What are your Thanksgiving memories as a kid? They can be good, sad, funny whatever Weird foods too

[debm55]

Macy's parade. There was one in Philly and one in Detroit too. All three were shown in Pittsburgh area
the kids table
the jello thing with fruit cocktail in it
men in living room watching Detroit and whoever playing
women in the kitchen cooking
kids playing penny penny
My mother's family had 7 kids, plus spouses and aleast 4 kids each. So it was a packed house. As the day progressed, men in living room got louder from drinking beer all day. In the kitchen, well like the saying goes too many cooks.

[brewens]

1. My uncles all ponying up cash to send me on a beer run and my mom chewing their ass after

I got back with the beer because I was underage! LOL

I was senior in high school and she was kind of used to my drinking beer, but she thought that was out of line. That was 1978.

[debm55]

43. We had to buy the booze before here in PA. No beer, wine, or liquor sold in stores. Had to go to a

State Store or Beer Distributor before the holidays. They have change that slightly. But the selection is sparse and you need a liquor license.

[getagrip_already]

2. it was always going over to a family friends house....

My dad and their dad were doctors who studied together during WWII. Neither saw any real action since they graduated right before japan surrendered, but they were best friends. My father ended up serving in the phillipines in the pre-invasion build-up (that luckily never happened) in the army air corp. His friend was I think on the mainland somewhere. They both just chilled and never saw anything exciting, which was fine by them.

He was a devout catholic obgyn (who refused to do abortions back in the 70's), and my dad was an atheist liberal pediatrician.

Let's just say that conversations were a bid animated, especially concerning nixon and watergate.

[debm55]

22. I bet it was. Did it ruin Thanksgiving?

[getagrip_already]

33. Nope, it was actually fun to watch....

They weren't jerks about arguing, but neither one would give ground. And they largely made valid points.

It was very friendly, in a heated I can't believe you believe that kind of way.

It was very different from arguments today where one side is in a fantasy world and goes straight to personal attacks.

[applegrove]

3. I hated squash. I could not swallow it. I would back it in my cheeks with

my tongue. At some point my proper grandmother or her sister would point out I looked like a chipmunk. Then I would swallow it. Happened more than once at Thanksgiving and I was young enough that I had not figured out that the taste I hated would disappear if I just swallowed. Granny was undirect like that. Really sweet. At some point my mom allowed us kids all one or two things we were allowed to hate. For me it was squash. My twin brother: tomatoes. My older brother: mushrooms. My sister: bananas. I've only been able to eat squash when it is baked in butter and maple syrup like my aunt used to make. I used to work in an Indian restaurant and the chef would put all the excess curry in a big single bowl. At the end of the night there would be 6 different curries in it. We would share it. At least one of them would have squash or maybe she made squash soup. It was wonderful but then with so many spices I could not taste the squash.

[rsdsharp]

4. My father's brother died young, and for a time, his two oldest kids lived with us.

Needless to say, we were quite close to them. A few years later, by the mid 60s, Donnie was away starting a career in the army, and Linda brought her fiancé to Thanksgiving dinner, a young farmer with a booming voice, and we learned, a massive appetite. We had a huge spread, including a 20 pound turkey, and all the trimmings.

There was a huge bowl of mashed potatoes. In fact, they were served in the mixing bowl in which they were prepared. There were eight people at the dining room table. The fiancé was about the third guy to get the potatoes passed to him. He emptied the bowl! And then he started on other things. We just sat back and watched him eat. It was a masterwork! I saw him this summer. He’s now 82, still has the booming voice, and is in great health.

[Walleye]

6. Mashed potatoes still in the mixing bowl. That's the real deal

[debm55]

23. Walleye, it is the real deal. LOL

[debm55]

46. rsdsharp. what did the other people do for potatoes?

[rsdsharp]

50. Nothing. We sat an watched. There was other food,

but it remains the only Thanksgiving in my memory where there were no leftovers. The man could eat!

[Walleye]

5. When I was growing up we would always go out to a restaurant

My parents had a photography studio and worked very hard around Christmas and Thanksgiving so our extended family of about 20 would all get together at a restaurant called the Dinner Bell. Just to be contrary, I ordered fried ousters instead of turkey. I really do miss getting together with those relatives. Most of whom have passed away. Once we were grown, we would get together at my brothers house

[Polly Hennessey]

7. Happy memories and creamed onions.

The pearl onions came in a can. Mom made a cream sauce. They had a slightly sour taste. For some reason, I liked them.

[debm55]

40. Sounds like the creamed carrots my aunt would make.Polly, I like them too.

[yourout]

8. Playing football with my cousins at the park near my grandparents.

And eating 3 or 4 plates of food.
One thing about growing up on a dairy farm was you could eat as much as you wanted without gaining a pound because you were working from sun up to sun down.

[Skittles]

9. few

was mostly in England

[debm55]

41. Skittles, did they have a Harvest fest in England? I know Canada has a Thanksgiving now, either the

4th of October or November.

[Skittles]

54. I don't remember celebrating that....

but I googled and you are correct, there is such a celebration:

The Harvest Festival of Thanksgiving is a celebration of the harvest and food grown on the land in the United Kingdom. It is about giving thanks for a successful crop yield over the year as winter starts to approach.

[TlalocW]

10. You know the song

Over the river and through the woods to Grandma's house we go? I lived that... well as close as you can get for woods in Kansas. We have country roads lined with trees that were planted in FDR's time to break up the wind-swept plains to prevent future Dust Bowls. Anyway, Grandma lived on the family farm for as long as she could, so we would head there. Very storybook grandma - great cook, baked most of the pies, crocheted blankets, once had her identity stolen by a wolf wearing her clothes, etc.

Eventually Grandma moved in with an aunt in my hometown, and dinner was always at their house.

Called it the Macy Day Parade until I was 12. Always liked watching that. Never watched football. One year, my aunt and grandma had moved into a house that had a pool table in the basement so that was fun. Played board games - RISK was my brother's favorite. I liked Trivial Pursuit.

[debm55]

42. Tlaloc, sounds like fun. All we had was penny, penny. Guess the hand that had the penny and you got

move up a stair.

[cachukis]

11. English v Latin. Harvard Stadium. My Uncle coached Latin.

Malden v Medford.
High school games late 50's early 60's before dinner.

[ItsjustMe]

12. My first Thanksgiving memory was very traumatic

We go to my grandparents' house, (My Mother's Parents) and in the backyard running free is a large white Turkey. So naturally, we kids are trying to play with it and pet it. But after a while, my grandfather comes out the back door with a large knife. He walks up to the turkey, grabs It by the head and cuts the head off. The turkey starts running around the yard with no head, blood Is squirting out of its neck. The Turkey is crashing into the fence, the garage, and the tree. Now all of the younger children are crying and running for the back door. Finally, the turkey drops to the ground and furiously flaps Its wings for the longest time. This happened about 55 years ago, and I still remember it like it was yesterday.

[debm55]

24. Oh my how terrible for you guys. My father did that with a pheasant. It was beautiful. He did the

same and was laughing when I screamed. We were in the cellar. I didn't eat it.

[cksmithy]

63. When we moved to the country

when I was about three, there was a chicken coop and about 10 chickens. They didn't lay eggs, we didn't feed them appropriately, or stray dogs got to them. I'll never know. Eventually there was only a few left, and I can remember vividly, like it was yesterday, my father chopping a chickens head off and the poor creature running around. It was horrible. This was about 68 years ago, I can remember looking at our to be new home, before we moved in, I was about 2 years and 10 months.

[debm55]

65. cks, I guess if you are used to living on a farm, it wouldn't bother us. I was in awe of the beauty

of the pheasant, when my dad did that, he made it seem to me like he got me a pet. When he cut the head off after letting me pet it, i
saw him for what he was. I am so sorry for the trauma it put you through.:
As the bird's body was running around, he was laughing, I was crying and screaming. My mother prepared with white wine, I kept a feather from the tail and saved for many years,

[cksmithy]

69. I was just 3 or 4

years old. We didn't really have a farm. There were just a few chickens running around. We looked at the chickens from a far, I can just remember my father's back bent over the stump and the poor chicken running around before and after. I have seen on UK shows Midsummer Murders or something like that, where they pet the animal (rabbit or chicken) twist/break its neck and everything is over. No blood, no running with their head cut off. Why isn't that the way it is done here. I don't eat beef, only very small portions of range free chicken, lots of vegetables. I don't like to think about how they are killed. I too am sorry for your crying and screaming, our parents just didn't get it.

[Ocelot II]

13. We often had pheasant instead of turkey for Thanksgiving,

the result of my dad's hunting trips and we got the tail feathers to play with and make things out of. We had to be careful while eating because of the birdshot but it was really good meat - to this day I prefer it to turkey, which can be too dry. We also always had wild rice instead of or in addition to mashed potatoes; a long time ago had to get it from the Ojibway because it wasn't available in grocery stores, but later you could get cultivated rice which wasn't as good. You still have to get Native-raised wild rice if you want the good stuff.

[wnylib]

14. There were 7 people in our household.

Both parents, 4 kids, and my mother's aunt, who raised her. At Thanksgiving there were usually other relatives with us, e.g. my paternal grandfather (grandma was deceased), or my mother's cousins that she grew up with as brothers after her mother died.

Every one dressed up for dinner which was in the dining room with white linen tablecloth, white linen napkins, good china, candles.

Besides the main meal and its side dishes, there was a relish tray and later, small dishes of nuts and little melt-in-your mouth mints (which I LOVED).

My mother made the stuffing from scratch the night before. This meant boiling the giblets and running them through an old fashioned meat grinder attached to the kitchen table. Then tearing up bread, slicing celery and onions, adding spices. She ran some of the celery and onions through the meat grinder, too, so that their juices moistened the bread. She did that after making both apple and pumpkin pies.

[debm55]

44. Wnylib, the relish tray radishes cut like roses, did you put the black olives on your fingers and

pretend they were the soldiers in the Wizard of Oz?

[wnylib]

51. I didn't like olives then, or radishes, either.

I love black olives today, but not green ones. Still hate radishes.

[doc03]

15. Thanksgiving was going rabbit hunting in the morning. nt

[debm55]

25. My dad shot one. I tried to eat but it was full of pellets or something. Didn't eat

[madamesilverspurs]

16. Started with the Macy's parade on our big cabinet black-and-white TV.

Mom and grandmother prepared turkey and all the fixings, my favorite was the stuffing with lots of turkey gravy. For dessert, Mom's pumpkin pie; for the whipped cream she chilled the mixing bowl and beaters in the freezer, then whipped it up right before serving it on the pie. Ymmmmmm!


.

[debm55]

32. Thank you, madame, for your memories,

I near had anyone mix their own.Did she sweeten it,

[madamesilverspurs]

61. She did.

Sugar and vanilla extract. And my sister and I got to lick the beaters, our reward for helping in the kitchen.


.

[yellowdogintexas]

17. our Thanksgiving dinners were not huge family events

unless my mother's brother and step brothers all attended. Then we ate at a huge table with lots of talking and laughing.

My dad's family had a big family deal with everyone at Christmas though.

[debm55]

47. We did the same Mother had 9 and dad had 8. Father's mother was no cook but she tried.

[MOMFUDSKI]

18. AHHH - what fun.

Macy's Parade on TV and then outside to play. We lived upstairs from my aunt and uncle and 2 cousins and would always go down to their house for Thanksgiving. Smell of turkey in the oven and pies on the window sills to cool. Windows usually steamed up due to warm kitchen and cold outside. The 4 adults played poker before dinner. Then all to the table and we kids got a small glass of Mogen David wine! wow. Then back outside to play with all the neighborhood kids while dads hit the chairs in the living room. Laughter rang out all day. We felt loved and safe. I had a great childhood and am so thankful for that.

[debm55]

26. Good, it sounds like a very nice time. They say smell is the sense to best bring back memories.

Last edited Tue Nov 15, 2022, 02:59 PM - Edit history (1)

[likesmountains 52]

19. Polishing the silverware,

and setting the dining room table. We really only ate in there, with the silver and the china, on holidays. I liked the ritual.

[debm55]

27. Yes, they say the most dining rooms are used for only two days-thanksgiving and Christmas. Most

people don't use otherwise. Agree with the silver and China. And as most people had no dishwashers, It was all waqhed and dried by hand. Thank you for your memory, likesmountains.

[Chipper Chat]

20. 1951

Ready whip was a new product and we used it for the 1st time. When pumpkin pie was served my Uncle Jack did not know how to use the nozzle he pressed it pointed to his face and his face got creamed with ready whip. We are still laughing 70 years later

[debm55]

28. Chipper that is funny, Did you ever put the nozzle in your mouth and load the Ready Ship in your

mouth. I hated Cool Whip. It was soooo fake tasting.

[Marthe48]

21. We'd get together with my uncle's family

My Dad's brother. There was the big table for the grown ups, and 1 or 2 card tables for us kids. I remember that sometimes a couple of us very young kids got to sit at the big table on a stack of phone books on a chair. In Cleveland, they were big, thick books.

I remember being at the big table one year, and my uncle told the story of being at his in-laws right after he and my aunt got married. He said they were sitting a huge, long table, and they were passing food around. My uncle called out to his mother-in-law, "Mother Jennings, do you want some stuffing up your end?" And then wished he could disappear. Everyone at our table laughed. Later my older brother said, "Uncle John, do you want some cranberry sauce up your end?" And everyone laughed again. It got to be a family joke, and somebody would say something like that every Thanksgiving.

[debm55]

29. Marthe, that is funny. I only realized in my teens that stuffing went up the turkey's ass. Sorta

gross when you think about it. But stuffing made in the pan doesn't have the kick and juices of stuffing in the bird.

[frogmarch]

30. The only one

I specifically remember was when I was 9 years old. We had a parakeet named Bobby who we forgot to put back in his cage during dinner, and he flew to the dining room table, lit in my uncle's chocolate pudding, and ran around on the white linen tablecloth, tracking pudding and bobbing his head up and down and squeaking like our dog Pugsy's rubber squeaky toy chicken. At first, Mom didn't appreciate it, but she soon couldn't help laughing with the rest of us.

[debm55]

31. Funny frog. Do you remember when Butterball turkeys had that thermometer built into the turkey that

Last edited Tue Nov 15, 2022, 02:37 PM - Edit history (1)

would pop up when the turkey was done? Some times it worked and sometimes it didn't.

[debm55]

48. Frog, so funny about Bobby.

[3catwoman3]

34. We did not live near any family members, so would get together...

…with a couple of other families who also had no relatives nearby - all 3 sets of parents grew up in the Midwest and ended up in Rochester NY. 8 kids amongst the 3 families. I was the older of 2 in mine.

I was also the oldest of the 8, and because of that, was always expected to “set a good example” for the other 7. The other 2 girls were 5 and 8 years younger than I was, so we had nothing in common. 4 of the 5 boys were all close in age and were good buddies. The final boy was about 5 years younger that the other 4. The boys could typically get fairly rowdy, and by late November in Rochester, it was usually too cold to send them outside.

Of course, no one ever followed my good example, and I would get scolded for not setting one, even though I was - serious first-born personality and all that. It was not a time I looked forward to.

[debm55]

37. I hear you, 3cat. Thanksgiving almost always ended in an argument over something or other.

[Archae]

35. Going to Grandma's house.

I did this with my family until a couple years before she died in 1989.
(She came down with dementia)

Kids' table until I was 12.

Lots of food brought by relatives.

Jell-O cubes with that creamy sweet white topping.

Turkey of course.

The men would gather in my Grandma's living room to watch football.

Us kids would play outside.

[debm55]

38. Sounds similar to mine.

[debm55]

36. I was thinking about the jello thing with the fruit cocktail inside. I used to think it was the

centerpiece. No one ate any. Year after year it would show up. I wonder if it was like the fruit and nut cake that keeps coming back.

[csziggy]

39. My Dad cutting up rutabagas for the dinner

Dad and I were the only ones in the family that liked rutabagas, but he insisted on them every Thanksgiving so Mom made him cut up the tough root vegetables. Dad and I would pile them up on our plates - everyone else took a token one or two cubes. Then we'd have lots of leftovers which Dad and I had to eat by ourselves because no one else would touch them. Mom always was happy when Dad's mother and aunt also came to Thanksgiving because they would also eat the rutabagas and there wouldn't be so many leftovers.

Mom's set menu for Thanksgiving was turkey, gravy, dressing, green beans, peas and pearl onions, homemade biscuits, mincemeat pie - with hard sauce - and pecan pie.

Oddly, there was no football. There were four daughters so we didn't ask for it. Dad's uncle had been an early NFL player and later was a NFL official (still is a fantasy football player) so it was kind of surprising that he wasn't into football.

No drinking, either. My great aunt was a tea totaler (even though she loved the hard sauce which was rum and powdered sugar) and in our dry county town, no one drank in public or in family gatherings.

[debm55]

45. csyiggy, aren't rutabagas similiar to potatoes? We would eat them raw as a kid. With a touch of salt

[csziggy]

62. I think they are closer to turnips

They have a much stronger taste than potatoes and are much harder when raw.

[debm55]

49. WHAT !!!! Not one poster mentioned the Green Bean casserole made with beans, mushroom soup and

Frenches fried onions in a can. I simply can't believe it. What a world,what a world. On second thought maybe it's a Christmas thing.

[AngryOldDem]

52. Watching my mom make cranberry salad the night before.

Her feeding the berries into a hand grinder that was clamped on to the edge of a table.

Didn’t like it as a kid, but now I think homemade is light years better than the canned glop. My tastes have evolved, LOL.

[elleng]

53. I think I got chicken pox.

Visiting newly adopted mother's family for first Massachusetts Thanksgiving, at least I slept through most of it.

[debm55]

57. I had chicken pox too when I was 6. Missed thanksgiving. sister who was born on October 28 also got

it. Was blamed for giving it to her.

[elleng]

58. SORRY you were blamed, instead of the Pox!

Wondering now what if anything happened to my kid brother, pox-wise. I do recall that he and Dad got MUMPS together!!!

[debm55]

59. No, everything was always my fault. Uneducated people don't believe in Science. Did you get the

Shingle shot. If you had chicken pox it's very important to get it done. I thought it was the opposite that if you had chicken pox you couldn't get shingles. I was on a tour on NYC before Christmas, I had it only the right side of my face and eye. I was terrible. AAA would not let me on the return bus. I went to Mount Sinai hospital . they gave me oxycotin and returned to Pittsburgh on a stinking, dirty bus. It was horrible, Please get the vacination if you haven' t already.

[elleng]

60. OH NO how awful!

Yes, I've had the shot.

[herding cats]

55. My grandmother's ambrosia salad.

My grandmother was born in 1910, she had my mother - her only child - in her 40's and really only settled down in the 1950's. Im not sure what era this was from but I'm guessing it was probably 50's or 60's. It was a fresh fruit salad with mini marshmallows mixed in whipped cream. We only had it on Thanksgiving, and I looked forward to it every year.

We'd all set around the Duncan Phyfe table in the dining room, my parents, my 3 siblings, my grandparents and whomever else they found who needed a spot to land and share the feast. The chaos, the laughter and love were as exquisite as her fruit salad.

That all ended when I was 14, but every Thanksgiving I remember those moments fondly as I create new ones with my own family now.

[debm55]

56. Herding cats, beautiful post and yes I remember the Ambrosia Salad. It was good. Thank you for

sharing your memories.

[cksmithy]

64. The lime jello

with mayonnaise and a can of fruit cocktail. It was served in a bowl, looked gross, but actually tasted ok to me. I, also, vomited every thanksgiving or when ever a butterball turkey with added flavoring (msg), like rice a roni, the San Francisco treat, or most prepacked/prepared/canned foods had msg in it. It took me more 30 to 50 years to realize all of my food sensitivities were due to celiac disease. So my main memories is of eating, feeling sick, and vomiting while the rest of my family, 5 siblings, 2 parents, were having fun. I was always told I had a nervous stomach and to just relax (my parents.)

[debm55]

66. ck, one of the relatives always made that jello thing with fruit cocktail, ni mayo. You could always

the pears, pineapples and whatever floating around.-- no mayo in it. No one ate it. Always appeared Thanksgiving after Thanksgiving. Like it was put in the frig and left for the following Thanksgiving. I was told I had a nervous stomach, gee I wounder why? Sorry about the celiac disease.

[MissB]

67. my mom had four siblings

Only one didn't live nearby us. The other three did, and had kids the same age as my siblings.

The Thanksgiving dinners all blend together in my memories, but I do remember the laughter and the food. The food was largely great - my family has plenty of amazing cooks. We did have the jello/fruit/coolwhip/cottage cheese concoction on the menu, but the rest was pretty much standard fare including homemade rolls and pies.

The only thing I hated was the kids table. As one of the youngest cousins, I was at that table for far too many years.

When I host T-day or Xmas meals, I weave the kids into the main table(s). Because they're just fine to sit with adults.

[debm55]

68. MissB, that is a good idea. It's as if the kids didn't belong.