Thanksgiving brings family, fun, five extra pounds


By Carol Kallberg Record Columnist By the time you read this your Thanksgiving feast will likely be just a faint memory of indigestion, and you'll be well on your way to losing that 5 extra pounds you just gained. But, it certainly was worth it, wasn't it? After all, we don't have mince pie at any other time of year, or pumpkin pie with whipped cream, or pecan pie, or candied sweet potatoes, or cranberry salad. And, I never roast a turkey at any other time of year either. Don't ask me why, we just don't. I guess it wouldn't seem as special if we did it more often. I agree with my college roommate, Janice, who e-mailed after they'd had an early feast with their northern children before leaving for their winter home in Florida. She said it took hours to prepare the meal, and in 20 minutes it was all over. Well, the eating part may be over, but there are always the dishes. Even with a dishwasher it's a major pain. The thing I want most at the end of the big meal is a robot in the kitchen to scrape the plates and load the dishwasher. Suddenly my adequate-sized kitchen becomes chaotic, with not a square inch of empty flat space on which to put anything. By the time the dishwasher is loaded (with the first round) the grandchildren are back in the kitchen looking for something to snack on. If they would just have eaten their peas and sweet potatoes during the meal, their little tummies would be full and they'd be asleep in front of the TV like the men. As this is written, before Thanksgiving, we are planning on 20 at our table. That's if everyone who should be here is well. At this very moment, four grandchildren are down with the messy kind of flu, and one has already recovered and gone back to school. There should be enough time for the bug to sweep through the rest of the household and be done with it. I'm trying to stay away from all of them, but it's not easy. (I just managed to escape cold germs from three grandchildren who like to breathe on me, and then my husband came down with a dilly of a cold. It was a miracle I didn't get his either. But, I don't want to press my luck with the flu.) We plan to spring our aunt and uncle from the nursing home for a few hours and bring them out for the feast, too. But, it will depend on their health, and ours, at that moment, and the weather, of course. A lot can happen in a few days when you are in your late eighties. I just read some place that during the first Thanksgiving the feast lasted for three days. I don't know which is worse, having it end in 20 minutes, or go on for days. Either could have a down side. In the early days it probably took a long time to cook it. I can't imagine what it must have been like not to have all our modern conveniences, like a freezer and refrigerator to do things ahead of time, and a microwave to speed things along on the actual day of the feast. Or a few crock pots in which to keep things warm. Even when my Grandma Massie cooked Thanksgiving dinner, back in the 1940s, it was much different. I can recall Grandpa used to raise his own turkey and kill it for the dinner. Turkeys were a lot skinnier then. We kids used to get the drumsticks. Grandma also fixed cranberries by boiling them in water with lots of sugar and serving them in special cut glass cups. We also got to use the cut glass salt cellars to dip our celery sticks in that day. What a treat for a little girl!

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