I want to give thanks to the late artist, Norman Rockwell, for ruining Thanksgiving for the rest of us with a few stokes of his brush. He’s the guy who painted that lovely scene of several smiling people seated around a table as a blushing grandmother presents a perfectly cooked, golden brown turkey. Rockwell even included himself in the picture, seated in the lower right corner and turning to grin at the viewer. Yeah, you, genius! Now everyone thinks Thanksgiving should be so perfect. That’s why you’re grinning—the joke’s on us!
OK, with apologies to Mr. Rockwell, I love everything about Thanksgiving. I adore watching the Macy’s Parade, and my favorite was in 1991 when the Kermit the Frog balloon deflated and his balloon handlers had to drag his sorry green ass through Herald Square.
I have had quite a few memorable Thanksgivings, but not for the reasons you may think. Let me start with Mom and her remarkable T-Day feasts. This lady picked up a knack for cooking from her mother, Lula, that would put Martha Stewart to shame. These two women could each single-handedly give the ultimate make-over to the most butt-ugly bird on the planet.
Mom’s and Grandma’s Thanksgiving chow-downs are legend in my family. The aromas would start drifting out of their kitchens on Wednesday as they baked pies, cornbread for stuffing, prepared the sweet potatoes, and made cinnamon rolls to enjoy with coffee the next morning. I’ll never forget Mom making one of Grandma’s recipes and pleading on the phone, “How much is a handful? For God’s sake, Mother, your hands are bigger than mine!” My own past T-Day attempts have been more like Hell’s Kitchen, with Chef Gordon f****ing Ramsey hovering about in the person of my British husband. What does he know about Thanksgiving, anyway? My results have often looked more like one of Salvador Dali’s melting creations.
I made my first efforts at making the annual turkey feast about 10 years ago. Making Thanksgiving dinner is something of a rite of passage, and I decided I would cook dinner for friends in my Pasadena bungalow. I had everything ready: pies baked, potatoes peeled, dressing mixed, cranberries chilling per Mom’s homemade recipe, and a 23-pound turkey thawing in the fridge.
Thursday morning, I took that bird out to prep it for roasting and the darned thing was still rock hard. So I yanked out my blow-dryer and went to work, but an hour later had made barely a dent in that frozen Butterball. Panic set in as guests would arrive at 4, so I called for back-up. “Mom!” I squealed on the phone. “My turkey is still frozen! What do I do?”
Speaking in that calm voice of hers, which has always annoyed the hell out of me, she asked, “When did you buy it?” “Yesterday,” I answered, “Why?” That was her next question. “Why did you wait? You have to let a turkey thaw slowly in the fridge. You should have bought that bird no later than Monday!” So I asked her what kind of pizza goes best with stuffing, yams, and cranberry sauce. Instead, she told me how to quick-thaw the turkey in a sink full of water, so I spent the better part of my morning emptying and filling the sink and turning that bird over and over. It thawed, we ate, I conquered!
The next year I simplified out of necessity. My oven was fried, so I bought a pre-baked dinner from a local grocery store. I arrived to pick up my fully cooked feast, only to discover that the bird, though cooked, was ice cold. “You need to heat it slowly at about 325 degrees for about two hours,” said the lady at the deli counter. Where’s the convenience in that? My microwave was only big enough to heat dinner plates and mugs of soup. Fortunately, one of my guests lived close by and her oven worked. Maybe I needed to take a page from my sister’s cookbook. Michele makes a big pot of beef and bean chili for her family and relaxes. It’s become a tradition as, I imagine, has airing out the house with Fabreeze the next day.
Speaking of tradition, what’s with the weird Thanksgiving dinner dishes? Every year those commercials and print ads start touting the infamous green bean casserole. This incorporates canned green beans (fresh, if you’re really ambitious), cream of mushroom soup, and those crispy onion ring thingies on top. Oooh! How could Mr. Rockwell have left that out of his painting? And don’t get me started on monkey bread. It just doesn’t sound right: turkey and stuffing, cranberries, mashed potatoes, yams, and ooh! ooh! monkey bread!
This year I’m doing the traditional thing, with a turkey and stuffing (Stovetop, because that’s what the Brit loves, but what does he know about Thanksgiving?). Trimmings include mashed potatoes, peas, cranberry sauce, rolls, and pumpkin and apple pies, but no yams. I love them, but not the Brit or grandson Mini-Brit. But what do they know … ooh, forget it.
Yesterday, I visited my friend Maureen who was baking a pumpkin to make pumpkin pie. That’s right, you bake the pumpkin first, then make the pie with the baked squash, which you puree. Most people buy canned pumpkin to bake their pies. But not me! I don’t merely make the pies, I make it to Marie Calendar’s! Oh, the shame!
Ariel Waterman especially loves Thanksgiving, because she enjoys giving everybody the bird. Send pie recipes via her editor, Ryan Miller, at rmiller@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Nov 25 – Dec 2, 2010.
