Share your Thanksgiving story

Cafe Society
1

You know you have one… unless you are a heathen from one of those countries that doesn’t celebrate the best holiday on the planet.

So what was it… did you confuse salt for sugar… not realize the cancel button didn’t just silent the timer but also turned off the oven… drunk uncle who did whatever…

A couple of mine.

I was finishing up college and had was living in an apartment and had actually gained some cooking skills. I loved cooking shows before there were special channels devoted to them. That said I was looking forward to coming to my parents for a home cooked Thanksgiving dinner. I got home and found out my Mom had the flu. I was upset for her, but thought this would be great since I would have a well stocked kitchen (rather than my tiny apartment) and already paid for food to try my new found skills on.

My Dad though told me I didn’t need to worry and proudly pulled out two turkey and gravy TV dinners. The strangest thing is that he was actually a very good cook so I don’t know where that came from. I still had a good time watching football and eating dinner on TV trays in the family room with him.

Another time I went to visit my wife’s parents in Florida. I’ll just say that my mother in law was best at making reservations. We planned to make the meal there, but we quickly found they didn’t have a very well stocked kitchen. To make a long story short, every few minutes I found myself saying “really… you don’t have that?” (exotic ingredients like salt and pepper, butter, etc.) and then running to the Publix a few blocks away. After my fifth or so trip the clerks at the store were laughing with me and saying they would see me soon. The dinner however turned out excellent.

So, what are your Thanksgiving stories?

2

I’m a heathen from this country. I don’t celebrate Thanksgiving any more because I read about how it originally became a holiday*. Instead I celebrate Turkey Day.

And one Turkey Day my MIL and Sis-IL (married in like me) got into a humdinger of a battle royal. That was just before that SIL divorced my BIL and ended up in a cult.

2 lil banty chickens duking it out, from what I heard later (we had already left after spending the obligatory 8 hours of Family Time).

*http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2014/11/27/6-true-history-thanksgiving-stories-which-do-you-believe-158045 (Having learned the last story… yeah, I went from agnostic to heathen and maybe someday, when I’m old and retire to the rez I’ll learn about our Spirits beyond a few names.)

3

Once when we were young, we got our baby cousin to yell, “Pig out!” as soon as Papa put the “Amen” on the blessing. We thought it was quite funny, the grownups not so much.

When I was a bit older, probably around age sixteen, my Uncle David was giving the blessing, and after the usual thanking God for all the good food, he wound up his prayer, “…and dear Lord, please heal the hickeys on Julie’s neck. Amen.” :eek: Until then, no one had noticed!

Another year, I brought an orange gelatin dessert. People were eating it with strange looks on their faces, “This tastes so familiar, but I can’t quite place it.” They were horrified when I revealed the secret ingredient.

4

Two years ago, we had our usual Thanksgiving with all of the family coming to my parents’ house. About an hour after everyone had left, I noticed my father was acting strangely. I asked him and got him to admit he had been feeling pain for the last few hours. This was disturbing as my father is somebody who never admits he’s hurting. It was worrisome enough that my mother and I ended up taking him to the ER, where they found out he had appendicitis and sent him in for surgery.

5

My first roasted turkey was done for my new in-laws. I had been a part of lots of Thanksgiving dinners, but this was my first solo. It came out almost perfect. Everyone seemed to be enjoying dinner. My father in law specifically seemed to like the stuffing with some gravy on it, and had had a couple of helpings. He was working on a third helping when my Mother in law asked about how I had prepared it. She said that my gravy had such a rich flavor, and the stuffing was very moist.

I told her that it was just standard giblet gravy. She asked “Giblets?” I explained that they were the liver, gizzard and such simmered with the Turkey neck to make the stock for the gravy.

My father in law stopped in mid bite with a horrified look on his face.

I went on to tell Florene that the stuffing was probably moist due to the canned oysters.

My father in law was up like a shot and made a beeline for the bathroom, where he spent the next half hour rather violently ill. The rest of my wife’s family did not eat another bite.

No food allergies in the group. I just had no idea that my wife’s father was a very picky eater and did not allow any “weird food” in his house. I did not cook this stuff to sandbag him. It was just standard Thanksgiving turkey, stuffing and gravy in my house.

My in-laws have never since eaten any dish I have ever brought to a holiday dinner.

6

I brine my turkey, according to the Gospel of Alton Brown.

First time I did it, my MIL looked at me askance. “You’re doing WHAT to the turkey?” “You’re only roasting it for three hours?” etc etc.

I had no leftovers. So there.

7

My fondest memory of Thanksgiving was going to my grandparents’ house as a child. It was the typical big traditional meal except for dessert.

Instead of pie, my grandmother made Floating Island Custard and served it in tall fancy crystal stem glasses with her special long silver spoons.

Thanksgiving was the only time she prepared this, so that made it super extra special. :slight_smile:

8

One year I was either still in college or had just graduated and I went to my sister’s for Thanksgiving. We were eating dinner at her new in-laws house and her mother-in-law Lucie is a very nice woman who is very overindulgent. Her sons are all pretty big (not fat, but tall) and she’s used to big appetites. She made turkey and ham and was serving up a storm. I, on the other hand, had a touch of the flu or something similar and was not much for eating (which can be atypical for me, I admit). At one point, I finished all my turkey so Lucie scooped up a slice of ham and plopped it right on my plate for me. I finished my meal, sat at the table as long as I could, and eventually crashed on their couch in the living room in front of a football game. Lucie then took pictures of me because it was so funny to see me passed out after dinner.

I remember years later my sister’s husband falling asleep after dinner and her and I razzing him for that.

9

I’ve got to have this recipe. I think a redneck Thanksgiving with this and White Castle stuffing would be a ton of fun.

http://www.whitecastle.com/food/recipes/recipes/white-castle-turkey-stuffing

10

Planes, Trains and Automobiles.

Gobble, gobble!

11

This looks a lot like it. Now wash that down with some Pepsi & peanuts, or some Mountain Dew. Whoo-eee! That’s eatin’!

12

I asked my in-laws to please put away the turkey, instead of leaving it out for people to take chunks of for sandwiches all afternoon. They weren’t thrilled, but did it, because I was worried about food safety. A few hours later, I spotted it out on the table. Someone had taken it from the fridge and not returned it.

And cats were gnawing on it.

13

Papa was going deaf…and li’l sis had laryngitis. You can easily guess where this led…

Sis (in a whisper): “It’s such a lovely day today.”
Papa: “Coming right up! You want cream and sugar?”

The rest of us were absolutely rolling about on the floors. Best TG ever!

14

Thanksgiving evening, 1974. Wandering the streets in downtown Santa Barbara, kinda chilly and hungry, feeling almost like a homeless destitute bum. Actually, I wasn’t homeless and destitute at all, just out-of-town on Thanksgiving evening and I was hungry and looking for a restaurant and nothing much was open. What I finally found to eat . . .

Full story here in the nearby MANDATORY Thanksgiving food thread . . .

15

I don’t know if I’ve told this before but anyway. You’ll see it is a classic but not really my story except after the fact.

Fresh out of college, I was working a full-time volunteer job and we lived in a group house. My parents came down to visit and stay for the TDay weekend. A housemate and her visiting sister Bunny and another housemate (HMVS&AH) were doing the cooking, which included a turkey from among the donations to the agency we worked for.

Unbeknownst to my parents and me, they had noticed the cooking bird did not smell so good. Looking at the label, they saw that a coupon for a future bird had expired six months before, which gives a good indication of the vintage of the cooking bird. A plot was hatched - see if they could pull off getting a replacement bird with **gigi **and parents being unaware of any of this!

They called down to see if the agency had any extra turkeys and it turned out they did have some meat available. HMVS&AH are giggling furiously amongst themselves and hurry out to the car on some pretext and “Bunny looked down and she was still wearing the oven mitts!” They go get the available meat from the agency and bring it back (and only after all this is done do they realize the replacement bird had been cooked with the giblets pack still inside!) and pass it off as the original.

In the meantime they realize they need to dispose of the offending original bird. This becomes another caper as they sneak it out of the house while my parents and I are not looking, and in their heightened nervous state, dump the turkey, roasting pan and all, into the alley by the house!

We never caught on and loved hearing the story a day or two later!
P.S. My mom had come down in part to teach me to make her French Silk Pie which is one of the top items I’ve ever eaten. The first step was take some flour and spread it on the board. I have a phobia about touching flour so she ended up making the whole pie herself! The last piece was the grand prize in a poker game. :slight_smile:

16

My Grandma and great-grandparents were not amused when I as a little girl excused myself from TDay dinner to go to the bathroom because “things build up in there”. :o

17

When I was a kid, I had a big, beautiful…but bad Irish Setter, Laddy (Londonderry Lad).

One Thanksgiving, my family (grandparents and all) were waiting for dad to emerge from the kitchen, cutlery in hand, to start carving the golden brown, deliciously aromatic turkey. All mouths were watering in anticipation of Dad getting down to business and start handing out the meat to each and all.

Good ol’ Laddy beat him to the punch, however. Like a flash, the dog jumped up and with forepaws on the head of the table (Dad’s spot), snatched the bird with his gapping maw and drug it down onto the floor. Dad quickly wrestled the prize from Laddy, washed the slobber off the bird in the sink and proceeded to carve it up. We all asked for deeper cuts.

That was the same Thanksgiving my mom asked nanna to pass the cranberry jelly, which was plated like this. Nanna reached over, squeezed the jelly and it oozed between her fingers and glopped all over the table. “I thought it was still in the can!?!” Nanna was a real hoot.

Years later, we had Thanksgiving at my older brother’s house. We weren’t really excited to eat there, because, although my sister-in-law is a great gal, she was a pretty bad cook in those days (e.g. she used ketchup as the sauce in her lasagna, she made coffee you could see through to the bottom of the cup, etc.). And sure enough, the turkey was presented for carving with a pallorous hue, bordering on cyanotic and lacking in any type of herbs or spices. The fixins’ were equally bad, if not worse.

My nephew was ~3 at the time and despised vegetables—just would not eat them. This dinner was no different; he picked at the meat and starches, but did not touch anything green. This irked my brother, who was concerned about the boy’s nutrition, so he tried negotiating with his son. “If you eat just half of a string bean, you can have dessert; otherwise, you’ll have to leave the table.” It didn’t work.

So, true to his word, brother walked over, lifted his son from under his arms and proceeded to remove him gently from the dinner table. This didn’t sit well with sis-in-law, who felt such draconian measures were unwarranted on a holiday. She popped up, grabbed her son by the feet and tried to wrestle him (non-violently) back onto his chair. In their 45+ year marriage, this was the closest I’ve ever seen my brother and his wife get into a fight. They pulled their kid back and forth, both refusing to give up their grip. This was a bit awkward for the rest of the family and we all just looked in different directions. Finally, brother relented; my nephew plopped back into his seat and enjoyed his pumpkin pie (which tasted like it was made with raw pumpkin flesh). To this day, we joke that my nephew grew to 6’5” not from his mother’s cooking, but due to the stretching he got at that holiday dinner.

Years later, we had Thanksgiving dinner at my house. The guests included my extended family, my much older business partner, his wife and their best friends (a conservative minister and his wife). Earlier in the day, my brother showed me one of those electronic flatulence machines that he just bought for the occasion (what can I say; holiday’s bring out the adolescent in us). I suggested that we tape the noise box to the bottom of Dad’s chair and blast it at an opportune time during dinner. Brother: “You don’t think the minister will be offended?”

“He probably will be, but that just makes it funnier”, I replied. I taped the box to the bottom of dad’s chair well before everyone was seated and brother played mission control.

Dinner was excellent (I made it myself :wink: with help from mom and sis…my ex was as bad a cook as my sister-in-law and tipsy as usual). Everyone was enjoying the meal and engaged in lively conversation. Then, at just the right moment, when everyone was full and there was a lull in the conversation, brother pushed the button and let it rip. I looked toward dad, mock-aghast and said, “that’s pretty rude, Dad!”
…but, everyone turned to stare at me…not Dad! What the…

Then, brother blasted again, even longer. He chastised, “Tibby, don’t blame Dad, excuse yourself to the bathroom!”

That’s when I realized my bastard brother switched my chair with dad’s when I wasn’t looking. Even the minister and his wife had a good laugh. I was mortified.

18

When we were all still kids my sisters and cousins were feeding the pet cat of one cousin all the turkey it would take. Boy, he was wolfing it down as if he was in heaven. Then he suddenly stopped eating, shook his head a little bit, and all of that turkey came back up, spewing over everthing!

The first time I ever did a turkey on my own it came out pretty good, but I thought I’d been gypped, as there were no giblets in the cavity. Then while cutting the bird I found the giblets, well cooked in their little bag, in the neck cavity, not the body as with chickens.

19

I cooked. We ate.

End of story.

20

Way too verbose, IMHO. Consider: Cooked. Ate. Fini.