Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Thanksgiving Recipes: The Unwavering and the Unforgivable

Every Thanksgiving my mom makes a lime green Jell-O mold. She insists that the only reason she keeps making it is because she failed to bring it one year and then my brother was disappointed and wondered where it was. My brother swears he's never asked about it, but knowing him he probably said something like, "The only reason I came to Thanksgiving dinner was for lime-green Jell-O and now that it's not here I may as well go to Denny's." That probably sent my mom into a guilt-wracked tailspin after which she vowed to make that lime-green Jell-O mold until the end of her days.

I don't mind it, though, because it really has become something of a tradition and to be perfectly honest, if I didn't see that fluorescent green ring sitting next to the turkey I might actually miss it. It's almost kind of majestic in its lime-green absurdness. And besides, it makes my mom happy to bring it and what kind of tyrant would deny an 89-year-old woman the joy of setting her jiggly gelatin creation down amidst the Thanksgiving splendor?

However, if she ever showed up with one of these I'd grab her walker, turn it around and send her out into traffic:


What is this? It's a Thanksgiving Turkey Cake. What you see are layers of ground turkey, stuffing, cranberries and sweet potatoes all held together by mashed potato 'icing' and finished off with a marshmallow topping. Think of it as the chalupa of Thanksgiving meals. Not to be mean to the hardworking chef who created this, but I think everytime one of these is made a turkey loses its wings.

But oh, how it makes me appreciate the lime-green Jell-O mold.

If for some reason you feel compelled to try it on your own, the recipe is here.

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5 comments:

  1. That Thanksgiving day turkey cake makes me think of a turducken. I realize that as a vegetarian I'm a bit biased, but really...when you're stuffing a bird in another bird all in yet another bird, it seems kind of like you're doing it just to say you've done it! LOL

    I do give the creator of the turkey cake credit...the picture is lovely and it reminded me of, and made me very hungry for, carrot cake.

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  2. I love a jell-o mold! My mom usually couldn't master the actual removal of the jell-o from the mold so we always just served the jell-o out of the mold pan. So when I see one on a plate in all it's glory, I get a little tingly.

    Do you also have the green bean/cream of mushroom/Durkee onion casserole? Yummmm....

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  3. Haha, which brother is to blame?!!

    At first I thought OMG, I love cream cheese frosting on a carrot cake but that is an insane amount! Instead it's creative leftovers! An updated shepherd's pie?

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  4. No jello molds for us, but my Dad (midwestern soul that he was) loved the green bean/cream of mushroom soup/fried onion topping cassarole, so we had that a lot of the time.

    Why does the jello have to be green?

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  5. I'll take the lime-green jello over what my MIL insists on bringing every year: a fruitcake (YES A FRUITCAKE! NOW YOU KNOW WHO'S BUYING THEM!) that costs her around $60 from some fancy schmancy place. Nobody eats it and then she sits around and pouts all day.

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