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View Winners → Motander’s Musings: Holiday traditions & memories are funny things: The Coldstream Guard and Puce Gravy
Arcadia Weekly Dec 04, 2014
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By Susan Motander
We have just entered the “Holiday Season.” When I was a child it seemed to be the longest period of time. Now it seems to fly past. It is all in perspective.
A good perspective is what we really need to enjoy this time of year. In years past I have gotten so involved in doing things “right” that I have forgotten to enjoy what is happening. I hope to avoid that pitfall this year.
To that end I have spent a bit of time reviewing my favorite holiday memories.
The holiday season used to begin with the preparation of the stuffing the night before Thanksgiving. My mother, sister and I would dice the onions and celery necessary to prepare the Mrs. Cubbinson’s Dressing (always the seasoned bread crumb variety, not that silly cornbread Johnny-come-lately version).
This preparation was always done while watching the Santa Claus Lane Parade (what we now call the Hollywood Christmas Parade). Then it was held on the night before Thanksgiving (heaven only knows when they hold it now). The parade had all the Hollywood Stars welcoming in the season. In those days, I knew who all the stars were. Now I need a guide to the stars whose images grace the covers of the tabloids.
Thanksgiving Day itself had more traditions. Of course, it started with the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, watched while we ate breakfast. There was a bit of a difference then: it did not seem to be a two-hour commercial for the new NBC shows. But I digress.
While we were glued to the television watching the parade, Mother was in the kitchen preparing the side dishes. She had already gotten up at the crack of dawn to get the 20+ pound bird in the oven. My father really loved turkey and all the leftovers.
By noon with the parade over, Mother would break out the celery stuffed with cheese and the black olives. My sister and I would put an olive on the tip of each finger and march them around the table. They were our own little Coldstream guardsmen with olive-skinned rather than tall bearskin caps. I have no idea why we did this year after year, even when our fingers outgrew the olives and split their sides (those of the olives, not our fingers). It was a part of the Thanksgiving tradition.
There are just some things that are done year after year without any more reason than “because”.
And then there are the memorable exceptions, those years when something goes so delightfully wrong that the foible becomes a cherished memory dragged out year and after year for re-inspection.
Such was the case of the year my father’s boss came to dinner. Mother was determined to make everything perfect. So, of course, the gravy was much too light in color and (horrors) we were out of Gravy Master, that delightful darkening agent. So Mother relied on the tools she had acquired as the parent of small children. When you mix red and green finger paint, you get a brown color. It does not work the same way with food coloring. We had puce gravy. Puce is a shade of purple used most commonly as a dress color for Edwardian widows just out of mourning and not at all complementary to turkey. But it tasted good. And we bring out the story very year.
And there was year my father fell asleep on the couch after the big meal. We usually held it in mid-afternoon. My father’s mother was visiting and took umbrage at this. She was busy sewing at the time as so stuck a needle in Papa’s foot. My sister and I learned a few new words that afternoon. And another unforgettable memory was created.
My parents were not the only ones capable of creating lasting memories. I am sure our children will remember the first time I cooked Thanksgiving dinner for all of us. I had inherited the cabin in which my husband and I live from my maternal grandmother. My family had already created many Thanksgiving memories here when she held the main event (that was before the year of too many martinis and the underdone turkey, but I digress).
My husband and I had not lived here long and I had never before invited my in-laws to dinner. I should have learned from my mother’s quest for perfection. I will admit I made certain to have Gravy Master on hand, but that was not my dilemma. After preparing all the side dishes in advance, one child called the night before Thanksgiving to announce her fiancé was a vegan. There was butter in all the sides. A no-no for true vegan.
At first I was horrified, but then decided to roll with it. I was rather pleased with my solution; a fruit platter from Pavilion. I thought I had avoided the inevitable first meal with the in-laws disaster. I should not have felt so smug.
Rather, in the middle of the meal, my father-in-law calmly turned to me and whispered, “I believe the credenza is on fire.”
It turns out the wick from one of the candles on the sideboard had dropped off the candle and caught the varnish on the wood on fire. I barely stopped one son from throwing his wine on the fire, but we were able to extinguish the small flame nevertheless.
My in-laws have never come to another meal here. Perhaps it is because we live the Wildland Urban Interface’s high fire hazard area. Perhaps I should have served black olives and puce gravy. At least I would have had a better time.
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