Thanks and Giving

Well, it's my favorite week of the year, and I don't even know where to begin.

Thanksgiving has always been my very favorite holiday - even when I was just a young girl. It's probably one of the few holidays we can all agree on. What one of us doesn't have a whole list of things to be grateful for?

About a year and a half ago, I began keeping a "gratitude journal". Each week, during the passing of the Sacrament (communion for non-LDS), I write one entire page of something I am thankful for, then I elaborate a bit on it. Through the past few months, I have listed many, many things - some of which may seem a bit inconsequential - but I am grateful for them, nonetheless. These would include:
My family
My home
Mr. Kerry!
My health
The change of seasons
Modern medicine and doctors
My parents
My extended family
Good, trustworthy cars
Safe food and water
Modern conveniences - electric, heat, stoves, running water, etc.
Windshields and windshield wipers
Air conditioning
Holidays
Friends
A good bed
The Weather Channel
Prayer
Church
The Post Office
Clothing I didn't have to make
Nature
My five senses
Tears
Rain
My teeth
Laughter
History
Peace
Technology
Talents - both mine and others
Sunglasses
Brakes
Trials and afflictions
My country
Growing older
The temple
The Savior

I think you get the idea. If I were to write in this little book every single day of my life and fill volumes more, I would still never run out of things to be thankful for. Shame on me if I refuse to recognize all that I have been blessed with.

I had the last of a series of injections into my back this week, following two days of pretty intense pain. I will probably find out tomorrow if surgery is in the near future.

Now for a wonderful week. Mr. Kerry is off all of this week, and I am grateful for that. The Post Office has been very good to us through the years. We have a couple of things we have to get done - first and foremost is a stove. Mine has now bit the dust. I've been cooking on one little tiny burner. But, I'm grateful I have crockpots, an electric skillet, a George Foreman grill, a gas grill, Dutch ovens, a backyard to build a fire in if I have to, a toaster, a breadmaker, etc. I think you get the idea...

Try to take a few moments this week to reflect on your own blessings. Even in the middle of hard times, you will find exactly what you're looking for...

AND, a big congratulations to my nephew, David Lauritzen, who passed the third audition for the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and will be singing with them by April General Conference! So, so happy for you, and so, so proud of you, David! And, I'll bet your parents are pleased, too! We loved always watching for your mom in the choir - we'll look for you now...

Love to y'all
Miss P

http://www.cpmsglife2.org/MSG/Pres/td/td1.html


“My brothers and sisters, we have built temples throughout the world and will continue to do so. To you who are worthy and able to attend the temple, I would admonish you to go often. The temple is a place where we can find peace. There we receive a renewed dedication to the gospel and a strengthened resolve to keep the commandments.”
Thomas S. Monson, “Until We Meet Again,” Ensign, May 2009, 113



- Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, or What the Pilgrims Really Ate at
Thanksgiving

Millions of American families will sit down to dine together in this
month's annual Thanksgiving Day celebration. Menus will vary a bit but
most will feature turkey along with stuffing, gravy, squash,
cranberries, and other vegetables. Pumpkin pie has always been popular
with my family as well. Did you ever wonder what the Pilgrims and their
Wampanoag Indian guests ate during their first Thanksgiving in 1621?

Unfortunately, we cannot be certain. The Pilgrims did not print menus
for their guests. After all, none of their Indian guests could read, nor
could very many of the Pilgrims themselves. Most were illiterate.
Luckily, several colonists who were literate wrote personal accounts of
the 1621 feast in Plymouth, Massachusetts, and those accounts have
survived. These accounts give a few hints as to the menu.


While 103 people landed at Plymouth Rock on December 11, 1620, about
half of them died during the first winter. Those who survived managed to
plant crops the following spring and reaped a good harvest during the
summer and fall. The first Thanksgiving at Plimoth Colony was held to
celebrate that harvest.

William Bradford wrote,

“They began now to gather in the small harvest they had, and to fit
up their houses and dwellings against winter, being all well recovered
in health and strength and had all things in good plenty. For as some
were thus employed in affairs abroad, others were exercised in fishing,
about cod and bass and other fish, of which they took good store, of
which every family had their portion. All the summer there was no want;
and now began to come in store of fowl, as winter approached, of which
this place did abound when they came first (but afterward decreased by
degrees). And besides waterfowl there was great store of wild turkeys,
of which they took many, besides venison, etc. Besides, they had about a
peck a meal a week to a person, or now since harvest, Indian corn to the
proportion. Which made many afterwards write so largely of their plenty
here to their friends in England, which were not feigned but true
reports."

Edward Winslow wrote,

“Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling,
that so we might after a special manner rejoice together after we had
gathered the fruits of our labor. They four in one day killed as much
fowl as, with a little help beside, served the company almost a week. At
which time, amongst other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of
the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest king
Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and
feasted, and they went out and killed five deer, which we brought to the
plantation and bestowed on our governor, and upon the captain and
others. And although it be not always so plentiful as it was at this
time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want that
we often wish you partakers of our plenty."

The Thanksgiving feast lasted three whole days, providing enough food
for 53 pilgrims and 90 Indians. While we do not know the exact menu,
historians have studied the food supply of the time and have been able
to guess the items that likely appeared on the menu those three days.

The Pilgrims and the Indians obviously dined on venison. Winslow wrote,
"They went out and killed five deer, which we brought to the
plantation." Turkey also was on the menu. As Winslow stated, "They four
in one day killed as much fowl as, with a little help beside, served the
company almost a week." The word "fowl" probably included turkeys
although there may have been ducks, geese, swans, and other birds as
well.

The turkeys probably were a bit skinnier than today's Butterball
turkeys, and probably had a stronger flavor as well. I live about 70
miles from Plymouth and can tell you that today's descendants of the
wild turkeys that escaped the Pilgrims certainly look big and fat. They
are also plentiful in this area. We can guess that the same was true in
1621.

The turkeys and most other meat dishes undoubtedly were roasted on a
spit over an open fire. Someone must have been assigned to turn the spit
frequently to make sure the food was not burnt on one side. Gravy was
unknown.

The other foods at the table probably included fish, clams, berries,
apples, dried fruit, pumpkin, squash, turnips, peas, onions, beans and
other vegetables.

Some accounts state that lobster was on the menu, although I have my
doubts. It seems unlikely when so many other items were already on the
menu. In 1621, lobster was considered to be a "trash fish" and typically
was eaten only by the poor, the starving, or by indentured servants.
This makes it unlikely that lobster would be served at a feast
celebrating a plentiful harvest.

Indeed, lobsters were used as fertilizer to help grow corn; the Pilgrims
and the Indians would plant a few corn seeds and then throw a lobster
into the ground beside the seeds before covering all of that with soil.
What a change we have nearly 400 years later! Lobster is now a major
export of the Plymouth area with prices that are far too high for the
poorer citizens of today.

Pumpkin pie wasn't on the menu in 1621 because there were no ovens for
baking, but the pilgrims probably did eat boiled pumpkin. Due to the
diminishing supply of flour, there was no bread of any kind.

Cranberries existed as wild plants in the Plymouth area at the time, and
it is possible that the Pilgrims were aware of the food value of these
plants. However, cranberries were largely ignored until American
Revolutionary War veteran Henry Hall became the first to farm
cranberries in the nearby Cape Cod town of Dennis around 1816. Aside
from their food value, the Pilgrims would have been eating unsweetened
cranberries, a less than tasty sensation without benefit of sugar.

Salt was readily available in Plimoth Colony with the ocean being only a
few yards away. Pepper was commonly used in England but probably not
available in Plimoth Colony at the time.

Some sugar was transported on the Mayflower but probably had been
consumed before the feast of 1621. Sugar could have been made from maple
syrup but it is doubtful that the Pilgrims learned these skills the
first year. Maple sap has to be collected early in the spring when there
is still snow on the ground. In the spring of 1621, the Pilgrims were
too weak from disease and starvation to organize efforts to tap maple
trees and collect the sap.

The list of beverages served at the three-day feast was not recorded.
The Pilgrims had no tea or coffee, as those imported items were missing
due to a lack of trade routes at the time.

Beer undoubtedly was served. As the Pilgrims set out for America the
previous year, they brought a considerable amount of this beverage with
them for the voyage (reportedly more than 28,617 liters = 7,560
gallons). An entry in the diary of a Mayflower passenger explains the
unplanned landing at Plymouth Rock: "We could not now take time for
further search...our victuals being much spent, especially our beer..."

Once settled, the Pilgrims undoubtedly followed the English customs of
the time with most families brewing beer in large quantities. They
served it at virtually all functions, including ordinations, funerals,
and regular Sabbath meals.

Plenty of clear water was available in the New World but the Pilgrims
were largely ignorant of the need for sanitation. As a result, it is
believed that many of the wells in Plimoth Colony were polluted.
Admittedly, this is all conjecture, since no one today knows for sure.

Serving meals in the seventeenth century was very different from serving
today. People weren't served their meals individually. Foods were placed
on the table and then people took the food from the table and ate it. In
fact, this "family style" of dining was similar to what most families do
today.

Pilgrims didn't eat in courses as we do today. All of the different
types of foods were placed on the table at the same time, and people ate
in any order they chose. Meat dishes, puddings, and sweets were all
served at the same time. Desserts were eaten at the same time as the
meats and other dishes.

Canning and freezing had not yet been invented. With no method of
preserving food, other than salting food for preservation, the Pilgrims
ate whatever was fresh. It is unlikely that they ate corn, other than
perhaps dried corn. The corn crop had come and gone before the autumn
feast. Late season vegetables, such as turnips, onions, pumpkin and
squash, certainly would have been available. However, the meal was
probably mostly meat, fish, and fowl, with few vegetables.

We can also imagine the table manners of those who dined. The Pilgrims
did not use silverware nicely arranged on linen napkins. Napkins were in
use although they were usually simple pieces of cloth, often rags. The
Pilgrims wiped their hands on the cloth napkins, which they also used to
pick up hot morsels of food. Linen was unknown. We can imagine that the
Indian guests probably wiped their hands and mouths on whatever was
available, such as on the back of the hand or on clothing.

The Pilgrims also did not use forks at the table. As Englishmen and
Englishwomen, they had no knowledge of forks. The fork was first
described in English by Thomas Coryat in a volume of writings about his
Italian travels only ten years earlier (1611). Very few English people
had even heard of a fork by 1621. For many years the fork was viewed as
an unmanly Italian affectation and was never seen in English homes. Some
writers of the Roman Catholic Church expressly disapproved of its use:
"God in his wisdom has provided man with natural forks — his fingers.
Therefore it is an insult to Him to substitute artificial metallic forks
for them when eating."

While the Pilgrims were not Catholics, we can assume they used the same
eating customs as most everyone else in England at the time: they
scooped up meat, fish, and boiled peas alike with their fingers. It was
not until the 18th century that the fork became commonly used in Great
Britain, with the United States following soon after.

Knives were used at the table but were not the same knives that we think
of as silverware. The knives of 1621 were multi-purpose tools: any one
knife might be used to cut a tree limb, to dissect a deer, or to cut
meat at the table.
In short, the Pilgrims had a great meal by their standards. They and
their Indian guests ate well for three days. That must have been a great
joy for the 53 hardy souls who had watched half of their group die of
malnourishment and disease only a few months earlier.

Their table manners didn't match today's standards, but they undoubtedly
didn't mind. Their diet was high in protein, especially red meats. They
undoubtedly had high cholesterol meals, especially in the months when
fresh fruits and vegetables were not available. However, their diet
probably met the needs of these people who led rugged, outdoor
lifestyles. They had little fear of heart attacks; the more common cause
of death was malnutrition and disease.

The Pilgrims of 1621 undoubtedly were delighted with their feast but I
don't think I would want to join them.