Another Thanksgiving in another country that has no concept of the best day on earth.  What’s not to love? Family, friends, eating and drinking.  And of course being thankful that you can still do all that.  So like a good American, I wanted to show some of my international friends what T-day was all about.  We didn’t celebrate on a Thursday, we couldn’t watch the Macy’s Day Parade or a football game, but I think we did a damn good job with everything else.  

Me and Amber (Canada)

Aine (Ireland) and Rury (spelled phonetically because the Scottish spelling is ridonkulous)

With a little help from my Canadian and Irish friends, we cooked a magnificent feast…turkey (obviously), rosemary garlic mashed potatoes, green beans with caramelized onions, toasted almonds and prosciutto, stuffing, gravy, rolls and butter, apple crisp, chocolate chip cookies, and tons of wine and beer…and vodka…and other beverages that I can’t remember for better or worse. 

The whole spread.  Turkey’s in the purple dish if you were wondering.  Doesn’t look like much, but it well fed about 13 hungry people…with left-overs.

And now a close-up:

Stuffing, turkey, corn, rolls.

Green beans, butter, potatoes and stuffing..mmmm…the best part.

As the head chef, I obviously started drinking and being thankful around 2pm.  And with some good timing/cooking advice from mom, everything was going smoothly.  The desserts were all made the night before.  The potatoes were peeled, cut and ready to be boiled and the green beans were washed.  The only slight little bump was trying to figure out the best way to cook the turkey.  My apartment wasn’t really…umm…equipped for such major cooking expeditions, so a roasting tray was certainly out of the question.

Seriously, this is how much room I had to work.  sheesh!

And anyone who has ever cooked turkey knows it can’t sit on the tray it has to be elevated so the juices can run and water can evaporate up into it…or something along those lines.  There was a period of time where I thought I was going to have to make a makeshift tent/roaster/lift with toothpicks and chopsticks.  thankfully (not the first time I was thankful that day) we found a baking tray with vents.  Yay! That sounds really lame, but I guarantee that if you found yourself in a similar situation you’d be praising the baking tray as well.

If you can tell, they are delicately balancing on a heavy baking tray over a fragile aluminum tin.  (Alright, so you might have noticed that its not a whole turkey….but for budgeting backpackers, two pre-boned, pre-stuffed turkey things sounded in a word: Perfect.

And then top off the meal with some incredibly done apple crisp, and there you are.  

Couldn’t get any better.

The night was full of dancing, singing, Irish drinking songs (which I am determined to learn before I come home), games, drinking…what a night.

Eating

Drinking

Just plain having fun

Happy Thanksgiving!