Canned Cranberry Sauce

Canned cranberry sauce and melting crumbly wensleydale    is heaven...... especially on a ciabatta bread.....

Canned cranberry sauce and melting crumbly wensleydale   is heaven...... especially on a ciabatta bread.....

Sounds wonderful!!  

Alas, DS will eat only the canned Ocean Spray jelly kind but we always used to make a cran/orange relish as well for general consumption.  Really easy.

That's why you should be with us - and you could bring the cran/orange relish! I think someone brought that to ours once - it had a lot of orange peel in it & I wasn't that keen, but I'm sure others would like it!  

My childhood Thanksgivings were all about the canned Ocean Spray jellied kind, complete with can ridges(!!!), back in the US, so that's normal for me -- also that satisfying sucking thwack sound when it comes out of the can.   (Similar to a British Christmas, and that lovely sucking sound when the first portion of a trifle made with jelly/Jello is spooned out, ha!)  So the Ocean Spray jar stuff here seems a rather posh step up from what I was used to.  

For me & I think for a lot of folks from the US, Thanksgiving is so tied up in memory & nostalgia. Essentially, I'm recreating my grandma's Thanksgiving - plus booze! And cranberry sauce is way down the Thanksgiving hierarchy for me, having grown up on the jellied stuff - sure I like cranberry, but it's not that important in my overall Thanksgiving scheme of things. What must be there are: lots of turkey, stuffing, mash & gravy, pumpkin pie, apple pie and homemade cinnamon rolls - these are non-negotiable, they simply must be there. And hopefully, some freshly made bread rolls as well, maybe a pecan pie as well.  Unlike Grandma, I don't also make sour cream raisin pie, or mincemeat pie made with actual meat in it (that's old skool mincemeat & yes my grandma really made it like that!)

So I leave it to my guests to bring the extra stuff that's non-negotiable for them. This year, a person is bringing sauerkraut. And I was like - sauerkraut?! I never heard of having that for Thanksgiving! I like sauerkraut, but with a brat or kielbasa, not turkey, lol! Anyway, for them - Thanksgiving has to have sauerkraut & they're bringing that. Everyone's traditions - either family or regional - can vary quite a bit. So I'm doing mine!  

For me & I think for a lot of folks from the US, Thanksgiving is so tied up in memory & nostalgia.

YES!!!!!

For example, that's why there's always green bean casserole, even though nobody in our family really likes it....Because it's tradition!!  

My family motto is you can always add to Thanksgiving, but you can never take a dish away.  Christmas is all about mixing up the foods- no tradition there!

I just looked up sour cream raisin pie as I have never heard of it.  I love cold custard if it's made properly (I cannot stand cold custard made from custard powder) -so that looks like it would taste good. It's probably nothing like a Little Debbie Raisin Creme Pie, but it's the taste flavour I've got in my mind.  

For example, that's why there's always green bean casserole, even though nobody in our family really likes it....

Oh I do like green bean casserole & I'm a little sad that no one wanted to bring it this year, but it's not one of my essentials! 

I just looked up sour cream raisin pie as I have never heard of it.  I love cold custard if it's made properly (I cannot stand cold custard made from custard powder) -so that looks like it would taste good. It's probably nothing like a Little Debbie Raisin Creme Pie, but it's the taste flavour I've got in my mind.  

I think it's an Amish thing. My grandma wasn't Amish, but same regional area/traditions, so... I don't think I ever ate any of it as a child - I always thought it sounded gross. I should probably try making one sometime! Although DH doesn't really like cold custard. I don't like hot custard & he doesn't like cold custard - we'll have to call the whole thing off! 

I have made quite a nice green bean casserole, but it was with a cheesy bechamel sauce- i.e. cauliflower cheese style -with the crispy onions on top. But that's not the Thanksgiving way, lol. 

I'm with you on the hot custard.  It's one of my foods...

I have made quite a nice green bean casserole, but it was with a cheesy bechamel sauce- i.e. cauliflower cheese style -with the crispy onions on top. But that's not the Thanksgiving way, lol. 

If I were going to make green bean casserole, I've wanted to try this recipe without the tinned cream of mushroom soup:

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/grandmas-green-bean-casserole/detail.aspx

I am PA Dutch and have a recipe for it somewhere, but I am a bad girl and I don't like dried fruit. 

Let's get on the subject of filling/stuffing.  Potato, never bread.  My dad tried yo make chestnut once, but I have had oyster. Any other varieties out there?

My Nola girlfriend always had rice dressing (stuffing).

It's herb & bread stuffing for me - we called it dressing though & it was baked separately, not stuffed in the bird.  I add Italian style sausage to it now as well because I like it with that sausage in it.

I've had a great one with sweet potatoes, sausage, and cranberries.

Cornbread stuffing as well

My mom was from New Orleans, so we always had rice instead of mashed potatoes.  I was SO EXCITED for my first Thanksgiving away from home because I could have mashed potatoes!

Mrs. Robinson - No sweet potato casserole?!?  That's a must have for me.  The sweet potatoes with marshmallows on top.  It's not for everyone I guess, but my family yums it up!

And my family is the same - you can add but you can't take away.  One year, my grandmother forgot to buy marshmallows for the sweet potatos.  The next year, everyone brought bags of marshmallows and added them to everything (just dry on each dish), so the turkey, stuffing, etc., all had marshmallows as a garnish on the dish.  The photos from that year are SO FUNNY.

Mrs. Robinson - No sweet potato casserole?!?  That's a must have for me.  The sweet potatoes with marshmallows on top.  It's not for everyone I guess, but my family yums it up!

I don't really like sweet potato casserole very much. And my husband thinks it's just about the most disgusting dish ever, lol! So I'm okay to give that one a miss.

However, the same person who has to have sauerkraut also has to have sweet potato casserole, so yes she is bringing it & we will have it this year! 

Another year, someone brought this sweet potato casserole with pecans in it and not marshmallows & I preferred that one.

Oh that's a good idea too - cheese, I've never tried it with that. I've always put it on turkey sandwiches or on a dinner roll, etc. It's versatile!

It is versatile! It's also good with some warm melty brie on a crusty baguette.

Damn. Now I'm hungry.

I have always bought my fresh cranberries at Tesco, Ocean Spray even, but that is usually closer to Christmas. M&S has them as well.

My farm shop special ordered some fresh ones for me a couple of weeks ago. It never hurts to ask if you can't see them on the shelf!

Green bean casserole is one of my must haves. I have never had it with cheesy bechamal sauce.

Ahh, Thanksgiving traditions...

I didn't grow up with any.

I lost my mother when I was 10 years old so me and my sister were never taught how to cook or do domestic duties in the house because our father hired a maid to take care of those things. He never remarried and was a widower for 30 years.

Thanksgiving was spent at a different family member's house every year so Thanksgiving was always different. It's amazing how different things can be, even in a the same family. It is probably why as a grown woman, I have cultivated my own traditions.

When I married my English husband, we lived in England and there's no Thanksgiving in England so I made sure to make it a priority. It was very hard in those years ('96-'04) to find a turkey so early before Christmas so I either had to pay a fortune from a specialist farmer or think of something else. Well, I learned to adapt. In those years, it was known as "Lorena's Thanksgiving" and I served what I wanted but always made sure to have the family chat about all the good things that happened to us during the year.

Now that I have been Stateside for nine years, my Thanksgiving is still different every year. The first year, I cooked a turkey for my Dad but forgot that he lived in a high altitude city and I kinda messed it up. I've also made salmon, Texas brisket on the grill, tamales, turkey curry, pizza, vegetarian pot luck, lamb, ham...

I like that the food is always different but the sentiment stays the same.