Den vdakyvzdania - Day of Giving Thanks

December 27, 2005 - This is when I sent this - not necessarily when I wrote it.

So, our "domace" turkey arrived last night. It was as disgusting as I expected, but not as bad as it could have been. I guess the main awful thing was there was this awful neck hanging off it that Milan dutifully cut off to spare me the pain of looking at it. There were also quills and feathers. They never quite get them all. Milan's mom quickly went to work on those, but it's not likely she'll get them all. It's too big for our pan and our oven.

I'm beginning to understand why Slovak people don't have big family meals together. First of all there's the money factor. We are the "rich" relatives, we're trying to have the whole family for Thanksgiving, and it's financially tough to do. There has been extreme inflation here over the last 15 years. When a carton of milk goes from 1 koruna to 30, what can you do but cut back?

Then there's the preparation factor. The second problem with this 22lb. turkey is that it's too big for our oven and every other oven in Grinava, I imagine. We're trying to figure out which limbs to remove and where. It's too long, but it's also too tall. Milan tried crushing the ribcage enough to get it into the oven, but we don't even own a pan big enough catch all the juice I'm expecting from this bird. It's sort of shocking because the legs are stuck out like a Barbie. They're not bent close to the body like American turkeys. Milan was wrestling with it on the floor of the kitchen trying to get the rigor mortis to give in to bending to fit, but they didn't want to. So, we're going to chop the sucker in half and forego stuffing it. 3 hours per half in that oven and no meat thermometer. We don't have self basting. So, we've shoved butter in the skin along with some sort of bacon.

Then there's another element. I don't think we realize how convenient Kraft, Pepperidge Farms and Butterball make Thanksgiving for us. There's pie and stuffing and biscuits and... Let me list all the things that don't exist here:

We do not have stuffing. So, we're drying the bread right now.

We also don't have chicken broth. We'll do what we can without it. I found a kind of sauce that you can put on chicken.

We cannot buy biscuit or crescent roll dough from Pillsbury. I can make them from Bisquik, but Milan's mom is a biscuit genius. I tried a couple of unsuccessful attempts; it's harder than it looks.

We do not have frozen pie crusts. We don't even have pie. No pie tins either. So, I have a recipe. Wish me luck.

We couldn't even figure out a word for pumpkin in the Slovak language, and you cannot buy a pumpkin, let alone pumpkin puree anywhere. However, we have some from Milan's dad's garden this year, and we're saved. Milan's mom is preparing the puree today. I'll prepare the pies tonight. (update May 2006 - tenkvice=pumpkin. We're growing them in the garden this year and canning them ourselves.)

We do not have baby carrots. I spent last night preparing 16 giant, Slovak sized carrots for a kind of ginger, lemon, butter, recipe. Again, I hope it doesn't suck. (update April 2006 - found baby carrots. We find new things almost every week.)

Anyway, overall, we've found most of what we're looking for. I'm happy that Milan's mom is willing to help. It'll be the biggest party they've ever had as a family, I think. I feel very lucky for my Slovak family as well as my new life with Milan. As many problems as we have, we're very happy. We seem to be able to manage no matter what happens.

I miss you all this Thanksgiving, but please know that I am giving thanks for all of you, and you are all in my prayers.