I've felt it for the last few days, almost a week now. Everyone is winding down into holiday mode, getting ready for a big meal, possibly followed by a day of horrendous shopping and crowd dodging. Friends are leaving town (one to Las Vegas, one to Palm Springs, another to the wilds of Missouri).
I have really fond memories of Thanksgiving as a kid. I especially remember coming home from school (or, for a few years, work) on the day before Thanksgiving, to a warm home, heated up to protect us from the late November chill outside. On that day, my mom would make stuffing for our turkey dinner the next day, and the house would be filled with this warm, baked bread smell. At night, I would steal a taste of it, removing the glass Pyrex top off one of the two containers filled with stuffing and stealing a few forkfuls. My mom would yell at me, secretly pleased that I liked it that much to sneak some of it, and go back to worrying about the turkey. How long will it take to cook? When should it go in the oven? Is it too big? Will the neighbors burn down the house, since they used the "let's cook the bird overnight" slow cook method, going to bed with the oven on a low heat. The minute our bird came out of the oven was her moment of truth. If it was too dry, the day was ruined. If not, well...it still wasn't her favorite day.
We would eat around 3:00pm, for a reason I could never figure out (was it PST...Pilgrim Standard Time?). We'd be chastised for wanting breakfast and lunch, told it would ruin our appetite for this too-late-for-lunch, too-early-for-dinner major meal that would weigh us down for the rest of the day. Later in life, it was just the four of us--mom, dad, my brother, and me--but when I was really little, all my cousins got together at my grandparents' house and we had these huge meals. They were the nexus of our holiday celebrations, from New Years all the way through the year until Christmas, and when they died, part of the holidays went with them.
These are the things I remember most about Thanksgiving and will always carry with me. That warm smell enveloping the house. The clanging dishes after the meal and my mom's quiet muttering about "All this work and now it's over." The turkey leftovers the next day. Everyone--except mom, stuck in the kitchen--falling asleep in front of the big color TV with football blasting in the background. I hope wherever you are today, you have these feelings, too...dysfunctional, argumentative, but still wonderful though they may be. And I hope someone slaps your hand when you try to steal that forkful of stuffing.
Amen to this post! Your mother is/was a cooking comrade in the clanking/clanging of dishes and the cleaning up after her Thanksgiving feast... days to cook vs. 1/2 hour or so to gobble, gobble! All of us cooks stand (or sit) together in disbelief as we watch days worth of preparation be devoured! Relax... we all love the attention!
Posted by: Kitchen Encounters | December 01, 2010 at 04:51 PM