24 November 2010 The Night Before the Ex-pat Thanksgiving

This will be my third ex-pat Thanksgiving but my first time actually cooking the bird abroad. I’m a little nervous. We have a convection oven with a grill element and after nearly 9 months I still don’t have the hang of it. Things are always turning out… crisp. My first ex-pat Thanksgiving was in France over 10 years ago at the Camargo Foundation. We were six or seven Americans who organized a pot-luck Thanksgiving feast. Since none of us had an oven, one of the fellows–the resident novelist, whose name was Paul– volunteered to talk to a local butcher about getting us a cooked bird. The day came, we collected the turkey, and prepared to tuck into it. Paul did the honors. But when he opened up the neck cavity and scooped out the stuffing, what came out was a thick, dark, mash. It was blacker than anything I’ve ever burned in my British convection oven.

“It’s… it’s foie gras,” Paul said. “The butcher stuffed it with foie gras.”

We had a laugh about that. It was so unexpected. So fatty and rich. So French.

Ex-pat holidays are more intense than their domestic counterparts. Little things take on vital importance. Little things like cranberries. I went nuts looking for fresh cranberries in France. Nobody knew what I was talking about. And when I finally found some, I remember leaping gleefully to the till, clutching the bag of tart, red fruit as though it was the key to everyone’s happiness. The key to home.

I didn’t even like cranberries that much back then. And I don’t remember eating them at all at the dinner. I do remember washing down my turkey stuffed with foie gras with a lot of wine and a lot of silly laughter.

We have American friends coming down from London tomorrow. Hopefully they won’t mind if the turkey is a little… crisp. I’ve already made my cranberry relish. That and a lot of wine and some silly laughter ought to make it a meal to give thanks for.