Thanksgiving, Belgian Style.

Tomorrow, Emma, Talia and I are cooking a Thanksgiving meal for our host families. Kind of. See, there are a few... unforeseen challenges we've been presented with. Like the fact that you can't get a turkey in Belgium at this time of year. So we're making chicken. Okay, fine. But we're not making one chicken, we're making two. Why? Because my host dad couldn't find a 6 kilo chicken, he bought two 3 kilo chickens. Okay, that works. But do you make a chicken the same way you do a turkey? Will there be enough space in the oven for said chickens? What's the appropriate amount of time for baking a chicken? I called my grandmother and asked her for her turkey recipe. So I need to go out and buy 8 pounds of butter (oh wait, they don't use pounds here...) and a few spices and some mushrooms, an onion, raisins and some celery. Except I forgot the word for celery. So I didn't write it on the list. I came home and looked it up later, and what is it? Céleri. Of course.

We also want to make pumpkin pie. Dandy. Except Anne-Michèle couldn't find pumpkin purée. So I have a legit pumpkin waiting for me downstairs. It requires cutting, gutting, baking, peeling, mashing, purée-ing, and then it will finally be ready to be made into pie. But do we have all of the spices? I put ginger on the list as well. Anne-Michèle bought a ginger root. That's great, I can use it, but what's the appropriate substitution for real ginger and ground ginger? Oh, and I need apples for apple pie too. Okay, we can handle this.

I need bread for stuffing. I have these cute little baguettes that I need to bake, let cool, slice, then bake again to dry them out. They won't make enough bread crumbs I'm sure, so we need to go out and buy more.

Did you know that in Belgium (and, I'm assuming, most of Europe) they don't use cups, teaspoons, tablespoons, or any other measurement like that? They use grams for EVERYTHING. EVERYTHING EVERYTHING EVERYTHING. This includes liquids. So I need to find 10 grams of vanilla extract. Okay. I don't even want to think about how many grams of butter I need. Or grams of sugar. By the way, do we have enough butter, sugar, and flour for all of this? I sure hope so.

I forgot peas. Crap. It's okay, we'll just live without.

Our menu:

Chicken

Green Bean Casserole

Cranberry Sauce

Salad

Pumpkin Pie

Apple Pie

Mashed Potatoes (oh no no no.... did we remember to buy potatoes!?)

Crescent Rolls

Well, time to get crackin' on that pumpkin. Wish me luck.

Mikayla