Thanksgiving in the UK

Last week I had my first Thanksgiving away from home. I thought I would really splurge so for the first time I went and bought a cheesburger and chips (fries) from the cart across the street from the college. I must say, it was a disappointment. The cheeseburger just didn't have that substantial meaty American feel. And the guy put pepper on my fries - not a good combo, let me tell you. And that was Thanksgiving. At least we weren't fasting until the next day...

Now that you are all feeling nice and sorry for me, I'll tell you the rest of the story... (I'm feeling a little like Paul Harvey now!)

We didn't have a proper Thanksgiving on Thursday because it was kind of a crazy day - but we did plan one for Saturday. We ended up feeding 26 people - 3 Americans, 3 Canadians, 1 half American/half Canadian, 1 German, 1 Romanian, and the other 17 were British. We had the full meal - turkey, cranberry sauce (Ocean Spray!) stuffing, mashed potatoes, corn, rolls, sweet potato casserole, and apple and pumpkin pie for desert. We got a turkey roll instead of a regular turkey (basically a big mass of turkey meat, looking somewhat like a small child). It took an extra hour and a half to cook, but came out nice and moist so that you almost didn't need gravy - which was a good thing because the gravy just wouldn't thicken and we ran out of cornstarch. Other than those two minor blips, everything went as smoothly as it possibly could and was amazingly delicious. I think my favorites were the stuffing and the sweet potato casserole. After being properly stuffed, we all collapsed in front of the TV to watch a movie - a nice traditional Thanksgiving! Oh, and you all will be very happy to know that I told them about the first Thanksgiving before we ate. It was an edited version because the British have short attention spans for history which doesn't revolve around them... (Sorry, I'm in kind of a punchy mood tonight. That was primarily aimed at the former history majors in the college. I just told one of my housemates what I wrote and she claims that Americans are the ones who do that. She's probably right...)

Ok, before I really start perjuring myself, I'll finish the story with some pictures...

Sarah, one of the other Americans, and the primary organizer of our feast

How do you carve a turkey?

Waiting for food...

A beautiful sight!

The cleanup - so glad we decided to use paper plates and plastic cups!

Canned pumpkin is not generally sold in the UK and we weren't able to find any. Zoe had a can leftover from her Canadian Thanksgiving which she was saving for Christmas, but she shared it with us instead. We made her an honorary American for the day!