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Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Thanksgiving Irish Style

My youngest chick arrives home this evening for the Thanksgiving holiday. As I type, he is homing in from Duluth. The arrival of the oldest three will be staggered throughout Wednesday evening and an hour before dinner on Thursday. They are all looking forward to coming home, eating mom’s cooking, watching football on the television and socializing with one another. For the next six days if anyone is looking for me, I will be in the kitchen, stirring, grating, peeling, stuffing etc. I am exhausted, thinking about it.

On Thursday, we will have a traditional meal. Our traditional meal is more Irish Christmas, than American Thanksgiving. There will be butternut squash soup masquerading as carrot soup. For mothers of fussy eaters, I know you will appreciate that one! Name it something they like and they might actually eat it! The soup is accompanied by second son’s all time favorite, brown soda bread. The main course will consist of turkey, with my mother’s bread stuffing, a favorite of all, even though it contains chopped onions. Stuffing is the one dish not subjected to a magnifying glass inspection in an attempt to remove all offending onions. They actually watch one another as the stuffing is passed around, to make sure no-one takes more than they should. There will be roast and mashed potatoes. The roast potatoes being a strange new phenomenon for the American son-in-law and American girlfriends. The holiday meal would be a flop for my two oldest children if marrowfat peas where missing from the menu. They love those marrowfats! Carrots in lemon butter, with the usual accompaniments, one of which is gravy, made with the giblets. To my amazement another favorite of my fussy eaters. Strange I know. Cranberry sauce and Kerrygold butter, yes, there will be real Irish butter on the table, shipped via internet from New Jersey. I have commissioned the three oldest to bring a vegetable dish this year. This insures there will be at least one or two vegetables that will appeal to each. Desert is chocolate bread pudding with custard and pumpkin cheesecake with whipped cream. I haven’t come up with a disguise for the cheesecake yet, still working on that one.

The soup and turkey are all that qualify as traditional Thanksgiving fare. The traditional pumpkin pie having morphed into a cheesecake to make it more appealing. Of course, there will be wine and beer. That goes without saying. But the most important thing, the thing that warms my heart and makes all the stirring, grating, peeling, etc. worthwhile is, all my chicks choose to be at my table for Thanksgiving and for that I am truly Thankful.

10 comments:

Barbara Scully said...

I am drooling here over my keyboard... sounds delicious... yummy. But can't believe no roast potatoes in the US????

Anyway HAPPY THANKSGIVING. Have a lovely meal and love to all of you!

b
x

Catherine said...

This sounds delicious and very like an Irish Christmas dinner! I hope you all have a lovely Thanksgiving holiday - when is it? This Thursday I think according to my son who spent last Thanksgiving on a study semester in Tennessee.I love marrowfat mushy peas too!I always associate thanksgiving with pumpkin pie which I made once and was delicious.
Have a great time anyway - I was on strike today and on the picket line outside Dungarvan Community Hospital - the wonderful new replacement for St. Vincent's District hospital - and we were nearly blown away by galeforce winds and sheets of lashing rain! (I'll blog about the public sector strike day when I get a minute!)
Catherine

Ann said...

No roast potatoes among the new additions to my family anyway. They just don't know what they are missing! Have a wonderful weekend. A :)

Ann said...

Your Son was in Tennessee, where in Tennessee. My sister lives in Nashville. Look forward to reading your blog. A :)

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Anonymous said...

Trisha said:"Have a wonderful day, Robert's on call so we will hit cracker barrel on thursday and cook something (less elaborate) on Friday. I still have one of Rian's boxes of marrowfats, maybe I'll cook them in his honor (Ugh I hate them!)and guess what...we have kerrygold butter in most of our local supermarkets- now I'm thankful for that!"

Ann said...

Yes, Rian loves those Marrowfats. We used to have Kerrygold in the grocery store here, but they stopped carrying it. Thank goodness for the Irish Food site!

Unknown said...

What about my favourite? your gorgeous red cabbage. I have never tasted a recipe that comes close to yours...Ann's red cabbage,yum yum! Happy Thanksgiving to all there, Siobhan x.

Ann said...

Only Rian likes the red cabbage! It will be on the Christmas menu though!

Anonymous said...

Rian said "I can get Kerrygold at Trader Joes now too, its great! no marrowfats though unless i drive to st paul"