Tag: Thanksgiving

Let’s read and eat this holiday!
Beauty · Books · Cooking · holiday · hostess with the mostess · just plain fun · Something wonderful · Thanksgiving

Let’s read and eat this holiday!

AuntGemLeave a comment

This year’s Thanksgiving, I’m keeping it minimal. No two main dishes of both Turkey and Ham, no 12 side dishes, no pie and cakes (plural) for dessert.

It’s a bare-bones Thanksgiving dinner: ham, one side dish of green bean casserole, and one recipe inspired by something I read: Bourbon-Berries. The recipe I got years ago from Gabriel Mallor’s recipe exchange on the Ace of Spades website. Sorry, no picture of that – but it looks delicious! I’ve already made it in advance of the holiday and it is chilling in the fridge.

I smile and shake my head thinking about the Thanksgiving extravaganzas I’ve put together in the past. Last year I brined the turkey for the first time ever, taking the recipe from the Pioneer Woman’s wonderful book: The Pioneer Woman Cooks: A Year of Holidays.

That lovely book, a gift from my sister-in-law (who knows me well) helped me create my aforementioned Thanksgiving extravaganza. There were so many dishes on the table that as we were finishing, I exclaimed: “I forgot the carrots!” Or some such extraneous side – I can’t remember now. Everyone looked around and laughed. And Dad, ever the wit, said, “Well, Thanksgiving is ruined!”

Cookbooks – books that please twice

Anyone who knows me knows I love to read and I love to eat. It’s just too bad for my waistline I also love combining the two. Reading cookbooks is one of my favorite pastimes too – if you truly want to learn the history of American food, how it developed from the colonial days, suffered through the “better living through chemistry” boxes and cans of the middle 20th century and has enjoyed the renaissance since the early 70s of Alice Waters and other chefs, NEEDS to read’s James Beard’s classic: American Cookery.

I bought this book from a kiosk in the old Dutch Square Mall in spring 1985 – the year James Beard died. In a fit of religious zeal I had just decided to do a Lenten fast from Diet Coke and sweets – I was so ambitious those days! Therefore, I was hungry. So naturally I had to buy a cookbook. But this cookbook – it was an inspired choice. If I had to save one cookbook from my house in a fire, it would be this one. All the beautiful illustrated cookbooks by Susan Branch, the Moosewood Cookbook, the Pioneer Woman, *even* The Joy of Cooking – I’d leave all those to burn up if it meant I could save this book.

Beauty in the word and image

I adore the writers of cookbooks who not only write delicious recipes, but also illustrate them with beautiful artwork they’ve created. I love both cooking from and just admiring the ones I own by Susan Branch, an artist/writer/cook who lives on Martha’s Vineyard. I started with her first book, Heart of the Home: Notes from a Vineyard Kitchen, and now with the change of the seasons, I’m cooking from her aptly named Autumn. Just look at these beautiful covers and pages – all hand-drawn:

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you, and may you cook something special this year!

Gratitude · Toastmasters

Not just nice, but necessary

AuntGem1 Comment

This is the text of a speech I gave at my Toastmasters club the Friday before Thanksgiving.

In 1988 a columnist for Newsweek disparaged the winning presidential candidate, saying he had “thank-you noted his way to the top.” It was a swipe at his many connections. It was no secret that George H. W. Bush, or Bush 41 as he later became known was an “establishmentarian.” And many observers give partial credit for his winning campaign to his habit of sending a thank you note to every host he and Barbara met on the campaign trail.

As I read that article, that phrase rankled. It stood out so much that I remember it 23 years later. I did not care for the whiff of insult to the thank you note.

Thank you notes are as writer Bob Morris said a “grace note in our age of dissonance.” Thank you notes aren’t just nice. They’re needed – in today’s coarse society, more than ever.

But thank you notes have fallen out of favor for several reasons:

  • They’re time consuming to write.

Oklahoma First Lady Cathy Keating wrote thank you notes to everyone who gave after the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995. She didn’t have time – but she made time – because it was important. She’d write in the car in between appointments, wherever and whenever she could.

  • The price of stamps is  — well, if they get any more expensive, we’ll just paste dollar bills on envelopes
  • The whiff of cynicism that sticks to the act:

Job seekers write thank you notes. Are they sincere – or just selling themselves further?

Nakedly ambitious social climbers write thank you notes to their hosts.

Schemers who want to ensure they stay in the family patriarch’s will always write thank you notes.

A thank you note doesn’t have to be formal. One of my favorite thank you notes, which I sent to a friend, had a picture of Garfield on it with the legend Muchos Gracias! –The inside said, “That’s Spanish for if I were any more grateful, I’d give you my car!”

The Southern girl knows is taught how to write thank you notes. Always include a personal anecdote. As Southern writer Gayden Metcalfe said in her book: Being Dead is No Excuse: the Official Southern Ladies’ Guide to Hosting the Perfect Funeral, “A Southern girl has to stop herself from gushing more than Old Faithful. If she is writing a thank you note for a toaster, she doesn’t just say thank you, she tells you about every single thing she’s ever toasted in that toaster, or ever will toast.”

What about you – you’re not a cynical job seeker, and you’re not a gushing Southern girl. Why should you write a thank you note?

1)   Do it to teach children courtesy.  How will they learn, unless they see you modeling it?

2)   Do it because it makes the recipient so happy.

Only 3 percent of our mail is personal. Most of the actual mail most people get these days is junk mail. Here’s a sample from my recent haul one day this past week: Several circulars for grocery store ads; ValPak coupons, Three letters from political campaigns begging for donations; A card from the local Goodwill telling me the next day the donation truck would be coming around; flyer from a new restaurant, two bills and a personal card. What do you think I opened first?  What would you open first?

Why write a handwritten note – or sign an actual card? You can send an email, and I certainly appreciate a genuine email of thanks.

But seriously – Are you really going to tie a ribbon around emails? Will you save those?

3)   Do it because someone needs to hear the words you say. Your thanks may be the encouragement that they need.

4)   Do it because the very act of writing a thank you note it turns your thoughts to gratitude. Think of all the corny songs – count your blessings instead of sheep. “Accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative, don’t mess with Mr. in-Between” as Johnny Mercer sang.

5)   And finally – write a thank you note because we’re in the season of giving thanks.  Now is the time, when we celebrate the holiday dedicated to remembering how our Founding Fathers gave thanks for surviving their first tough year in the New World. Now’s the time to reach out to someone who has made an impact on your life – and let them know. Thank them for what they’ve meant to you. Is there an old teacher, a mentor, or an old schoolmate who played a significant role in your life? Reach out to them. That “Thanksgiving letter” – a thank you note – will be cherished long after mass-produced seasonal cards are thrown away.

Remember – thank yous aren’t just nice – they’re necessary. They help keep the veneer of civilization on the rough framework of our society.