If ever there was a time when we all needed comforting, surely it is now. If ever there was a time when comfort food was a good idea, surely it is now.
After we have filled our plates with mashed potatoes, tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches, chocolate pudding, baked beans, shepherd’s pie, and mac and cheese, especially the creamy kind, all the easy-to-eat, unchallenging fare, then we can take a deep breath and face once again all the dilemmas of modern life, perhaps fortified enough to extend a helping hand and understanding to a neighbor.
Comfort food raises a question about discomfort food. For me, that would be anything that hurts to cook or swallow. That’s why there is no lobster in the mac and cheese: picking out lobster meat too often results in punctured fingers and even though we know better, all that green goo inside the body is a bit off putting. Removing the channel down the middle of the tail meat reminds us a little too forcibly how lobster is caught; I always think of bait when I take it out.
Let’s ignore Thanksgiving fear-mongers. Let’s invite to dinner people we love…
I love onions in my cooking but they always make me cry; I hear that contact lenses are the one true solution. I’ve tried all the others: running water, bread in my mouth, a burning candle, you name it. Slicing onions on a mandolin or in a food processor merely shortens the misery.
I don’t like capsicums. Occasionally I tolerate the faintest whiff of jalapeno buried deep in beans and corn with enough sweet and sour dressing to take the curse off. A wee hint of chipotle in aioli sauce is bearable. Nothing, please, that leaves my lip stinging. T he absolute last thing I want right now is for my food to hurt.
Thank goodness, then, for Thanksgiving, a grand wallow in some of the most comforting dishes we can imagine. Start with turkey which can put you to sleep. Stuffing made deeply flavorful with non-disturbing additions like oysters, or sausage, and seasoned with robust herbs like sage and rosemary. Soothing gravy made from pan juices adorns sliced meat, and stuffing and mashed potatoes, too.
Ah, mashed potatoes. I’m OK with garlic in them though some of our Yankee forebears would be offended with the foreign flavor too much associated with Catholic immigrants. How useful now it is to remind us that each generation’s prejudices are a source of our soul’s disquiet, and conducive to what disturbs our lives even today.
Squash with brown sugar and butter, or roasted Brussels sprouts, the ubiquitous green bean casserole, and sweet potatoes baked with or without marshmallows on top, are wonderfully soothing. So are the molded salads and cranberry sauce, the rolls with butter.
Three kinds of pie—apple, pumpkin, and mincemeat—were, historically, the requisite dessert. Even though commercial mincemeat these days has scarcely a molecule of actual meat in it, most people cheerfully substitute chocolate pie for it. A pity.
A dedicated locovore might feel disturbed by the news that most of the pumpkin consumed in pies on Thanksgiving is the product of what usually proves to be unwholesome monoculture and hails from ten counties in Illinois where the Libby’s plant in Morton produces 80% of canned pumpkin sold in this country. Pardon this moment of discomfort.
Oddly, though, this comforting Thanksgiving meal, one that gives us a welcome pause to feel grateful, is annually beset with anxiety. No sooner has Halloween blown out on cold winter winds then food writers begin their onslaught on our peace of mind with advice on how not to ruin the meal with dry turkey breast or underdone pie crust.
Pictures abound for elaborate table arrangement ideas, creating expectations that drove one household I know to set the table with paper plates and napkins. Detailed instructions appear for completely unnecessarily complex side dishes. Help lines are established for nervous cooks to check in for guidance through one of the year’s most significant meals.
I understand help lines following mass-shootings. But for turkey?
Let’s ignore Thanksgiving fear-mongers. Let’s invite to dinner people we love and trust not to dive deeply into divisive politics. Let’s extend the right hand of friendship to a lonely neighbor. Let’s keep our menus simple.
If a turkey makes you so nervous that you can’t sleep at night, just make mac and cheese.
Sandy Oliver is a good historian who gardens, cooks, and writes on Islesboro. She may be contacted at SandyOliver47@gmail.com.
