November 19. 2003

Thanksgiving Traditions

One November in North Carolina after we hosted friends and their three children my friend Marlene said, "My, what an unusual Thanksgiving dinner!" Huh? Seemed normal to me. I'd had this self-same dinner every year of my life since memory began. My mother is 85, and she probably started cooking this approximate menu 50 years ago.

In fact my sister will be cooking the same traditional menu this year when I go home to Illinois : turkey and giblet gravy, sage stuffing, scalloped oysters, mashed potatoes and sweet potatoes, asparagus casserole, cranberry-grape-walnut-whipped cream salad, rolls, riced cream cheese and cherries, and half a dozen assorted pies. Black olives are a must. We might add a ham, or an additional salad or new pie, but pumpkin and pecan are givens. Everyone will be in a state of near starvation by serving time of 1 p.m. when all food is served at once, then spend the afternoon in a state of torpor until time for mid-evening turkey sandwiches.

Back in North Carolina , when we were later invited to Marlene's house for Thanksgiving, I did notice differences. She served dinner in the late afternoon and in courses, including salad and escarole soup with pasta to please her Italian husband. Her father hated all fowl, so she broiled him a big steak. I don't remember anything unusual about the rest of the meal, except for the delicious coconut custard pie her father, a former restaurant owner, made with fresh coconut.

This year when I asked friends and acquaintances to tell me their Thanksgiving menus, traditions and so forth, I got a lot of replies saying, "nothing special" and "the usual turkey and trimmings." Maybe, maybe not. You don't know what's routine until you hear someone else's idea of routine. To some people, there is no Thanksgiving without creamed onions. My friend Jane's sons insist on deviled eggs, macaroni and cheese, green beans with ham and chocolate pie. I won't give up my scalloped oysters and it's definitely not acceptable to grill or fry my turkey. For what's Thanksgiving without good brown gravy? (And lose the giblets, please.)

Here is a coast-to-coast cross section of replies from some good cooks I know:

Wendy , California : "I always make cranberry bread, cornbread stuffing, and ever since marrying my husband, Steve, blue cheese-cream cheese-stuffed celery and apple pie. To me it's not Thanksgiving unless there's apple pie. I try and make different salads and a different variety of vegetables every year. The best turkey we ever had was the one done on the grill with the rotisserie.

I remember the first year my sister was married and she hosted Thanksgiving-I was stuck in Westchester , NY traffic for about 6 hrs and didn't arrive at her house till 11:30 pm the night before and she hadn't made anything yet. She didn't have butter for the potatoes and no tin foil so at midnight I was off to the grocery to pick up last minute items. She wouldn't touch the giblets in the turkey cavity so I had to get up early and get the 20 lb. turkey in the oven. 10 minutes before serving the meal, I dropped a casserole dish and had on open toed sandals and cut my toe-blood all over the floor as I was stirring the gravy. It was one of the last Thanksgiving meals spent with my mother, grandmother and all of our immediate family before mom died a few years later. We all live in different parts of the country now so family gatherings are a part of our past but this year since my sister lives for the first time in 15 years within driving distance of us, I'm thinking we'll have a family Thanksgiving with me doing most of the cooking. Basic traditional fare since her children are fussy fussy eaters. Several of us don't like turkey so I may try and do something in addition to turkey this year-maybe quail or duck."

Cynthia , New York . Our Thanksgiving childhood traditions changed when my father died (I was 11) and we bought a store.we'd never had relatives in the scene.  Here in Schenectady , we'd invite friends over.  Ron always made the turkey and dressing.  When we moved his parents here, then they always came over.  When I started working, Ron and I began a tradition of going away for the long Thanksgiving weekend (leaving on Friday when his parents were alive and on Wednesday when it was just the two of us)...it was a rest between major fall deadlines and preparing Christmas for 500-700 children and families.  One year we'd go to Vermont , the next to Lake Placid , the next to the Maine coast---we always visited a different area, staying at a bed and breakfast.  It was wonderful...actually my favorite tradition.  Now with retirement, we seem to be trying to figure out a new direction...so, for us, the "tradition" has changed with the different phases of life." 

Julie , Tennessee . "Thanksgiving. My favorite food holiday. My family has always had a very casual one. Dress down and wear elastic waist pants. Since my family is all over the map, I always have a turkey, even if it's just Mark and I. It's just not Thanksgiving without it. Plus, I MUST make soup with the carcass!

I started making this salad last Thanksgiving. I've made it several times since, and it's always a hit at dinner parties. I believe it will become a new tradition on my Thanksgiving table."

[Note: Julie sent me the recipe for Goat Cheese and Pear Salad with Candied Pecans with Zinfandel Pancetta Vinaigrette. Because it came from the Food Network/Food TV, I can't print it here for you here, but you can e-mail me for it.]

Mary , Tennessee . Before I was 12 years old, we had Thanksgiving at my Grandma Julia's.  We had Christmas dinner (lunch) there as well.  She lived about four miles from us out in the country in Mississippi County , Missouri .  My mother, dad, brother, sister, and cousins (six of them) usually were in attendance.  Before the meal "the kids" played outside if the weather was not rainy and it seems to me it was always not rainy. 

We had turkey and dressing, sometimes ham, and every kind of vegetable you could think of (seemed like that then because it included broccoli and cauliflower and Brussels sprouts and lima beans and hominy, none of which I was very fond of)--as well as green beans and sweet potatoes. Mother would usually take something--probably cranberry sauce or salad and maybe a pie (apple, mincemeat, or pumpkin).  Usually there was also fruit salad and pound cakes and probably fruit cake.  The grown ups ate at the dining room table and the rest of us kids were scattered about the house at card tables.

After dinner (lunch) the grown women helped clean up the shotgun kitchen with the older "kid" girls sometimes helping at least dry dishes.  The men started watching football games.  Eventually everybody ended up in the living room snoozing and watching football.  About 4 o'clock we'd go back home.  Sometime later in the evening we'd have leftovers for dinner. 

Since I was 12 (my grandmother died that year) we've had Thanksgiving dinner served promptly at noon mostly at my mother's house in Wyatt, Missouri with mother and dad, my brother and sister (spouses and children when they appeared), Aunt Mildred and Uncle Fred (until he died in 1970).  The cousins had Thanksgiving at their mother and stepfather's.  We still had turkey and dressing and giblet gravy (with or without the giblets and with or without hardboiled eggs depending on the year) and occasionally ham.  Iced tea.  All the good china and silver and crystal out (all of which had to be hand washed). 

Sweet potatoes, cheese scalloped potatoes, green beans, sometimes broccoli and /or asparagus (sometimes sauced or not), sometimes creamed onions, and the occasional other vegetable.  We'd also have cranberry salad or sauce (usually both), sometimes a tomato aspic salad and bought rolls and butter (usually the Blackhawk Bakery rolls from Paducah , KY ).  Aunt Mildred usually brought flowers, fruit salad and cookies or cake, sometimes the sweet potatoes or the creamed onions.  After my brother married, then my sister-in-law began to bring usually a vegetable.  We tried farming out the cheese scalloped potatoes but they never seemed to turn out like mother's.  Also we'd have pumpkin and mincemeat pies.  Sometimes a cherry or apple pie as well.  As the family grew we added a card table in the living room when grandkids were old enough to eat with carpet under them--before that they ate at the kitchen table.

In the fall sometimes, the crops are still being harvested in Missouri and if that is the case then the farmers in the family when they finish lunch leave to harvest crops (if all the soy beans aren't out by Thanksgiving).

In the last few years the Thanksgiving meal has sometimes been at my sister-in-laws (at Alfalfa Center with whatever part of the immediate family was in town. We had it once at my nephew's house in Charleston, Missouri, once in Nashville, Tennessee at my house when I was married, and then we've split up and sometimes gone to my sister's (Huntsville, Birmingham, Jacksonville, and/ or Atlanta) where a whole different set of traditions reign--who ever heard of rice with turkey?  And pecan pie apparently was an absolute must (my sister found that out one year when she didn't make it!).  Also they had dressing in the turkey as well as on the side where mother's had always been on the side--things like that.

In the last few years I've seen fried turkey and no turkey Thanksgivings and one Thanksgiving at Opryland (nice but definitely not a repeater for the holiday meal!).  I even spent one or two at home resting between Wednesday and Friday work schedules.
The tradition seems to be dying with my mother's generation.  With all the grandchildren now of marrying age with their own homes it is harder and harder for everyone to gather. 

[Note: A few years ago I had the honor of enjoying some of Mary's Aunt Mildred's Fruit Cake individually baked in muffin tins. It was, bar none, my favorite of all I've ever eaten and I'm happy to say Mary got the recipe for me. Maybe this Christmas?]

Here are two of my favorite Thanksgiving recipes.have a happy!

Onions au Gratin

Though I love onions in most ways, I'm not fond of creamed onions. This gratin is the onion dish of the gods, really good with prime rib roast as well as on the Thanksgiving table. Usually I make a half recipe of onions (not many onion lovers in my family), add some Swiss cheese to the other half of the sauce and make another gratin of green beans. Servings: 8 or more as a side

4 lbs. white or yellow onions
5 hard cooked eggs

Sauce Supreme:
3 Tablespoons butter
4 Tablespoons flour
1 cup homemade chicken stock
1 cup half and half or light cream
Salt, white pepper and grated nutmeg

Topping:
1 to 1 1/2 cups soft bread crumbs
4 Tablespoons butter

Cut the onions roughly into eighths and cook in boiling salted water until tender. Drain well and chop finely. Chop the eggs finely. I often chop eggs with my pastry blender, which is lots easier to wash than the processor. Works for the onions also, if you are cutting the recipe in half.

Make the sauce as for Bechamel, and season with salt, white pepper and a touch of nutmeg.

For the crumb topping, melt the butter in a saucepan and stir in the crumbs. Cook, stirring, over medium heat for a few minutes, but don't let them get brown.

Assembly: Stir the onions and eggs into the sauce and taste for seasonings. Turn into a buttered 8 x 8 or 9 x 9 inch square casserole dish. Top with crumbs. May cover and refrigerate until ready to bake.

Lady Bird's Pecan Pie

Evidently this recipe was one of those given out while Johnson was president. Actually Lady Bird used white sugar and dark corn syrup, but I experimented and liked the combination of brown sugar and light syrup better . Some prefer pecan halves, which are indeed prettier, but the pie cuts easier and the nuts are better distributed if chopped . Serve with a bit of whipped cream to cut the sweetness, if you like. Serves 8-10.

½ cup unsalted butter, very soft
1 cup light brown sugar, packed
1 cup light corn syrup
Dash of salt
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
3 large eggs
2 cups chopped pecans
1 9-inch unbaked pastry shell

Combine butter, sugar, syrup, salt and vanilla. Beat until thoroughly blended. Add eggs and beat until just blended. Fold in pecans and pour into pie shell.

Bake 40 to 50 minutes at 375 degrees on the oven rack directly below the middle rack. Top should be toasted brown and filling set in center. If crust edges brown too easily, loosely cover with a strip of foil.

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