Paper Palate

I love Thanksgiving, I truly do. A gathering of friends and family celebrating food and togetherness and the year’s blessings; what’s not to enjoy. But if I get one more food magazine with a glossy bird on the cover, I’m going to roast Ruth Reichl on a magazine rack for this year’s holiday feast. Saveur, Gourmet, Fine Cooking, Bon Appetit — every single one has a shiny brown turkey on the front cover of the November issue.

There is only so much you can do to a roast turkey. You can brine it, you can rub flavorful things under the skin and stuff them into the cavity, and you can baste it with various liquidy concoctions. That’s about it. Then the side dishes — don’t we have enough recipes for stuffing (no raisins, PLEASE!), cranberry glop, and pumpkin pie (always better when purchased at the local gourmet food store). No one needs an entire month of food journalism each year devoted to these simple recipes and their subsequent leftovers (turkey sandwiches with sharp cheese and honey mustard, obviously).

Perhaps I could get behind the concept of such single-minded food journalism if it were devoted to a particularly intriguing and complex delight like the oyster, or if only a few select magazines each year were permitted to run Thanksgiving recipes in their November issues. It could be determined by lottery the previous year, or a committee could be established to make the decision. It would be like the Olympics. Magazines would put in bids and only the most worthy (i.e. those promising to feature oyster or otherwise raisin-less stuffing) would be chosen by the ITC to adorn the covers of their November issues with festive fowls.

People, let’s band together. Let’s write to the editors. Let’s stamp out the Thanksgiving magazine menace before it creeps back to September. I’m doing what I can (last year we ate short ribs for Thanksgiving dinner), what are you doing? Our voices need to be heard before the Christmas cookie barrage begins, if we want to make any kind of a difference!