Thanksgiving in Brussels
Thanksgiving is not my favorite holiday ever. I realize I may be breaking many people's hearts with that statement, but it's true. I think it's because with my rather large family, there were multiple events to gather together in a year and at each one, there were mountains of food. So Thanksgiving wasn't a once a year thing, it was just hectic craziness in the kitchen all morning for this "perfect meal". No other gathering had this pressure. The other 12 family gatherings we would just bring what we could and everyone would eat. But on Thanksgiving, there had to be certain dishes. It has to be a certain way. Otherwise you have failed the family. It's just food. Really good food. But it's just food.
When I moved to Los Angeles, it was perfect. Sometimes we got invited to fancy dinners, but mostly, no one in LA is that domestic or want's to work that hard on something they can't put in their reel. Then Amy met Ken and our lives became glorious. We didn't do thanksgiving on Thanksgiving anymore. Instead we got invited to a fancy turkey dinner the Saturday after. Now Ken and Amy do this dinner together. They do like to work that hard. But again, I would order pizza on Thanksgiving and maybe watch the parade.
So when my American friends here in Brussels said we should do Thanksgiving together, I inwardly cringed. Everything in Brussels is a little more complicated, so this very complicated meal was going to be in the Olympics of complicated. They still have bakeries, where you get your bread and butcher shops that get deliveries of WHOLE PIGS in the morning. You go to the flower shop for flowers. Grocery stores are closed on Sunday or close by 2pm. Everything is in glass jars instead of plastic. Do you see where I'm going with this? Lauren, who hosted, had to special order turkeys because the butchers don't normally carry them.
I signed up to bring green beans, partly cause they would be easy and partly to assuage the fears of our more health conscience members that there might be too many carbs (Thanksgiving = carbs). So I sat there that morning snapping green beans and remembering my Grandmother. And how she did this for lunch. on a normal day. And I thought about my mom and how crazy she made me on Thanksgiving mornings and how her mashed sweet potatoes were half actual sweet potatoes and half butter and sugar. And I thought about my sister and her husband shoveling pumpkin mousse into parfait glasses. And of course later I thought about sweet Lauren, getting up at 6am to chop onions and put turkeys in the oven. And for all the chaos and crazy and politically incorrectness of the history and the consumer insanity of it's present state, Thanksgiving is a recurring exercise of being incredibly loved. With food.
My Thanksgiving abroad this year was wonderful. I hope yours was too.
When I moved to Los Angeles, it was perfect. Sometimes we got invited to fancy dinners, but mostly, no one in LA is that domestic or want's to work that hard on something they can't put in their reel. Then Amy met Ken and our lives became glorious. We didn't do thanksgiving on Thanksgiving anymore. Instead we got invited to a fancy turkey dinner the Saturday after. Now Ken and Amy do this dinner together. They do like to work that hard. But again, I would order pizza on Thanksgiving and maybe watch the parade.
So when my American friends here in Brussels said we should do Thanksgiving together, I inwardly cringed. Everything in Brussels is a little more complicated, so this very complicated meal was going to be in the Olympics of complicated. They still have bakeries, where you get your bread and butcher shops that get deliveries of WHOLE PIGS in the morning. You go to the flower shop for flowers. Grocery stores are closed on Sunday or close by 2pm. Everything is in glass jars instead of plastic. Do you see where I'm going with this? Lauren, who hosted, had to special order turkeys because the butchers don't normally carry them.
I signed up to bring green beans, partly cause they would be easy and partly to assuage the fears of our more health conscience members that there might be too many carbs (Thanksgiving = carbs). So I sat there that morning snapping green beans and remembering my Grandmother. And how she did this for lunch. on a normal day. And I thought about my mom and how crazy she made me on Thanksgiving mornings and how her mashed sweet potatoes were half actual sweet potatoes and half butter and sugar. And I thought about my sister and her husband shoveling pumpkin mousse into parfait glasses. And of course later I thought about sweet Lauren, getting up at 6am to chop onions and put turkeys in the oven. And for all the chaos and crazy and politically incorrectness of the history and the consumer insanity of it's present state, Thanksgiving is a recurring exercise of being incredibly loved. With food.
My Thanksgiving abroad this year was wonderful. I hope yours was too.
Scotswoman Gillian took her first turn with yams with marshmallow topping. Yum.
Finished Product: Turkey, stuffing, green beans, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, parmesan zucchini, and homemade cranberry sauce (thanks Angela).
Lauren and her amazing turkeys. Great job for her first Thanksgiving!
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