I did pick up a 20-lb turkey yesterday for a very good price. They needed to make room for the Christmas hams! So, thanks for your recipe, Della!! What do Europeans do when you get a craving for turkey? Do you eat pheasant or sage grouse, perhaps?
Now, we need some side dish recipes here. Common knowledge is that Thanksgiving is all about turkey. Wrong! It’s really all about those super side dishes, as my mother-in-law demonstrated at one of her Thanksgiving feasts. She had so many side dishes that she had to set up a special table to accommodate serving them.
Sweet and sour onions lead the list. These are always a hit, and we rarely go to the trouble of serving them any other time (although with frozen and canned baby onions available now, I may do this more often).
Brussels sprouts are often on the table, because they are my daughter’s favorite vegetable. I boil them briefly and then sauté them in olive oil with a splash of lemon juice at the end, often adding bacon bits.
This year I am serving an acorn squash that I will cut into rings, dunk in an egg/milk mixture and then into a cornmeal/ bread crumb mixture and bake in a hot oven for 30 minutes, drizzling with butter.
There really should be some kind of celery to provide a satisfying crunch, but if you have appetizers or stuffing containing celery, then you can omit this dish.
Most people have sweet potatoes at Thanksgiving. I occasionally cook them, but often find that the potatoes interfere with the pumpkin dishes, which must be given precedence. I abstain from adding marshmallows or maraschino cherries. Instead, I simply add equal parts butter and maple syrup to mashed sweet potatoes and season with salt and pepper.
Same with the green beans. I’ve found that the standard green bean with fried onion ring topping is rarely missed. In my book, green beans are at their best in the summer, when I put them into a nice Nicoise salad.
Cabbage usually finds its way onto the side dish table. I like to make a coleslaw or braised red cabbage with apple, bacon, and maple syrup. Who could resist that? A lighter alternative to coleslaw is a barley and cabbage salad. If you’re looking for something really special to dress up your cabbage, may I suggest cabbage with blueberries, which is as easy to make as it is spectacular looking and tasting. This dish also contains mushrooms, if you’re looking for a way to work mushrooms into the menu.
Other elegant vegetable dishes can be made from carrots, zucchini, beets, cucumbers in yogurt, asparagus, fennel, and leeks.
Let me know if you'd like any recipes!