It's been a busy two years of home ownership, much of it involving the house being completely upside down as we removed the original "insulation" of carbon dust and added a proper layer in our first floor, replaced heat pumps, redid the 1920s kitchen that was clearly designed for a single cook, and of course constructed a tree house on an old cherry tree in the yard. Even in a fractured house, there hasn't been a day I regretted making the move from Oslo, and the expansive view over the fjord has not grown ordinary.
The longer I live away from America, the more abstract most of American culture has become for me, with the exception of Thanksgiving. As a child in Vermont, I always enjoyed November's quiet in-betweenness, when the feeling of snow hangs heavy in the air, the grass and leaves dull to subtler tones, and the darkness closes in. Thanksgiving, holding back the tide of Christmas was the high point of this time. My family was not stuck to a specific ritual, so we celebrated in our own home alone, at my grandparents and other relatives, and as we children grew older, in our apartments in various cities on the East Coast. Throughout all of this was the chaos of cooking and good scents, a meal that was always completely from scratch (exception for those particularly fond of canned cranberry sauce).
During my years in Iceland, my life was one of constant change and disruption, with living spaces that were often too small or not home-like enough to bring thoughts of Thanksgiving to the forefront. It took a few Novembers in Germany to recall what I was missing, when I attended my American friend H's glorious Thanksgiving spread.
The first year I had a family of my own was when the urge to host myself suddenly emerged. I invited my mom to join us that year, only to discover the day before her flight arrived that I was pregnant. Thanksgiving that year was a blur of morning sickness exacerbated by the smell of roasting turkey, which made me more resolved to try again when I could enjoy it better.
Since then, it's become an annual tradition to cook something that resembles Thanksgiving, mutated as always happens with anyone living outside America. We have a chicken instead of turkey, lingonberry jam instead of cranberries, but for me all that matters is that I am able to recreate the flavor of my mom's stuffing.
This year was the first time in our new kitchen, with extended family that had never tried the meal before. We started the shopping a week early, made a strict timeline on Thursday, then started the bread drying and prepared the two chickens for sous vide on Friday. Saturday morning I puttered my way through the stuffing prep, adjusting the quantities by feel until I achieved the perfect just-like-mom balance. My six-year old F was an enthusiastic assistant with the sweet potato casserole, a flavor that wasn't on my childhood table but is now a steady family favorite. Our guests arrived after T had put the chickens in a giant plastic storage bin to simmer with the sous vide, and we pressed the new arrivals to work on preparing the apple crisp.
F was once again somber in his role as final apple slicer & quality control, and in short time the makings of a vast dessert were assembled and ready in line for their oven time after the chickens were roasted. As we cooked, the guests mingled in the adjacent dining room, discussing the boats passing on the fjord and watching as the gray day turned navy and faded to black.
Candles lit, the spread laid on the kitchen table, everyone ate enthusiastically with many questions about the different ingredients and flavors. One guest had even done homework and come prepared to share what she was thankful for in the last year.
Now, even as November fills feverishly with everything that Must Be Completed before the holiday pause, the love of the in-between time persists. I'm already looking forward to next year's meal.
