Tag Archives: thanksgiving

A lot of Montrealers have asked me if I plan to cook a blow-out Thanksgiving feast today. They assume, I think, that I’d use Thanksgiving as a great excuse to devise of some over-the-top, decadent, butter-drenched affair. But the thing is, I realized that Adam and I have never needed a reason to enjoy a crazy meal, to spend five hours in a kitchen getting something just right, to uncork eight bottles of wine, to spend weeks researching recipes. The way we cook, the things we like to eat, is a special part of our lives, something still unfamiliar to me, something I’m still settling into, this idea that I could ever be paired with someone who loves food as much as I do.

Looking back over the past year, we often have meals that are more elaborate than most Thanksgiving feasts I’ve attended. A lot of foods that Americans consider “special holiday food” — mashed potatoes is a classic example — we enjoy on the regular. Nothing is off limits. There never needs to be a “special occasion” for us to cook something that we love. Why do so many Americans wait until one day a year to drool over roast goose, or to puree yams or bake pumpkin pie? It’s not just fancy foods, though, that I’m grateful for today. Adam has a way of making every meal seem special, whether it’s two fried eggs and leftover lentils for breakfast, or a roast chicken and seared scallops feast the following night. I’m grateful for that, for my special teacup that is painted with scarlet roses, for fresh-squeezed orange juice every morning, for wild mushrooms soaked in duck fat, for fluffy slices of chocolate cake, for the plenty and the abundance that appears in our lives every day.

Happy Thanksgiving.