Thanksgiving No. 3

Well, Thanksgiving just past was our third together. I pushed the boat out and did the whole Thanksgivingy thing again (I had a break last year).

I imported, at great expense, an organic bird, fresh from the green farms of Amish country. The organic, free-range, no hormone, everything natural really does make for a tasty bird for eating. They've developed good muscles, felt sun and rain on their feathers, gobbled around good time for a while, just generally been turkeys, before ending up on my table.

I decided this year, to shoot for a 'fusion' Thanksgiving and threw in some Scottish special effects:

Scottish smoked salmon to start

Black pudding which was supposed to go with the roasted brussels sprouts, but I left on the side as our honoured guest, my galpal, didn't really fancy eating blood with her dinner

Haggis, served as part of our trio of stuffings, or 'stuffing, three ways' as is so gastronomically correct these days. And for my wonderful husband, yes, Stove Top was available.

We also had creamy mashed potatoes, orange glazed baby carrots, caramelised baked pear with red onions (thank you, Martha Stewart, for this one), gravy, cranberry sauce.....the usual culprits.

Followed, somewhat painfully even after a respectable time lapse, by pecan pie (thank you Renu for supplying this) and vanilla ice cream (mmmm Häagen-Dazs).

Thanks was given, quietly and individually, mainly because I forgot, after all those hours in the kitchen, that that was part of the 'deal'. Oh well, I'm thankful to many and much - and you all know who you are and for what.

There will be NO more turkey until next year, forget Christmas - actually I quite fancy the more traditional continental goose for Christmas...hmmmm. This year, not a scrap went to waste, what with hungry relatives, dogs, neighbourhood cats, ourselves and our dinner guest.

Not right then and there, you understand, when we're talking about a 14-pounder, but over the next few days ;)