On Turkeys and Traditions

E very Sunday after church, my husband and I visit with a small group of friends at the cozy coffee shop near our parish. Most weeks, one friend poses a poll question, asking each of us to weigh in on a contentious topic such as, “Should men get pedicures?” or, “When is the appropriate time to start decorating for Christmas?”

Sometimes, the questions are meant to settle minor marital disagreements; other times, they’re merely to satisfy a point of curiosity. One of the more recent questions intended to provoke a vigorous debate was, “Thanksgiving turkey, yea or nay?” Among the six of us, there were two turkey lovers, two who eschew turkey for steak (thankfully, those two are married to each other), and two who insist on Thanksgiving turkey not for love of turkey but for love of tradition.

Our debate quickly turned to other questions of Thanksgiving tradition: Does stuffing really have to be stuffed, or is it better cooked outside of the bird? Is cranberry sauce a useless decoration or a necessary acidic element? Which green vegetable deserves a spot on the table, if any?

The conversation reminded me of my column last year on Thanksgiving’s culinary diversity, and it inspired me to do some more digging into why we eat what we eat for this national celebration, which is almost as much an ode to good food as it is a time for gratitude.

As it turns out, the question of turkey in particular is up for grabs this year for more reasons than taste alone. In The Guardian, Aimee Levitt proposes that it’s “time to get rid of the Thanksgiving turkey,” in part due to shortages and inflation. Though Levitt makes a few fair points — many culinary traditions have come and gone, and many Americans simply don’t like turkey — she indulges in one trope I can’t abide: “Most home cooks are used to preparing it just once a year and cooking a 12lb bird evenly in a conventional oven is, to put it gently, a challenge, from which far too many turkeys emerge with dry breasts, singed wing tips, and flabby skin.”

But the best way to avoid consuming dry, unevenly cooked turkey isn’t avoiding turkey altogether; it’s learning to cook it well — a challenge, to be sure, but a worthy one. The difference between a well-cooked turkey and a lazily prepared one is night and day, and the bird shouldn’t be dinged on the grounds that it tastes bad until home chefs have tried to make it taste good.

Even so, there’s something to be said for cultivating unique traditions on this feasting holiday. This New York Times graphic relates the most distinct Thanksgiving side dishes and desserts in each state, and many of them are so unique that discerning what exactly they comprise requires a lot of Googling. (If I have the particulars of any of these dishes wrong, I’d be more than happy to receive corrections and feedback from readers more familiar with them.)

Many states’ most unique side dish is some kind of salad. In Nevada, Idaho, and Colorado, it’s frog-eye salad, which features no frog eyes but, if you ask me, is perhaps more gruesome: pasta salad featuring canned fruits such as pineapple and mandarin oranges, custard, shredded coconut, and whipped topping.

South Dakota, Iowa, and Nebraska prefer “snickers salad,” a whipped pudding base with apple cubes and chopped Snickers bars, while North Dakota does “cookie salad,” with pudding, pineapple, mandarin oranges, and crushed fudge-stripe cookies. Illinoisans opt for “Hawaiian salad,” with pineapple, Mandarin oranges, grapes, shredded coconut, sour cream, and mini marshmallows. These are concoctions my East-Coast self could never have imagined in my wildest dreams.

Then there are the casseroles: green rice in Missouri, which is a combination of rice, scallions, herbs, cheese, and eggs; asparagus in Mississippi and butternut squash in Massachusetts, both of which just seem to be green-bean casserole with a new starring vegetable; and pineapple in South Carolina, with sugar, flour, cheddar cheese, and a Ritz-cracker crust.

Plenty of states prefer a side dish featuring potatoes: Alabama has sweet-potato dumplings, Utah has funeral potatoes (a very cheesy dish with crushed potato chips on top), and Pennsylvania has potato filling, a traditional Dutch recipe with potatoes, butter, onions, celery, milk, and torn white bread.

Here in my home state of Virginia, the most popular side is collard greens, which my family eats with gusto on New Year’s Day but never on Thanksgiving. By far the most unique thing to grace our Thanksgiving table is dirty rice, a traditional spicy Creole dish featuring the “Holy Trinity” of onions, celery, and bell peppers, along with rice, ground pork, and chicken livers. No one in my family is remotely Cajun, we just like the way it tastes.

When my father was growing up in Ohio, his Thanksgiving table featured not only the traditional American staples but also several Italian classics, including antipasto before dinner, pasta and meatballs, and Italian wedding soup. So while I usually balk at proposals to eliminate the now-traditional turkey, I can’t complain much about the fact that Levitt’s family has replaced it with lasagna.

In the end, the culinary traditions that mark this holiday are deeply personal, shaped by our region, our upbringing, our family, and our palate. May the diverse offerings adorning our tables this Thanksgiving remind us to remain united in gratitude for our nation and its blessings of liberty.