[lit-ideas] Re: Physics, Philosophy, Turkey, Urban Myth

From: JimKandJulieB@xxxxxxx
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Wed, 23 Nov 2005 01:18:39 EST
<So much of a shibboleth  has  
this become that I am beset on all sides when I try to ask for  a  
piece that is fresh from the oven and hot.>> 
I have a different  problem/approach.  When I call people to the table it is 
inevitabely at  least 20 minutes of coaxing and herding and gathering before 
everyone is  seated.  By the the turkey is tepid at best.  And then of course 
I'm  running back and forth to the kitchen and by the time I'm able to actually 
eat,  the turkey tastes like it had been in the frig for a fairly good while. 
 I  counter this to the best of my ability by calling everyone 20 minutes 
before the  turkey (and roasts) are ready, leaving them in the oven (turned 
off, 
but w/  residual heat) until the last moment.  That way at least my first bite 
is  sort of warm. 
Now, it will be a stretch to relate  this to philosophy or literature, but 
since we're talking sardines, pizza,  turkey, I just absolutely have to share 
something so weird-sounding but so  delicious and wonderful that it would be 
wrong to keep it to myself.  (Btw,  does anyone else have an absolute passion 
for 
guava paste?  It's wonderful  w/ cream cheese on a cracker, but I keep 
looking for other ways to use  it.) 
Julie Krueger 
suddenly hungry 
_http://splendidtable.publicradio.org/recipes/sundaysuppers/nov_turkey.html_ 
(http://splendidtable.publicradio.org/recipes/sundaysuppers/nov_turkey.html)  
<<The Ultimate Turkey Sandwich
from _Lynne's  Sunday Suppers_ 
(http://splendidtable.publicradio.org/recipes/sundaysuppers/index.html) , 
November 2000  
Makes 1 Sandwich and multiplies easily 
Cranberry sauce and cream cheese could change your life. Or at least your  
sandwiches. They made this one of the best turkey sandwiches I've ever had. I  
discovered it at a little general store restaurant in Story, Wyoming, a village 
 at the base of the Big Horn Mountains. It's now our Thanksgiving Sunday  
tradition. 
2 slices good tasting, firm white bread
2 to 3 tablespoons cream cheese  (not low fat), at room temperature

1 whole scallion, thin sliced (optional)

2 to 3 tablespoons cranberry sauce (whatever you have in the house is  fine)

A generous amount of thin-sliced turkey (light or dark meat is your  call)

Dark, grainy mustard (we use Gulden's)

1 leaf of lettuce

Mayonnaise 
Spread 1 slice of bread with the cream cheese. Sprinkle with scallions, then  
spread with the cranberry sauce. Top with turkey. Spread a generous film of  
mustard over the turkey. Top with the lettuce. Then spread a thin film of  
mayonnaise over the second slice of bread. Put the sandwich together. Cut in  
half or quarters, and enjoy.>> 


========Original Message========     Subj: [lit-ideas] Re: Physics, 
Philosophy, Turkey, Urban Myth  Date: 11/22/05 11:53:34 PM Central Standard 
Time  From: 
_ritchierd@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx (mailto:ritchierd@xxxxxxxxxxxxx)   To: 
_lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx (mailto:lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx)   Sent on:    

Some people on this list cook; others pride  themselves on their  
sardines and vegan pizzas.  None need be  excluded from the debate  
that follows.  Here is the issue.   Those of us who eat meat on  
Thanksgiving will put a turkey in the oven  and, one way or another-- 
here factionism enters in--cook it.  I am not  concerned here with  
whether you cover the thing with aluminum foil,  start with breasts  
down, stick the corpse on a beer can, douse the  beast in brine.   
These are the schisms of kitchen  belief.

What bothers me is an American appetite for cold food.  I  have come  
to live with the potluck supper, an euphemism for "let's  eat  
everything cold."  And  I know that Thanksgiving is  supposed to be a  
Puritan festival--and how better to feel Puritan than  by eating food  
that ought to be hot, cold?--but I have reached my  limit of patience  
with daft advice in the newspaper.  Today's  Oregonian has a  
Thanksgiving Turkey expert explaining, "You don't take  [the turkey  
from the oven] to the table.  You *hide* it.  I  hide it in the  
garage.  Now you put the side dishes in the  oven.  Then I call  
everyone to the table for the first  course.  All you're doing is  
buying time while the turkey  rests--half an hour or 45 minutes, if  
you play it right."

Our  garage temperature is currently about thirty two degrees (normal   
scale, not foreign).  Forty five minutes in this temperature  would  
give you what?  Near-frozen turkey.

Americans will  tell you that a roast beast continues to cook after  
you take it out of  the oven and thus, like a clockwork toy that needs  
time to unwind, you  must let it "rest."  So much of a shibboleth has  
this become that  I am beset on all sides when I try to ask for a  
piece that is fresh  from the oven and hot.

My questions to you are: where did this notion of  a well-rested dead  
beast come from?  What does it mean concerning  the American Way of  
Death?  Why don't some like it  hot?

David Ritchie
Portland,  Oregon

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[lit-ideas] Re: Physics, Philosophy, Turkey, Urban Myth

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