The author longed for the familiar tastes and traditions of her Southern upbringing when she went north to live and study in New York City. Her attempt to replicate them with her group of international friends led to compromise and adaptation, and eventually to new culinary practices after she married and adopted some of the traditions of her Italian in-laws.

Thanksgiving was the one day of the year my father prayed. My memories of him looming over our dinner table are as fresh as paint, and I recall his big hands clasped together as he searched our family’s collective past year for things to be thankful for. “Lord, this year…” his voice dwindled as he thought of something appropriate, and we watched him squirm. Our house was literally falling down around us; the plumbing didn’t work; you couldn’t turn on the vacuum and television at the same time; there were holes in the floor and ceiling because our home couldn’t stand up to Texas weather. Too poor (according to him) or too cheap (according to my mother), my father hadn’t hired someone to come in and fix everything that ailed our crumbling house. But every year at Thanksgiving, my dad was determined to tell the Lord that he and his were thankful for something. “Lord, I thank you for my children,” he prayed, but we all knew we were a mixed blessing. We were five mouths to feed and clothe and house, and my parents were fond of telling us we were more trouble than we were worth.

What finally saved my father’s yearly obligatory prayer were the small children and hungry relatives gathered around the dining room table. Starved and ready to eat, they would show their united impatience with overly loud coughs that always suspiciously sounded like, “Hurry up, man.” Embarrassed by the silence, my father would inevitably state the obvious, “Lord, Lord, I want to thank you for the bounty on this table,” recognizing that what a poor Southern family of seven could be grateful for lay right before him.

A JOB WELL DONE
This holiday, in some ways, was like the Cadillac sitting in our driveway—a physical manifestation of my father’s financial success. A black man who picked cotton during his childhood, who had not one but both parents die before he was 15, who didn’t even complete the seventh grade, was able to provide enough food for as many as 20 uncles, aunts, and cousins. Though my father swore he never went into debt, clearly he spent at least two of his paychecks in order to provide such a bounty. In my family, Thanksgiving was a time to show your wealth, even if you didn’t have very much of it. In essence, every year we gathered around the table to congratulate my father on a job well done and not succumbing to welfare.

And what a feast we had. The necessary turkey that over the course of the years had undergone a plethora of cooking techniques—from browned to the point of charred to a pale, almost translucent skin—that resisted the culinary advice my relatives gave my mother (cook it in a brown paper bag, it’ll seal in the juice; blast it at five hundred degrees for an hour and then turn it down) was the table’s centerpiece. It was surrounded by ham, chitterlings smothered in tomato gravy and hot sauce, collard greens with ham hocks, and the secret Reynolds ingredient: dill pickle juice. Then there were turnip greens, candied yams, Jiffy cornbread dressing, mashed potatoes, macaroni and cheese, and creamed spinach. For dessert: banana bread pudding, sweet potato pie, coconut cream pie, chocolate cake, cheesecake, and sometimes as many as seven pecan pies. I always skipped dessert, but how I loved the food. The family conversation, watching the intricacies of putting together a menu—my mother literally spent weeks thinking about food preparation—made it my favorite holiday. Without the responsibility of gift giving that Christmas and birthdays brought, the only thing my sisters and I had to worry about was how much would be left over after the meal and making sly bets about which cousin, despite being as full as a tick, would go back for a third helping of corn bread dressing.

When I left for college in New York, it was Thanksgiving that I missed the most. Too poor to travel back to home, I spent the short holiday in Brooklyn with friends. At the time, I chalked up their version of Thanksgiving to youthful ignorance. The only thing on the table I recognized was the mashed potatoes. None of my friends had heard of dressing and chitterlings. Gone was the giblet gravy and ham. Instead, David, my friend from California, Alicyn from Greece, and Penelope from France had cooked up vats of couscous and curried red lentils, yellow pepper and goat cheese tarts. We ate roasted capon in lieu of turkey. I’m no fool; capon is an old chicken. And to make matters worse, my sisters called me from Texas, spoon-feeding me family gossip and news on how the year’s turkey turned out. I missed the familiarity of my family’s food. Did moving to New York mean eating platters of tabouli and green falafel every Thanksgiving? Suddenly, I longed for my cacophonous relatives. What was Thanksgiving if my aunt Gladys wasn’t there to yank off her wig and scratch her head, her personal signal that she loved the turkey? I decided I should make my own Thanksgiving. Maybe I couldn’t have the numerous Reynolds clan, but certainly I was deserving of the once a year treat of giblet gravy.

FROM GUEST TO HOST
It was a leap into adulthood, creating my own Thanksgiving meal. Suddenly, I had made the move from guest to responsible host all because of my favorite holiday. We invited friends and co-workers whose families were too far away. No more moussaka for me; I called my parents, taking copious notes on how to create moist dressing and my mother’s world famous chitterlings. Everything was going to be wonderful, a true Southern Thanksgiving in East Harlem. There was only one problem: my husband.

Well, he’s not really a problem, but he’s certainly Italian. It seems I wasn’t the only one aching for reminders of home during Thanksgiving. We weren’t inviting enough people to justify every dish we agreed was essential for a proper Thanksgiving, nor did we have space to prepare so much food. Our Thanksgiving holiday, even now, is a complicated compromise, a negotiation of Northern taste buds, Southern desires, and Italian expectations. And so while we don’t have chitterlings or spaghetti with red gravy, we did agree that without a rendition of Kenneth’s grandmother’s towering antipasti, Thanksgiving just wasn’t Thanksgiving.

Capicolla, mortadella, prosciutto, sopressatta, Genoa salami—all sliced paper thin—are piled up to a dizzying height along with endive, tomatoes, roasted bell peppers, capers, and Italian tuna fish. This appetizer is so important, according to my husband, that the women gather around this cold antipasto and have their picture taken just before they all sit down to eat.

We don’t take pictures of the antipasti in my house, but every year I faithfully follow Grandma Edith’s recipe. And though I miss some of the dishes my family prepared, like my father, I’m grateful and happy with the bounty on the table. This marriage of mine, a coming together of home cooking and celebration, of Italian and black Southern cuisine eaten by my many Northern friends, is distinctly American. And trust me, next year I’ll get to make my chitterlings.

RECIIPE FOR COLLARD GREENS
(Measures: 1 pound= .45 kilograms; 1 cup= 237 milliliters)

Collard Greens
Collard greens as well as their sister turnip greens are a staple in most Southern homes. Like almost every Southern dish, preparation requires patience, but it is well worth the time.

3 pounds collard greens, chopped or hand torn
6 cups water
2 smoked ham hocks or 1 smoked shin
1 medium sized onion, coarsely chopped
Salt to taste
Pepper to taste
2 tablespoons Dill pickle juice

In a large stockpot or Dutch oven pot, add water and ham hocks. Under high heat bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low, uncover, and simmer for two hours or until water is reduced by three quarters and ham hock meat falls away from the bone. Add onions and cleaned collards. Allow collards to wilt. Cover pot and simmer for 45 minutes, until, collards are tender. Add pickle juice just before serving.

Serves six to eight persons.