Thanksgiving in Sevilla

Okay, technical difficulties resolved!

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Perhaps no other holiday is so quintessentially American as Thanksgiving Day. And so it should come as no small surprise to the reader, as was certainly the case with my Spanish friends, that until rather late I had no concrete plans as to how I should commemorate this day of days. I had known for several months that returning to the U.S. would not be financially feasible. In the absence of an oven, I had all but resigned myself to finding a local expat haunt in the desperate hope of at least having turkey.

My Spanish friend David had invited me to a small dinner with his long-time friends the Sunday before Thanksgiving. After a long discussion at the dinner table on the history (which I no doubt butchered) and significance of Thanksgiving Day, I had initially declined an invitation to host a meal at my place. (By all marks, I think this is a tradition in and of itself if I’m not mistaken.) I think the anthropologists in the group, of which there were two, found the idea of actually experiencing the holiday with a real, live American too good an opportunity to pass by. They were very persuasive. At some point in the early morning as we waited out Sevilla’s first Autumn rainstorm – say around 3am – I accepted their nomination most certainly not thinking at my full potential. Only the next morning did I realize the full gravity of the situation.

In the hopes of trying to create as authentic an experience as possible, I was determined to make certain the very best expectations of Thanksgiving made it to the dinner table. Thankfully that fateful early Monday morning I also had the good sense to explain another venerable American dining custom, the potlatch meal. David offered to cook the turkey, (though we would later learn that it was the singular feat of his mother – thank you David’s mother!). The rest of the group promised baked potatoes and a salad. I later convinced additional guests to join with responsibilities for additional items, libations chief among them.

As host, I had to make sure a few traditional American items made it into the mix. Though somewhat impossible to get a football game on my television, I thought it all too funny that my friend and fellow Fulbrighter, Heather, was able to find chips and salsa – Doritos brand no less! Because cranberries are about as foreign as it comes in Spain and because the Spanish word for cranberry is most confusingly also that for blueberry – that other mysterious foreign berry – I was told it would be unlikely that I would find something to accompany the turkey. In fact, I was fortunate enough to find salsa de arándanos al Oporto (cranberries in Port sauce) in the gourmet section of one of the local supermarkets. Thanks to the marvels of the internet and a little improvisation, I managed to concoct stove-top stuffing out of stale baguettes, chicken stock, and vegetables sautéed in olive oil. Mashed batatas (sweet potatoes, not to be confused with patatas) made for an easy side dish. Heather also contributed a delicious Spanish bizcocho-style apple pie baked with the help of her language exchange partner. Sorry, no pictures; we ate it too quickly!

All in all, the meal proved very authentic, and quite a lot of fun. I finally managed to get the group out the door at 4am – still somewhat early by Spanish standards – so I could prepare for my 10am flight. For more info on this excursion, stay tuned...