Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Interested in people’s thoughts—What unusual thing must always be will be at your Thanksgiving table?
For me it’s a relish tray with black olives right out of can and celery stuffed (must be 1/2 of celery stalks with peanut butter and 1/2 with soft cheese). The cheese can vary —- pimento, pub cheese or other. My mom always did this for every Thanksgiving, Easter, and Christmas. That made it a “special” thing.
A family friend had to have gravy topped with sliced hard boiled eggs.
What is yours?
Olives/relish tray / stuffed celery is not that strange. I think all the moms / grandmas read about it in the same 50s magazine and it became fancy.
“Relish trays” are one thing (hate that term), but I have never seen peanut butter or “stuffed” celery on one of them. Plain celery? Yes. A dip in the middle of the tray? Sure. But peanut butter celery is…not part of a relish tray.
I'm sure if you haven't personally seen stuffed celery as a Thanksgiving appetizer (I also hate the term relish tray--we didn't call it that) then nobody eats it. At all.
https://www.boston.com/food/food/2014/11/24/celery-and-olives-dominated-thanksgiving-for-nearly-100-yearsuntil-they-didnt/
I mean, thanks for an article about old-ass food trends that no one uses?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:In my family, we all hate cranberry sauce but along the way we just all absorbed that it’s “supposed” to be there for thanksgiving, so it evolved into a tradition where we find the fanciest possible crystal dish, preferably on some kind of pedestal and plop an unopened can of cranberry sauce on top.
I love this tradition. Just imagining the dishes of varying heights vying for the fancy title.
It’s fun and we’ve had some interesting discussions about the exact definition of fancy.

Anonymous wrote:Jello!
Anonymous wrote:I don’t know if it’s unusual but for a few years now I’ve wanted to add some kind of pickled item and have never gotten to it. I’m not sure what the pickled item would be, but it would be nice to add some acidic brightness to the rich meal. The cranberry sauce does that, but it is sweet.
Anonymous wrote:We are French, and didn't have a Thanksgiving tradition until we came here. We discovered that cranberries are delicious, so usually have it as a sauce with whatever duck or goose or capon (turkey is too dry). Except today: I made cranberry curd tart. Miam!
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:In my family, we all hate cranberry sauce but along the way we just all absorbed that it’s “supposed” to be there for thanksgiving, so it evolved into a tradition where we find the fanciest possible crystal dish, preferably on some kind of pedestal and plop an unopened can of cranberry sauce on top.
I love this tradition. Just imagining the dishes of varying heights vying for the fancy title.
Anonymous wrote:We always had deviled eggs as an appetizer. My husband is not a fan, so we do shrimp cocktail now.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Interested in people’s thoughts—What unusual thing must always be will be at your Thanksgiving table?
For me it’s a relish tray with black olives right out of can and celery stuffed (must be 1/2 of celery stalks with peanut butter and 1/2 with soft cheese). The cheese can vary —- pimento, pub cheese or other. My mom always did this for every Thanksgiving, Easter, and Christmas. That made it a “special” thing.
A family friend had to have gravy topped with sliced hard boiled eggs.
What is yours?
Olives/relish tray / stuffed celery is not that strange. I think all the moms / grandmas read about it in the same 50s magazine and it became fancy.
“Relish trays” are one thing (hate that term), but I have never seen peanut butter or “stuffed” celery on one of them. Plain celery? Yes. A dip in the middle of the tray? Sure. But peanut butter celery is…not part of a relish tray.
Not OP, but I grew up with stuffed celery on our relish tray too. Some with peanut butter, some with cream cheese.
Anonymous wrote:Celery stuffed with cream cheese and olives