It’s another time of the year again for all the Americans throughout the world to celebrate the Thanksgiving day today. I am wishing everybody a very Happy and wonderful celebration. May it maybe simple or lavish or fancy or whatever you and your family celebrated.
As for my family we will celebrate Thanksgiving the way the family of Bob were celebrating. I first celebrate with them 21 years ago. It was really an eye opener for me. As you know I came from a big family here in the Philippines and when they celebrate there it just Bob, me, Chris and his parents and his brother and his family. It was really intimate. I did enjoy it. It was the first time for Bob’s family to have rice included in the menu for thanksgiving or any occasion afterwards.
Happy Thanksgiving
I did really study the way Bob’s family put the whole feast together. Me and Bob wanted to follow the tradition of his family so that we can pass it along to our children. As you know we moved from the States over 12 years ago. Our youngest son Jared was just barely 1 months old. Since he never saw the way we celebrated in the States, Bob and I made sure that he knows about a lot of the holidays in the States and how they are celebrated. Since the time he remembered, we did celebrate the Thanksgiving the way his grandmother in the States did. During our first year here we bought a live turkey from our neighbor. They found out from Jun my brother-in-law that we wanted a turkey, so they offered their turkey. I can’t remember how much we paid for the 2 turkey. I had Jun roast (lechon style) the turkey outside in our yard. When it was done, when tasted it was not the same as the Butterball or the Norbest turkey like in the States. It was tough. But it’s okay, we couldn’t get brand of turkey that we want. The other food that were prepared were good anyway.
After 2 years of living in GenSan, we then moved to Davao. A few years of celebrating Thanksgiving here in Davao we usually bought our pumpkin pie from the restaurant here. It cost a lot. I still bought yams in a can from the grocery store here. Even the croutons were still from the grocery stores.
The imported items before were not as wide of a varieties as now. Luckily overtime Gaisano Mall here in Davao stocked up more and more imported items over the years. Few items they had were yams in the can, white marshmallows, crouton’s and other Thanksgiving stuff. So I bought a few cans and it was good. At that time I didn’t make any pumpkin pie, I just bought different desserts then. Made mashed potato, Bob made the gravy. I am not into cooking at that time yet.
Until one Christmas Bob bought me a stove with built-in oven in it. I guess he is hinting for me to start cooking. 
. LOL. So I started to be the cook then. Lots of trial and error. Thank God for the internet, surfing the net was my safety blanket then. Ha ha ha. Really I am searching the net for the new recipes and substitution for the ingredients that I can’t find here. Still this day we still have more ingredients that so hard to find here. Bob really was the one encourages me to try to make the pumpkin pie out from the squash. I was so happy that he really showed confidence in me on everything I do especially the cooking. I don’t like cooking before. He really gave me the boost to do it. Now, I am so confident on how to cook and make something even using the substitute ingredients. I make everything now from scratched, from the stuffing’s I made my own sausage and croutons. Yams from the local sweet potato here in the Philippines. Pumpkin pie from the local squash from here.
Since we don’t have the off day of the kids on Thursday (the day of Thanksgiving, it’s not a holiday here), for a long time now we do our Thanksgiving on the Saturday, it’s just 2 days after the Thanksgiving day anyway. So Thanksgiving Day for us will be on Saturday the 24th. Which means a busy week for me and my niece Glenda preparing our food for Saturday Thanksgiving Day. New recipes to be added on our menu for Thanksgiving this year it will be a pumpkin shake. It will be replacing the eggnog. Bob and the kids like the pumpkin shakes better than the eggnog. So pumpkin shake it is.
I hope you guys have a good Thanksgiving Day with your family. Happy Eating.
Happy Turkey Day!!!