Warning: There are spoil-sports out there who claim Thanksgiving lasts just one day and there’s no excuse for carrying on for a whole week afterward like we’re guests at some mythological Greek food orgy. They say we should look for low-fat food choices this time of year so the numbers on our scale don’t suggest we’d do better weighing in with the livestock at the feed store. They claim, for example, that pie crust contains a nasty three-letter word: F-A-T.
Yes, friends, there’s something in your house that inevitably carries the feasting tradition onward: that last bastion of Thanksgiving, your refrigerator. If you prepared the Thanksgiving meal, I’ll bet you could open your fridge right this minute, examine any shelf therein and find numerous foil-covered bowls, plastic containers and oddly-shaped wrappings holding remnants of last week’s dinner. The week following Thanksgiving is the Grand Prix of leftovers dining. But everybody knows that leftovers are not all created equal. Turkey, for example, has lots of leftover potential; broccoli, not so much.
This week we’re clinging to every word Martha utters about creatively disguising leftover turkey. We’re suffering through gallons of turkey soup simmered on the stovetop after we dismembered the bird’s carcass and picked every last scrap of meat from the bones. Granted, it’s hard to just toss the remains of your turkey without feeling obligated to give it one last hurrah before finally hauling it out to the curb on trash day. I’ll admit that I for one am a little skeptical about the merits of turkey soup. It’s great to utilize those skeletal remains and all, but yikes! This means you’ve got to go back to the market to buy even more food to flavor the soup such as veggies, rice or noodles, herbs and spices. I mean, you can’t be dumping the remains of your green bean casserole into the soup pot without having a disturbing mess on your hands.
With so many dishes prepared for the Thanksgiving feast, using up leftovers is a daunting task. In fact, I’d like to see this chore made into an official challenge at the Food Network. Let a couple of those Iron Chefs go head-to-head using Thanksgiving leftovers as the secret ingredient. Give them four tablespoons of cranberry sauce, half a cup of dressing, a dollop of whipped cream, three celery stocks stuffed with peanut butter, two quarts of mashed potatoes and a couple of turkey thighs and see what they can come up with.
Nevertheless, there is one traditional Thanksgiving food item that I love having as leftovers because there’s not a darned thing you have to do with it other than locate a plate and fork. That item is pie. Yes, I know the stuffing is the king of leftovers, but who ever has leftover stuffing? If your family is like mine, the dressing was cooked inside the turkey, and there is only so much room in there you know. We fight over the last crumb of stuffing because it just tastes so darned good and there’s never enough of it. I know there are controversies about cooking the stuffing inside or outside the turkey, and I’ve eaten some delicious dressing baked in a pan, but family traditions die hard.
Now let’s get back to that pie. I don’t know about you, but I have an inner sixth sense about pie. The morning after Thanksgiving, I wake up and the first thing that pops into my head is, “There’s pie!” It practically calls my name from the kitchen. Sure, I try to ignore it for a while but then I begin reasoning with myself because you and I both know that pie is practically health food. Pumpkin pie? Oh, please – its basic ingredient, pumpkin, is one of those orange vegetables that all the health experts are forever yammering at us to eat because of all is wonderful properties that perform near miracles to the human body such as tripling our I.Q. with every teaspoon we consume, nourishing our skin until it’s soft and supple as a baby’s bottom, and developing us into tall, willowy people like Julia Roberts. So letting that pumpkin pie languish in the fridge basically amounts to a disservice to our bodies.
Then there’s good old apple pie. Now think about it: Can you call yourself American if you don’t eat apple pie? Plus, not only does an apple a day keep the doctor away, you can top apple pie with cheese – more protein – or ice cream – calcium for strong bones and teeth. I mean, can you think of a healthier breakfast?
Or maybe you baked a pecan pie – surely you’ve heard about the health benefits of nuts? I mean, eating a few nuts a day makes your heart so healthy you are practically guaranteed to live until you are 167 years old or the approximate age of Ed McMahon. Plus pecan pie filling, like pumpkin, contains eggs. Eggs, people! Protein abounds – this is the nutritional building block that keeps us strong and vibrant, allowing us to run entire marathons without even breaking a sweat.
So as long as there’s pie in the fridge, we are happy campers. Have you ever leapt out of bed at dawn the day after Thanksgiving, tip-toed to the kitchen to cut a nice slice of pie and then savored all that sweetness that was so gosh-darned yummy you went right into your happy dance, moon-walking backward around the kitchen in your big fuzzy slippers, then realized your spouse had just returned from visiting the bathroom and was warning you that you were scaring the dog? Nope, me neither.
So if the diet police are sending out their message that you should mend your ways, I say, the heck with all that low-fat business. Thanksgiving leftovers week is practically a season all its own. And when that season is over, we will get serious and shed that extra weight. Right? I mean, what on earth do you think New Year’s Resolutions are for? Â
