A New Approach to Thanksgiving

I love Thanksgiving. I love everything about it. The food, family, football (off brand, I know), the parade (obvi), the sense of occasion. For years, my Thanksgiving would begin weeks in advance with menu and meal prep. I would make and freeze doughs and fillings, I would buy new pieces of serving ware and linens, and I would meticulously go over my timeline leading up to the meal so that everything was perfect.

Then we bought a cheese shop.

Now that doesn’t mean I love the holiday less, oh no, I love it more. But now I spend the days leading up preparing even more food for even more people, and it’s absolutely exhilarating. Joe and I wake up around 5 am to get to the shop where I make the cheese boards. I am in charge of the making, and Joe is in charge of the zhuzhing and wrapping. Then we stir up a giant amount of Autumn Sangria and serve complimentary glasses all day long to all of you, my favorite customers. The whole day feels like home. It feels like a day of accepting of one another’s kindness and love of good things. It feels, as I’ve said before, like it’s where we are all meant to be. It’s just the best day.

On Thanksgiving Day, I still wake up and iron linens while I watch the parade and set a beautiful table, but that’s about it. My old must-be-perfect-Martha-traditions are gone - gone, I tell you! Last year, for the first time in a while, we bought the meal elsewhere, reheated it, and put it out. I mean, I added garnish, because I’m still gay, and then we ate. That’s all there was to it!

I didn’t even dress up - something I wouldn’t dream of in the past. I told my friend Fiona, our perennial Thanksgiving guest, to wear comfy clothes, and that there was no pressure that day - and when I took that to heart myself, I never had a better holiday. It was easy. It was full of good food, family, and friends. No stress, and I mean it.

This year, I invite you to try relaxing a bit. Yes, I would love for you to buy our Thanksgiving Collection (which only involves cooking the turkey - you know, so your house smells good), but even if you don’t, I still think you should wear your comfy clothes, and try to cook almost nothing. In the end, entertaining is about how you make people feel, and really nothing much else. Give the people food and drink, sure, but really, what they truly want you to give them, is yourself.

xoxo,
Scott