By Lisa

Thanksgiving is my least favorite holiday.  I love the long weekend. I love the movies Kory and the kids make.  I love spending time with whatever friends and family gather around the table with us, but the food and the origin pale for me in comparison to other feasts.  A turkey (and I’ve cooked organic, heirloom, local, etc….) just isn’t a leg of lamb and can never be a beef filet. The side dishes are okay, but I always like them better leftover, on sandwiches. It’s just always seemed like a helluva a lot of work for not enough payoff. Culinarily-speaking, that is.  I’ve done homemade pumpkin raviolis, pumpkin risotto, all manner of innovations, and the meal just leaves me tired and underwhelmed. In other words, the day is fine, the cooking I could do without.

So, I was especially grateful to spend the day with Kory’s sister last year, and this year we’re going to Kory’s parents new home, where 4 generations will gather and feast and I will not be cooking.

BUT, The catch is that much as I hate cooking Thanksgiving dinner, I am messianic about my Turkey soup, which is the most essential, most traditional, most important part of Thanksgiving food for us.  To not have a carcass for soup would just ruin my year. Last year, I took my sister-in-law’s turkey carcass home in the trunk of our car.

And this year, because our movie will be an historical one, about Pilgrims and which I will post as soon as it’s done…but you can read about the what and the why here we have learned that the first Thanksgiving was actually 3 days long. So, we’ve begun a new tradition: Day 1 is for extended family. On Day 2, I will roast a turkey–and only a turkey–and a few friends will join us for sandwiches and I will have my carcass for soup.  Day 3 will be our family + soup + watching movies instead of making them.

The soup has a  long, honored, idiosyncratic, patriarchal tradition in our family, and I’ll post it, with pictures.  And the movie.  Soon.

In the meantime, we’re thankful here for our family, our health, our friends, the abundance of good food on our table.  And the Pilgrims.