After years of spending hours in the kitchen with my family preparing the turkey and all the sides found at Thanksgiving tables across the country, we got tired of the same thing. All the Thanksgiving Thursdays spent with cousins and grandparents were great but a thing of the past. Cousins grew up, the family moved farther away, and Thanksgiving became a holiday for our immediate family. If you are to know anything about the Mecke family, you should know that we never take things too seriously. We like to have fun and try new things! That’s when we decided to have a new Thanksgiving tradition. My older sister Kate, a foodie and a Spoon Alum, sent a text in our family groupchat: “What if we did fajitas for Thanksgiving?” After a moment's pause, my dad responded, “Yeah! I really like that idea! Let's change it up this year!” Our new family tradition was born.
A Tradition Is Born
Starting in 2019, the menu was make your own fajitas. Each of us brought unique fillings to the table so that each family member could try their own unique mix. Back then, I was, admittedly, a picky eater. What this meant was that my fajitas were not nearly as decadent as the rest of my family’s. My sister, however, had the best ones. After talking with Kate so I could remember what her experience was with the fajitas, she recalled that her fajitas had chicken, pickled red onions, cotija cheese, shredded lettuce, grilled vegetables, and some cilantro lime rice. If I could have this Thanksgiving dinner again, I would imagine my fajitas would look similar to Kate’s.
In 2020 the first Thanksgiving of COVID-19, each family member made their own dish to bring to the table. We all ranked our favorites to crown a winner. The dishes (top to bottom in the photos below) included pesto garlic monkey bread, calamari, toasted baguette slices topped with labneh, steak, and roasted red peppers, southwest shredded chicken and corn mini wraps, buffalo chicken sliders, and truffle parmesan fries. As the winner of this inter-family competition, I am happy to share my truffle-parm french fry recipe in another article!
In 2021, our meal consisted of hand-made dumplings and hand-rolled sushi (with the help of a sushi-making kit.) We followed a recipe that had previously worked out for us for the dumplings. One change we made this time was how we cooked them. As a family obsessed with our air fryer, we decided to air fry the dumplings rather than bake or pan-fry them. What we thought would be lightly crispy dumplings turned out to be pretty dry and tough to eat. Aside from those, our sushi was great. I rotated between using the sushi maker and hand-rolling it myself. I found that when I rolled it myself, I could control the size, whereas the sushi maker was an awkwardly large size.
Switching It Up
With my sister traveling for work this year, it was just my parents and me. With less of a group to eat and the business of the holiday season, we decided to continue with the tradition but venture out of our home for our meal.
A family favorite has always been takeout from Singh's Cafe in Wellesley, MA, so we went with that! Our dinner started off with vegetable samosas, followed by vegetable spring rolls. Dinner was chicken tikka masala, chicken curry, and tandoori tikka dal. We paired these delicious dishes with white rice, naan, and garlic naan. Despite the lack of effort, it took for our Thanksgiving dinner this year, I have to say that having Singh’s Cafe has been the best dinner choice yet!
If you are starting to get sick of the same old Thanksgiving dinner, start a new tradition with your family and change what a ‘normal’ Thanksgiving Thursday looks like. Whether you change up the whole menu or add some spunky sides to the usual, it will make Thanksgiving a whole new holiday experience!