stars, (or should I say bananas, Jean Louis?)
As we get closer to the arrival of the Parental Units, and I listen to friends plan (and moan) about their upcoming holiday plans, we continue to plan our Big Meal, which has inevitably lead to self-analysis and loved-one analysis about what is sacred and what is not at Thanksgiving.
While not a purist like some about specifics, there are those well-known dishes that make it That Special Day, mainly turkey, dressing, and cranberry jelly. I really don't like to mess with those standards. To quote Frasier’s dad when his son insisted on a fancy fresh-cranberry side dish and not getting canned cranberry sauce (with the "ridges from the can"), when people go off the reservation and into fancy cuisine on that one day, I wonder, “Is it that you can’t learn, or you won’t learn?!”
Don’t mess with the canned jelly goodness and pass the pumpkin pie!
In the spirit of my desire to be slightly perverse about this good day, however, without ruining the menu, I offer two Alternative Thanksgiving tidbits.
The origin of this holiday is, of course, in the Pilgrims’ first Thanksgiving, recorded by William Bradford in Of Plymouth Plantation. Sidestepping any politically-correct revisionist questions about the Pilgrims’ first Thanksgiving and their relationship with the Native Americans, I would like to share a later Turkey Tale as related by Bradford.
Dissatisfied with the secularization of the Pilgrims years after their 1620 settlement, Bradford relates a story that can only be summarized as A) “These teenagers today are out of control,” and B) “All of ya’ll are all going to hell in that proverbial hand basket!”
“Ther was a youth whose name was Thomas Granger; he was servant to an honest man of Duxbery, being aboute 16 or 17 years of age. (His father and mother lived at the same time at Sityate.) He was this year detected of buggery (and indicted for the same) with a mare, a cowe, tow goats, five sheep, 2 calves, and a turkey. Horrible it is to mention, but the truth of the historie requires it.”
I can imagine poor Thomas busted for bestiality and dragged in front of the elders. Knowing he would be executed for this crime against biblical law and nature, he confessed: “Ye Gods! I did do it,” going on to list a litany of possibly fictional farm animals, and culminating "with a Turkey too! So there!”
Of course, Granger isn’t the only one to abuse the turkey. PETA’s protests & my cooking aside, I just overheard a colleague talking about his new-found holiday tradition, something I had not seen since moving from South of I-10 in Louisiana. Turducken!
For those of you outside Louisiana and parts of Canada who are unfamiliar with this culinary abuse of the turkey, allow me to quote my students’ favorite source of all wisdom, Wikipedia: “A Turducken is a dish consisting of a partially de-boned turkey stuffed with a de-boned duck, which itself is stuffed with a small de-boned chicken. The thoracic cavity of the chicken and the rest of the gaps are filled with, at the very least, a highly seasoned breadcrumb mixture or sausage meat, although some versions have a different stuffing for each bird.”
Kinda like a Russian nesting-doll concept. Often credited as a culinary invention of Paul Prudhomme, I see it as a Culinary James-Dickey-Deliverance Special!
Mmm. Mmm.
Check out the picture if you need further convincing for or against such a dish:
http://fematrailer.blogspot.com/2007/11/happy-turducken-day.html
Perversions aside, I do love Thanksgiving. Still relatively-commercial free, it’s nice to have a day set aside to pig out and piously reflect on one’s blessings. What a wonderful American Tradition!
Before I start to get all Oprah-cheesy, here is a recent poem about giving thanks aired on Prairie Home Companion this past weekend:
In the meantime dear friends and love ones, know that I count you among my most precious blessings.
(OK back to holiday snarkiness!)
