Thanksgiving

It's Thanksgiving weekend here in the US of A, the biggest holiday of the year. So, a few words about it.

But first, this - by request, here is a pic of the POS that Alan is currently driving, a Vlad, properly known as a Chevrolet Impala:


Word from the garage is that Alan's car is almost fixed but they are waiting on one more part. We should have it back soon....

Alan bought me my Christmas present a month early on Wednesday. He figured I might as well have the use of it. A shiny new wide-angle lens :-) Here's a pic from the first outing, from my favourite vantage point overlooking the bridge on Loop 360:


And now to Thanksgiving. I think this holiday is originally to thank the Founding Fathers for discovering America and creating the country. However it's basically a big family get-together during which Americans eat copious amounts of turkey. A big turkey dinner is the tradition; it's also known as Turkey Day.

We had been invited to join Alan's colleagues Steve and Sarah for Thanksgiving dinner, to which they had invited others as well. There were eleven people at dinner, some from the company and their respective wives/husbands. Sarah had made a great dinner, with sweet potato, roast veg, sweetcorn, broccoli, cornbread, British and American stuffing. Not to mention all the tasty nibbles beforehand.

Another of Alan's mob, Stef, turned up with a second turkey and his own means of cooking it. Deep-fried turkey! Here we introduce Thanksgiving dinner, Stef-style:

Take an enormous box of cooking oil:


And a turkey:


Pour the oil into the burner:


Wait for it to heat up to 350 degrees, and drink some beer:


One person should carefully and slowly lower the turkey in. The rest of the audience should retreat to a safe distance at this point. There will be much bubbling and hissing.


Cook it for 3 minutes per pound.


Here's the finished result. It was more moist than the oven-cooked one but they were both equally nice. The deep-frying didn't make it as oily as you'd imagine, at all.


So there you are, that's our first introduction to Thanksgiving. And very good it was too.

Today - the day after Thanksgiving - is known as Black Friday. This is when the sales start, the Christmas shopping commences, the stores all open at 5am (really) and the retailers go into the black financially for the first time in the year. From here on in, Christmas will be in earnest. Shopping will need to be done, lights will appear on the houses and I expect things to get generally mental. We will keep you posted.