Daughters in the Holiday Kitchen

In a family of cooks as far back as anyone knows, holiday cooking has been our cherished tradition.  As little girls, my sister and I delighted in contributing to holiday meals and as we grew older and had life, like jobs and kids to raise, we'd spend weeks ahead, sharing thoughts on menu plans, planning, calling back and forth with ideas and themes, coordinating.  It may have seemed oddly intensive to outsiders, but to us, the experience was deeply satisfying and warm---a bond with the generations of our female ancestors, who were certainly intense cooks.

My daughters grew up with the same ritual of holiday food planning.  I've loved watching them plan together as my sister and I did, and to grow so accomplished and confident!  When the time came, I was proud and content to relinquish my role as prima ballerina of the holiday kitchen. 

And ever more proud when I read my first daughter Skye's account of her moment to shine, her moment when the holiday kitchen became hers.  I'm pleased to share the memory of her "first" holiday production, here with you:

A Sometimes Inconvenient Legacy
By Skye Emery

My mom is the oldest of five. When you’re the oldest daughter, you’re instilled with the duty and expectation to provide any and all holiday/birthday/anniversary get-togethers as required by the family at large. As the oldest daughter of the oldest daughter, this was something to which I paid close attention; my time was coming and this made me an eager student. I learned what garlic should smell like right before it’s overcooked and bitter, the difference between dicing and mincing, the importance of adding salt to the boiling water for pasta.

As my mom’s longtime sous chef, I felt that it wouldn’t be a problem to eventually mash potatoes for 40. Chop crudités for a crowd. Bake plenty of pie. I remember my slow promotion through kitchen duty; fetching ingredients, peeling potatoes, sautéing onions, grilling steaks, until finally I was included in the actual meal planning. There was something empowering about being involved in the behind the scenes preparation. Almost like getting to go backstage at a play and seeing the costumes and backdrops. There’s something magical and archetypal about pulling out the main dish, a perfectly browned turkey, a pepper crusted prime rib alongside creamed horseradish. Being a part of that magic is addicting.

The torch was finally passed when I was 31 years old. My husband had accepted a job out of state and much to the consternation of our collective family, we moved. As a sort of consolation, we invited the family to come up for Thanksgiving. And they all agreed to come. What at first was an exciting prospect, slowly turned in to a sickening realization that I was suddenly hosting dinner for 26, without a net. Some were flying in late Wednesday, some Thursday morning. No one would be there in time to help. I had been promoted to executive chef. I was determined to put on the most sublime meal. Not just meal. Experience. This was my birthright. It was time to prove myself worthy. In retrospect, I went way off the rails. 

It started with the china. While walking past a store in Truckee, California, I saw a display of the most amazing plates and platters. Having just moved from sunny San Diego to snowy Reno, I was embracing all things fall and winter; two previously unknown seasons. These plates were gorgeous. White plates with sepia tone photographs of 1920’s ski scenes – cabins tucked into hillsides, hikers, cheery couples with their Alpine wood skis and poles. I bought them. I bought them all. What better way to set the family table than with (some other) family images? This was just the beginning.

Reading through some craft blogs, I came across an embroidery pattern set – “The Vitamin Ball.” Really adorable, vintage inspired images of vegetables playing musical instruments and dancing. Whimsical asparagus waltzing with a tuxedoed potato. A red bell pepper playing a flute. A delicate celery stalk in an evening gown carrying a matching fringed purse. Originally intended for kitchen towels, I decided to use the patterns to hand embroider 26 cloth napkins. In a month. At the time, in my full-blown delusion, this made perfect sense. On his way to bed, my husband would walk past my self-imposed workstation at the corner of the couch, frantically curving red floss into a smug smile for my head of cabbage conductor. He would sadly shake his head and remind me that these were napkins, you know? For wiping gravy off chins and grease off fingers? His logic didn’t matter. I would embroider until 2 or 3 in the morning when my eyes were too sore to thread a needle, then stumble to bed so that I could wake up and search magazines and cookbooks, and, oh yeah, raise our two kids and all.

            On to the turkey. Only the unimaginative would go the grocery store and buy one. Pshaw! We were far, far outside that option. I figured that our new proximity to farmland meant that I could find a fresh, humanely raised, local turkey. I absolutely could have, had I ordered one in September. Since it was early November, I was faced with an uncertain origin for the crowning glory of my epic meal. Thanksgiving without turkey? Not even my adorable napkins could overcome that hurdle.

            My obsession further presented in such a way that I had to talk it out with everyone I came across. Random people in line with me at the grocery store got to hear about it. So did the neighbors. And the other parents on the sidelines of soccer games. It was here that I appeared to hit the jackpot. One of the dads told me that his parents had raised turkeys and they had a big one I was welcome to have. I was ecstatic in my relief. The next week, I asked soccer-dad for more details, which he delivered with unexpected emotion. While I was still free to take the turkey, I was going to have to kill it myself because it was really kind of a family pet and he couldn’t do it himself, he thought he could, but over the last week he had reconsidered. I was so focused on my picture-perfect holiday tableau that I actually hesitated before telling him that of course I would not be killing, butchering, and eating their pet turkey. I was ready to admit a partial defeat on the turkey front. I placed an order at Whole Foods for a fussy heirloom turkey and moved on.

I started looking at my kitchen as an obstacle course. I was eternally grateful that our new kitchen had double ovens and went about creating an Excel spreadsheet in order to maximize baking and roasting temperatures and times – the brussel sprouts could roast in the higher turkey temperature oven while the stuffing and sweet potatoes could go in the slightly cooler oven. The stovetop real estate was similarly divided into the most efficient schedule, cranberry sauce, gravy, and mashed potatoes were all assigned time and place. Platters and trays decorated our kitchen counter holding index cards labeled with which part of the meal they would hold.

Rather than all of this intensive preparation making me feel calmer, I panicked about what I was overlooking. There had to be something. I ordered a Honeybaked ham to supplement the turkey. I bought new silverware, uh, 36 place settings worth, after reading all of the Amazon.com reviews, poring over online pictures, and determining which pattern would be plain enough to allow the plates and napkins to be appreciated, yet hefty enough to lend shine to the table.  I researched wines and bought several bottles. Okay, lots of bottles. I baked the cornbread with enough time to dry it for stuffing. The pies were ready and cooling in the refrigerator, ready to be topped with the cream that would be whipped right before coffee and dessert serving. The turkey was soaking in the brine. I was a general awaiting the battle at dawn.

The house slowly filled with the smells of Thanksgiving – deep roasted meat, onions, leeks, shallots, sage, spiced sweet potatoes, starchy Russet potatoes, ready to mash; layer upon layer of nostalgia and tradition. I was a dervish in the kitchen, seamlessly putting out the olives, cheese, and crackers while zesting the orange for the cranberry sauce. It was perfect. All of it. Too perfect. Our family was afraid to actually use the gorgeous new plates. No one wanted to be the first to wipe or, God forbid!, stain the delicate napkins. I spent dinner assuring everyone to please relax and enjoy! Instead, we all stiffly ate and pretended that this was completely normal – our Martha Stewart glossy layout of a holiday.

A month of preparation resulted in roughly three hours of stilted togetherness, culminating in my father-in-law passing out on my bed and my husband and I cleaning the kitchen for four days. My sister’s boyfriend had drunk far too much while gambling in a local casino the night before so he had actually never made it over for dinner. His parents behaved in that distant, overly smiley way that you do when you’re embarrassed in front of people you barely know. I realized that part of the passing of the baton was the understanding that the person who cared most about the meal preparation and warm family experience was the one doing all of the work. The cooking and planning were secondary to the touchstone of family coming together, the good and the bad that come out of that collision.

Over the next six Thanksgivings, the plates have been scuffed with knife marks, the silverware is a bit tarnished, some of the forks bear scars from the garbage disposal, and the napkins have lost their sheen. When I pull them out this week, they are aged enough to be part of the tradition, not a symbol of what I’m trying to prove.


Happiest Thanksgiving to you and your families, from all of us!  Love, Barb