My favorite recipe for Thanksgiving is from Mona Faye herself. “Cranberry Salad” is just right — a nice blend of sweet, tangy, creamy, and nutty. It’s a perfect accompaniment to the turkey, I believe. So I want to share: 

 

And if you want to make some good ol’ fashion’ stuffing, Mona Faye remembers how her family made turkey stuffing way back when (from an earlier comment):

I remember Mama making Thanksgiving dressing to take out to Aunt Marie’s house (the old “home place”) where the whole family gathered each year.  She made it in a huge dishpan or the bottom of her big granite roaster.  First she crumbled up stale bread crumbs which she had been saving for weeks.  Sometimes she would add a batch of corn bread also.  I was allowed to put on my little apron and help with this chore.  She boiled the giblets separately and then cut them up finely.  To this broth she added a large onion and 1/2 a bunch of celery, cooking them until tender.  She added this mixture, salt and pepper, fresh sage to taste (lots), and 4 eggs. Tasting is crucial at this point, as is consistency.  Not too dry, but fairly moist. Add drippings from turkey or chicken boullion at this time, if necessary. This was cooked in the oven separately from the turkey, until brown on top.  Mmmm!  Can just taste and smell it now!  Happy Thanksgiving!

After a far-from-brief break, Mona Faye’s Kitchen is back — just in time for the holidays! So . . . we all know that T-giving hasn’t been with us for long. And it’s not the pilgrims we can thank for our turkey and trimmings. It’s Lincoln & FDR.

But the Pilgrims did feast and they did feast with those native around them. Feasting is a celebration of grace and thanksgiving. Always has been for people of the Book. So what did that motley crew eat? Edward Winslow describes it in A Journal of the Pilgrims at Plymouth from 1621:

Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a special manner rejoice together after we had gathered the fruit of our labors. They four in one day killed as much fowl as, with a little help beside, served the company almost a week. At which time, among other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest king Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer, which they brought to the plantation and bestowed upon our governor, and upon the captain, and others. And although it be not always so plentiful as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want that we often wish you partakers of our plenty.

The History Channel explains that they probably ate few veggies and sweets at that time. Meat — venison, wild turkey, lobster, seal, and swan — dominated the menu.

Didn’t know the Pilgrims were on Atkins now, did you?