Thanksgiving :)

Happy Thanksgiving to you all!  As always, we celebrated turkey day on the nearest available Saturday to the actual holiday.  This year that meant yesterday.  Our gathering was a bit smaller than other years, just 12 of us total.  I had invited my co-teacher and her son, but she is still not well enough to do much, although she is, thankfully, out of the hospital.  She is muslim and so I had specially ordered a halal turkey for this years celebration.  I don't know if that had anything to do with it, but the bird this year was the best I've ever cooked...and I have cooked some good turkey in my time abroad (if I do say so myself!). ;)

On Thursday, Emily came home from school absolutely beat and so I fed her some oatmeal and sent her to bed.  She was asleep by 6:30!  That is an unbelievably early bed time by Spanish standards, as some of you may know.  Anyway, her early retirement left me with plenty of time to do some Thanksgiving prep work as I had warned my friends that I would only be doing the turkey, stuffing, cranberry relish and "pumpkin" pie this year.  I made the pie crust and baked the sweet potatoes (remember I have taken to making sweet potato pie and passing it off for pumpkin...).  I even got the cranberry relish out of the way.

Friday all that was left to do upon arrival in La Roda was bake the pie, make the stuffing and brine the bird.  This year I brined in my own special concotion of herb-infused salt water, broth, vinegar and orange juice (oranges from our own tree).  The brining is the trick for a really moist turkey.  This year it was absolutely succulent!  Even the breast was tender and juicy.

Since Emily was so well rested, she woke up VERY early on Saturday and helped me get the turkey prepared.  She stuffed it all by herself and had a great time rubbing oil and salt all over it. It was adorable how excited she was for Thanksgiving.  When she saw the turkey she giggled giddily and exclaimed, "it's a BIG, fat turkey!"  And all morning she kept asking when our friends would be arriving. Thanks to my little chef's help, we got everything set and in the oven quite early.  This was the first year that I've had everything baked and ready by the time my guests were arriving.  The turkey was actually getting cold because some of them were particularly punctual, as Spaniards are known to be.  It was a nice change not to be madly stirring gravy or burning my hands carving a scalding turkey while my guests were hungrily snacking on jamón and cheese. ;)

Our dinner was delicious, but most importantly we had a really wonderful time all afternoon and evening.  Among the guests were a 6 and 10-year-old boy who really thought Norte was the best.  The three of them were playing wildly in the patio for most of the evening.  Norte was in heaven...and so worn out when they left!

I am so grateful for such wonderful friends who so willingly collaborate to help me celebrate the very best of American holidays.