Thank you and…….

When I lived in America the one holiday ..... the name given to any day of mass celebration...... I really embraced was Thanks Giving. It’s brilliant. Absolutely everybody goes to see family and if you’re a foreigner abroad they insist you join in …. all are welcome. Everything shuts down from Thursday through Sunday, tumbleweed blows through the empty streets. Even in Manhattan. They eat turkey and cranberry which sometimes comes in a can …… a can shaped lump of cranberry jelly sliced…… and stuffing and sweet potatoes. Sometimes they put sweet marshmallows in the sweet potatoes using recipes that their great grandmother’s used and it’s really sweet. And pies. Americans are mad for pies. They call pastry crust. Where as we might call a crust base with loads of apples or plums or pecans on top, a tart, they call it a pie. Where as we might call a tart with a pastry lid, a pie, they call it a double crust. They make pumpkin pies for Thanks Giving. They also make apple pie and cherry pie and cream-cheese pie and blueberry pie and…. I could go on. All the pies are good… just like mom used to make……and come with cream or ice-cream. Americans love their ice-cream too. When I was a teenager I briefly went out with a boy who lived with his parents in London. I went to visit him and he gave me walnut and maple syrup ice-cream, American ice-cream, kept in the freezer in a large silver tin, bought from a special shop that sold things like walnut and maple syrup ice-cream. This was food of the gods. And Americans. I had never tasted walnut and maple syrup ice-cream. Such things only existed in the movies along with blue-cheese dressing, sushi and Mexican food. The most exciting ice-cream event in my house was the arrival of the Arctic Roll, knocking the slab of Neapolitan off its exotic perch.

Back in Blighty I don’t usually celebrate Thanks Giving but this year, having been in touch with my Manhattan mates to make sure they’re all safe and sound, I got a taste for turkey. So, after much searching I found a small, ready-to-roast piece in M&S and we had our own little celebration. I did a kind of Ottolenghi version with red rice, puy lentils and butternut squash, crispy onions, chili and cranberry stuffing. I didn't make a pie, I made Nigella's Bakewell Tart which turned out remakably well  ……. and I gave thanks.

Top tip: respect flood water…..stay in!!