Recipe and Photo
by Linda Altoonian
“Though a moist turkey
was always the star on our holiday table, the costar was always my mom’s home-made,
stove top stuffing. Most of it never made it to the table because every time
folks passed the pan, they stole ‘just one more bite.”’ This is so good that
you will find yourself making it year round.”
| Ingredients
1 stick butter, melted
1 large onion, diced Turkey giblets, skinned, deveined and chopped fine 1 container of celery flakes 1 tsp. thyme leaves 1 Tbs. rubbed sage 8 slides of whole wheat bread, moistened with water or chicken broth, and chopped up | Directions 1. Sauté onion until golden. 2. Add giblets to onion and sauté until cooked. 3. Add all three spices and stir. 4. Add moistened bread and stir until coated with spices. 5. Cover and cook until bread is thoroughly heated and browned. |
Thanksgiving, Triumphing Over Turkeys
by Lael Morgan
Celebrating Thanksgiving
was my first real battle as a bride. It was the long-established tradition of
my husband’s family that his mother and stepfather host a Pilgrim-appropriate,
traditional dinner in the lovely dining room of their gracious Tudor-styled
home in West Newton, Massachusetts. They had managed their mob scene of kith
and kin for years. They were famous for
and proud of the feasts they’d provided. Family attendance was mandatory, but I
refused to attend.
For starters, both
my husband and I were in our last year as students at Boston University while
holding down weighty part-time jobs, so we didn’t have much time alone
together. I knew if I gave in to my
charming but strong-willed mother-in-law at that point, I’d be doing it for the
rest of my life. Also, I longed to start a Thanksgiving tradition of my own
that didn’t include turkey.
So we newly-weds
stayed home and enjoyed lobster followed by ice cream. Not only was it our
favorite meal and dirt cheap in those days, but it required no advanced preparation
except for covering our dining table with old newspapers and setting it with
forks, nut picks and pliers while waiting 13 minutes for the lobster to steam
as we melted butter. That day was so
lovely I felt guilty about it until my sister-in-law told me how much she
envied our break-away and considered following suit.
Not that I
disliked the usual Thanksgiving fare. My
forebears, like those of my in-laws, had come over on the Mayflower, and I
loved all their menu basics. In fact, I
longed for something traditional when, a few years later, my husband and I
sailed around the world on a 36-foot, 50-year-old schooner and Thanksgiving
found us somewhere in the Inland Passage of the east coast.
Tying up to
another boat of like-minded sailors, we hosted a spread which included mashed
squash, cranberry sauce and a small turkey laboriously roasted in a fold-up
oven planted over a primus stove. The meal, lubricated with local moonshine,
was a great success, but, alas, I retired before cleanup and was awakened at 2
a.m. when our boat dragged its anchor towards the rocky shore, with that of our
still tied-up guest, in a violent storm.
Mustering
on deck in heavy rain, wearing only my nightgown, I managed to untie the boat
of our friends while my husband kept us all off the rocks and maneuvered to a
safe place in the harbor. But I did
consider suicide when I discovered the stormy seas had bounced mashed squash
and cranberry sauce on our galley ceiling and lodged turkey, raised rolls,
butter and Indian pudding with whipped cream in our bunks.
Later, on my own,
when teaching at University of Alaska Fairbanks, I dragged out all my
traditional Thanksgiving recipes for the parent-deprived students and single
faculty who became my guests. This went well until our holiday celebrations
became super popular and one Thanksgiving morning at 5 a.m. I found myself
preparing a turkey that weighed almost as much as I did.
Still groggy from
sleep deprivation, I finally got the bird I could barely lift into the oven,
only to push the “Clean” button for which there is no “Off” switch. That meal was saved by a strong neighbor who
managed to push the stove forward so we could unplug it.
I also enjoyed traditional
Thanksgiving fare when two friends and I illegally traveled the private Dalton
Highway from Fairbanks to the North Slope where all the oil is, over a
Thanksgiving break. Knowing there was
only one stop where food was sold along that two-day haul, we precooked a
traditional meal and enjoyed it cold at a spot on the map labeled “Gobblers
Knob” for no reason we ever heard of.
Years later, I
returned to New England to run a newspaper for my now ex-husband and began
attending his family Thanksgiving celebrations where I was overjoyed to
discover the menu was based on my stubborn legacy of lobster. Having replaced
his mother as the keeper of family traditions, he had long since made lobster
the standard. Traditional kith and kin brought cooked turkeys, pumpkin pies and
the usual holiday fare to enjoy the next day, but he provided a marvelous
lobster bake banked with seaweed on the shore of Snow Island in Maine that
would convince even the most severe doubter that this was a good idea.
Today, back in
Alaska where Maine lobsters cost a zillion dollars to import, I sometimes
substitute Alaska king crab which are darned near as tasty and takes the same
scant time to produce. Or, if I have
some extra time, I may go with turkey this year because I love the wings and
stuffing and Indian pudding. However, I do have reservations about how our
Pilgrim Fathers treated the Indians who saved their lives on that first
thanksgiving when the new settlers didn’t have their sox up (i.e. a winter food
supply). In fact, it is my theory that
most of those who landed on or about Plymouth Rock couldn’t have survived
without the kindness of Indian strangers.
