Back at friends Cora and Didier’s for an alternative Thanksgiving, the evening found me alone in the kitchen whipping up turkey cutlets and cranberry sauce while the kids slept and their mom and dad toured the maternity ward of the local hospital. (Baby no. 3 arrives in less than a month.) We sat down to dinner at the terribly continental time of 10pm, fulfilling my objective of getting some variation of the traditional dinner in place before the day closed.The most important element, of course, isn’t the food but what it commemorates. There is no holiday quite so noble as this one, which encourages people to pause, evaluate and be grateful for all that is good in their lives. And perhaps it’s never been quite so needed as in this grim year, with markets tumbling, uncertainty rising and the entire world in an edgy bad temper. So time to put aside, temporarily, the angst over the future, raise a glass of Didier’s fine Bordeaux and count our blessings.
The scourge of breast cancer remains at bay: Mom’s discovered and eliminated, mine now two years gone and the statistical chances of its return tumbling by the day. (Women over 40 reading this: Have you had your mammogram? The difference between death and inconvenience is early discovery.) I’ve just passed the 50 pound mark in my weight loss, while still managing to eat and drink my way through many a notable evening (as this blog attests). My 70-year-old father is so fit he’s training for an inline skating marathon. Beloved spaniel Mr. Darcy, approaching a venerable 10 years next March, still has a spring in his step (thank you, Pedigree Joint Care) and shows no signs of leaving me any time soon. My friends continue to be a blessing without price. Work offers intellectual challenge, stimulating colleagues and the ability to pay the mortgage. I live in an exquisite little corner of the world and am fortunate to see other lovely bits of it. Sure, there’s plenty to worry about. But in the overall scheme of things, life is remarkably good.
Thank you to all … living or dead, mortal or divine, friend, family or stranger … who’ve contributed.
And so on to the pumpkin pie, the requisite completion element in this worthy ritual. You only have to spend one Thanksgiving in Europe to realise how uniquely American this dessert is. Most Europeans have never tasted it and, if they have, they find it vile. That is because most Europeans, mistakenly thinking this is some gourmet holiday dish, start with fresh pumpkin, follow recipes with a bewildering number of steps and add all manner of odd ingredients. The results, on the few times they’ve been inflicted on me, have been vegetal, too savoury and downright odd.
Pumpkin is one of the few things in the world that is significantly better out of a can than fresh. Most pumpkins sold in stores are intended only for carving, not for cooking. The European habit of substituting other types of squash is equally disastrous. It just doesn’t taste right. Leave the pumpkin sourcing to the fine people at Libby’s.
Pumpkin pie shouldn’t be over-thought. It is a dead simple recipe
from the ‘50s and should be kept that way: a tin of Libby’s pumpkin, two eggs, sugar, spices. Dump in pie shell. Bake. The result should be custardy, sweet and the embodiment of the taste of autumn. Didier and Cora ventured their first tastes this Thanksgiving. After a show of horror, Didier admitted that it was very pleasant and polished off the whole thing. A victory for American cuisine. And another thing for which to be thankful.
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