Thanksgiving

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Why is Thanksgiving so important? Why people have to eat turkey?

It was created as a national holiday in the mid Nineteenth century, 1863 to be exact, by Lincoln to serve as a kind of inspiring national myth as the civil war drug on. Sarah Hale had been lobbying for it since the 1840's. Eventually Thanksgiving and other holidays got 'standardized' as mass media developed and that's why the turkey is so common. As a holiday its supposed to promote unity at the family and national level.

Turkey?

Tradition, I guess. Turkey tends to get pretty old pretty quickly. I used to eat it once a week in the campus dining halls back in the 70s and I got so sick of it that I could barely stand it for a few years. Even then, I would still eat smoked turkey sandwiches.

Perhaps having Turkey twice a year -- Thanksgiving and Christmas -- is a way of spacing it out.

One thing that I'd like to try is goose. I've never eaten goose. I have looked online for goose and it was so expensive that I'm unlikely ever eat it unless I start raising geese (which I've seriously considered).

For some reason when I was a kid, we had baked red snapper for Thanksgiving and Christmas for a couple of years. Those were my favorite holiday meals ever.

I'd be perfectly happy for a good bowl of homemade chili with beans for Thanksgiving. Or a chicken fried steak with cream gravy, mashed potatoes, and field peas.