I think it’s often clear that sometimes the star of the show - the turkey - is indeed, not the star of the Thanksgiving show!
Side dishes seem to really reign!
What’s the one Thanksgiving dish you can’t do without. The one you can’t wait to eat. The one you’d like to have a stash put aside so it’s ALL YOURS later to enjoy for more than a day???
The one thing I really look forward to - and that we usually only have at T-Day…is pecan pie with freshly whipped cream. Oh my. My niece makes it and it’s fabulous. I’d really like to ask her to make an extra pie so I can take one home!!
Stuffing from inside the bird with gravy. Turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, and gravy is all I need for my perfect meal. Dessert can be seconds of the first course.
All the other stuff is purely optional and I’d be fine opting out. I usually do opt out of sweet desserts because I have no love for them.
No such thing as only one. Thanksgiving is all about having too much of everything. Starting with the appetizers (shrimp w/ cocktail sauce, cheese and crackers, veggie platter, tossed fresh salad with the last of the green house tomatoes), to the fresh baked sweet rolls (perfect for leftover sandwiches), all the way through to the side dishes (mashed potatoes, roasted yams, green bean casserole, turnips, roasted Brussels sprouts, baked cream corn, stuffing, and then leaving room for the main entrees, Turkey, lasagna, I am looking forward to a nap while the men clear and wash the dishes while I watch football with a few slices of various pies.
Then, of course, the leftover Turkey and gravy gets made into a pot pie.
Is there any wonder I am built like a refrigerator?
^^ See, I’m going to admit for me, there is too much food. I LOVE food. Love to eat. But I literally cannot eat mounds of food at one sitting. And who wants to just have “a bite or two” of your favorite foods? I often find I get very excited for the big meal but when it comes down to it, I just can’t shovel in that much in a meal or even over the course of a few hours.
I sometimes think I’d rather have four items on my plate that I really love - and nice servings of it - rather than 10 items, but only a couple bites of each.
No “musts” for me, but the dried corn casserole (the old recipe, not the current one on the John Cope’s Dried Corn package) that I take to the not-PA-Dutch cousins’ dinner has become a “must” for the younger cousins. The year I was out of state at Thanksgiving, I understand that there were tears.
In our house it’s my husband’s favorite childhood corn dish, made by his grandmother. She called it scalloped corn, really it’s just baked corn with saltene crackers. We only eat it at Thanksgiving, but if we’re invited to friends/family my husband makes it and brings it to share. It wouldn’t be Thanksgiving without his grandmother’s “scalloped” corn.
