If my first Turkey Day as a married woman had a sound track, it would include the theme song to Benny Hill—with intermittent puking sounds.
It was 1997, and we had just moved to Portland, Oregon. Mr. Foxy’s parents and sister were traveling from California for the big event. I was freaking out a bit (a lot) because I was going to be outnumbered by my husband’s family. Fortunately, my cousin was attending college in the area and decided to join us to eat free food act as my wingman.
We had a couple of things going for us:
- We had some brand-spanking-new china place settings. (So practical, I know.)
- We didn’t have kids yet so we actually had some time to plan (and shop and cook and…).
- We were young and naïve, and we thought we could conquer the world.
But we had more things not going for us:
- We lived in a tiny rental house with a very small, crappy kitchen and minimal furniture.
- My wingman was a vegetarian.
- We were so broke. Like Brokeback Mountain broke. (Except they weren’t broke, and we weren’t gay cowboys.)
- We had no fucking clue what we were doing.
Still, we were determined to put on the BEST THANKSGIVING EVER.
The first hurdle was the turkey. I needed to make the BEST BIRD EVER. After all, my new mother-in-law was coming, and I had to impress her. Unfortunately, we had ZERO experience with turkey. A friend of mine (who already had a few Thanksgivings under her belt) told me to stuff the turkey with lemons and oranges and tomatoes and onions and garlic. That it would be the most juicy and delicious turkey ever. Fabulous. Problem solved.
The next hurdle was the stuffing. At the time, I was on an ANTI-STUFFING* crusade. Everyone else liked stuffing just fine, but I didn’t. I had horrible flashbacks of mildly-seasoned, mushy piles of cubed bread, and I HATED them. I was absolutely, 100% morally-opposed to stuffing. And because I hated it, dammit, IT WOULD NOT BE SERVED IN MY HOUSE. (My new husband was smart enough not to fight me on this one.) Instead I found a promising recipe for baked risotto cakes. I would show all of my guests that this starchy side dish was far superior to stuffing.
The rest of the menu was filled out with mashed potatoes, a simple salad, and bread. Notice the lack of cranberry sauce. I was also on an anti-cranberry-sauce crusade, but I hated that shit so much I wouldn’t even dignify it with a substitute.
Mr. Foxy and I spent the morning running around like idiots getting everything ready: fumbling through the turkey prep, peeling (and dropping) potatoes, making the risotto, etc. We stumbled our way around that kitchen, but somehow everything was going okay. We were on track. We were going to rock this holiday. Despite the mess and the mayhem.
Then my in-laws called from the hotel. It seemed my mother-in-law had food poisoning or the stomach flu. Either way, she was not doing well. AT ALL. Not wanting her to be alone in the hotel, we invited her to lay low at our house. While the rest of us partied on—we were so considerate. (And suddenly I was totally off the hook for the quality of the turkey.)
As it turns out, the turkey came out beautifully. A quick taste-test confirmed it was moist and savory and delicious. Being his first time carving a turkey, it took Mr. Foxy quite some time to get the meat onto the serving platter. I admired his determination as he struggled to get that carving knife to cut through that slippery bird with the surgical precision of a chainsaw in a horror flick.
I mashed the potatoes (only coating one wall and the side of the refrigerator with fluffy white bits.) The risotto cakes were miraculously golden and smelled heavenly. Everything was coming out beautifully. (Except the vomit from my mother-in-law—that wasn’t pretty.)
I was busy guzzling wine preparing the salad and bread so I left the gravy making to my husband and father-in-law. They expertly mixed in the drippings with flour and turkey stock. Did I mention the drippings? Yeah, more on that later…
We crammed around our tiny table to feast on our meal. My MIL’s puking had slowed down a bit so we decided to dig right in. We piled on the turkey and mashed potatoes and risotto cakes. We poured that expertly-crafted gravy all over EVERYTHING. And set to work on eating entirely too much.
That first bite clued us in on our fatal mistake. That fabulous fruit that flavored the turkey so wonderfully? Well, it produced lemon and orange bile in the drippings. With just one taste, we discovered the gravy was overwhelmingly citrus flavored. No, not citrus flavored; it was essentially THICK, MEATY LEMON JUICE.
To everyone’s credit, no one started puking along with my MIL. But I wouldn’t have blamed them if they did. It was THAT bad.
We all dutifully scraped the gravy off of the food as well as we could. Because there wasn’t much more food in the kitchen (piss poor, remember?), everyone choked down every last bite in solidarity. But thanks to my ANTI-STUFFING CRUSADE, we feasted on seconds of the risotto cake—WITHOUT gravy.
Only two people didn’t regret their meal that evening: my mother-in-law and our cat, who got a bowl full of tuna sans the citrus slop.
And the moral of the story is ONCE AGAIN: Always have back-up gravy. Always.
*Don’t worry. I love stuffing now. I even make two kinds every year. This one and that one.
19 Responses
We have trained our kids to not like stuffing to double our own intake.
I never even try the real gravy anymore after several abysmal attempts and I always have two back ups. Enjoy your Thanksgiving.
I never force the stuffing on anyone for that exact reason. (We’re brilliant, you and I.) My husband has perfected gravy making, but after remembering this story, I don’t think it would hurt to have a back up. Happy Thanksgiving to you too!
We were so broke. Like Brokeback Mountain broke. (Except they weren’t broke, and we weren’t gay cowboys.)
That might be the best line I’ve ever read in the history of blogs. That I have read.
Mr. Foxy didn’t get that line and told me it wasn’t funny. I knew I should have married you instead. 😉
Meaty Lemon Juice: it’s what’s for dinner. Yum!!!
I throw up a little every time I read that phrase.
We ended up with a meaty lemon juice gravy one year. Luckily it was just my husband and I, so we could be thankful we hadn’t inflicted it on anyone else. I was also thankful that I am automatically cautious about any and all gravy and will always taste test a small amount before pouring it over everything.
As for my husband…well, it’s a good thing he really, REALLY likes lemon.
Our first married Thanksgiving was in 1999. We were living on love in a tiny duplex in a tiny town with no family around. We invited everyone we knew who were also transplants and had no family. I was a pretty experienced cook, but had never done Thanksgiving on my own. I didn’t let anyone bring anything. I made pies from scratch. They were beautiful! We put up a folding card table in the living room for the pies to cool. The next morning, I discovered that our dog had sampled every single one. Apparently, she didn’t care for the pumpkin because she only ate the crust off of the entire pie but left most of the pumpkin except for the blob she puked up next to the table. There were tears… there was almost a dead dog. My husband, god bless him, thought it was kind of funny – there was almost a dead husband – and then he thought that maybe I could just cover the pies with whipped cream and serve them anyway and no one would be the wiser! I ended up re baking 6 pies that morning. Luckily, dinner wasn’t until 4:00. Wine and beer was flowing and I probably could have served the half dog eaten pies and they really wouldn’t have known the difference.
Meaty lemon juice, I think I puked a little in my mouth! Lucky MIL. The rest was friggin too funny!
I have found that the trick to making a perfect Thanksgiving meal is to leave it to other people. This Thanksgiving, I’m responsible for bringing wine. I’m pretty sure I can handle that…
I didn’t have a mother, so what do I know from making gravy? So it was my first Thanksgiving with my husband’s family and his mom was dying and wanted everything to be perfect. And she asked me to mix the flour into the gravy. So I just dumped in the measuring cup full of flour and started stirring. Her last holiday with her family and the gravy was lumpy because of my stupidity. Good thing she didn’t leave the mashed potatoes to me! As soon as she gasped, I knew I’d done a bad thing, but I was like a dog that’s being admonished but doesn’t know what they did. After 20 years with my husband, I’ve learned to cook. But those early years were brutal!
Great story, and like, Michelle, I also loved the Brokeback Mountain reference. How does your husband not get it?
You and my sister need to open up a gravy shop. You can call it “Gross Gravy ‘N Things.”
Thanksgiving wouldn’t be Thanksgiving without some sort of food disaster. We had our Thanksgiving last Sunday (we call it “Fakesgiving” – brought about by the complicated dance of wanting to include my ex’s parents for dinner – but not my ex) and I spent all morning making lovely, fluffy rolls – and then promptly burned them to a crisp. I also forgot all about the stuffing until I was in the process of dishing up the food – and was realized that it seemed like a really limited menu. Luckily we had Stovetop stuffing in the cupboard and Pillsbury crescent rolls in the fridge.
That’s hilarious, Foxy! Citrus Gravy – AAAAH! And I love how it dovetails nicely into Always Have Back Up Gravy (by Sarah)! This is my new mantra!
Oh man, does that ever sound stressful! What a bummer after you worked so hard. I’ve always been suspicious of both gravy and stuffing because sometimes people put organ meat from the turkey in to flavor it. Eww! (Or maybe people don’t do that anymore and I’m showing my age).
Great post and I hope you have a fabulous Thanksgiving this year. I have a request: put up a link to your Foxy Family Thanksgiving songs. I’m sure I could find it, but I’m too lazy. Pleeease!
Sure your MIL was sick. Highly suspicious if you ask me. Have others bring a few dishes, not fair to be stuck in the kitchen.
Oh boy, citrus flavored gravy. Ew. But no stuffing? That’s sacrilege. Even if I do make the Pepperidge Farm blue bag. Hey, with some sausage, onion, and celery, it can’t be beat!
Happy Thanksgiving, lady!
Ah…meaty lemon gravy! Use a fork…you’ll want to get every drop.