Rethinking Thanksgiving

Over the last several years, I have had a hard time with Thanksgiving, and it had nothing to do with my roasting the turkey.

Like any former academic, I researched all the contempo methods, settled on the brine soaking approach as enunciated in the publication “Cook’s Illustrated,” and found the results both gratifying and tasty. As did my guests, according to the data collected in my Turkey Day Survey.

In truth, I don’t much like warm turkey. Never have, and I expect that it had something to do with gravy which I also don’t much like but which was one of those mandatory accompaniments for the holiday.

Far better to slather mayonnaise on a couple of pieces of toast and jam the middle with white meat just out of the fridge, add a sandwich pickle or two – now that’s something to be thankful for.

After the events of the last several months, the continuing economic dislocations roiling across the countryside, troops in harm’s way, people close to starvation in other parts of the world, whatever I might be thankful just now doesn’t seem to matter much in a world of hurt.

It’s time, I think, to have a long look at Thanksgiving and improve it. I don’t believe that there’s convincing evidence that the Pilgrims were deeply committed to turkey as a main dish. I know this offends the turkey growers, so I’ll add hastily that I doubt very much that roast beef was high on their list either. My conclusion – let’s get past the Pilgrim stuff and build a meal which, in its very construction, makes us thankful. In my case it would be roast beef, yorkshire pudding, to hell with the fiber-filled vegetables, some form of green salad, and a hot fudge sundae for dessert, with a couple of very thin, crisp ginger snaps.

The next step I would take to improve Thanksgiving would be to put restrictions on the conversation: no elucidations of health problems, no politics, no golf or football – in fact, no sport topics at all, and nothing about absent members of the family, unless it’s really complimentary (“She looked better at the wake than I’d seen her in years” would be acceptable, but “What’s a little embezzlement after his many years on drugs” would not.)

Then I would try very hard to find a new guest or two. Once you have the same group for several years, there is this tendency to begin believing you are in a slightly below average production of “You Can’t Take It With You,” The words are the same at each performance, just the hair styles and costumes change.

Here are some clues that you’re in a play:

“I can’t recall a turkey that’s ever looked [tasted] any better than that.”

Why [fill in name here], I just don’t know how you find time to make such a delicious [fill in food group here].

You know, the reason we have [insert least favorite/most appalling name of dish here] each year is that my [insert familial relationship descriptor here – i.e., father, grandmother, crazy Uncle Edward here] insisted on it for Thanksgiving.

In the interests of food safety, can I assume that you cooked the turkey to 160 degrees fahrenheit…?

It wouldn’t be Thanksgiving without [pecan, pumpkin] pie.

I don’t know much about wine, but I think this Southern Iowa Maize Golden Vintage is r-e-e-a-l interesting….

What I really need now is a nap…unless there’s football on tv?

Is it OK to stack?

Oh, I’d love to send you home with some turkey…it would just lie there in the fridge, waiting to crawl between slices of toast with mayonnaise, and Nick would just sit there with this foolish but beatific expression on his face as he ate it. No, no, no, I won’t hear another word about it.