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Food

My Childhood Thanksgivings Were Spent with 60 Expatriates

I grew up in Minneapolis in an Argentine family. Thanksgiving was the one day that we ate the same things as most people in Minnesota did with a bunch of Argentinian and Italian ex-pats.

Thanksgiving was my initiation into American culture. It was the one day of the year where we ate the same things as most people in Minnesota did. The way that we generally ate was so different than everybody else around us.

RECIPE: Korean Sweet Potatoes with Maple-Sage Brown Butter and Marshmallows

I grew up in Minneapolis in an Argentine family. It was always really cold out on that day—super cold. We were always invited to the same math professor's house for Thanksgiving. He always invited ex-patriots from different countries but mostly Italians and Argentines. We were always late to the dinner, which was awful because we'd have to park really far away due to all the cars gathering at the house. In the bitter cold, the walk felt like forever. You'd think that all the Italians and Argentines would turn it into a global dining experience, but for the most part, everyone tried to bring traditional Thanksgiving dishes as they understood them. The result was a Midwestern pot luck of oddballs interpreting a classic American holiday. One memorable dish was from my mom's friend Marisa (also Argentine), who would make cannelloni with bechamel and corn. The cannelloni in Argentina are Milan style–made of crepes instead of pasta. Her canelones de humita, (creamed corn) were the most bubbly golden hot dish I have ever had on Thanksgiving. I can still smell the scent of nutmeg wafting through the house when I think about that particular dish.

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We went to that party every year until I was around the age of nine. I got to drink grape soda, sit at the kids table, and eat an insane amount of desserts. I loved it. There was always a massive dessert table. I think I tried every single one of them each year.

We'd spend the entire drive home talking about how dry the bird was. It was actually part of the tradition to disparage the turkey and the cranberry sauce which was extruded from the can and sliced.

Visually, the dish that made the biggest impact (which we also though was weird and hilarious) was yams with puffed golden marshmallows baked over the top. I never knew if it was dessert or not so I never tried it. Imagine 50 dishes and another 20 desserts. I just couldn't go there without knowing if it was sweet or savory.

The next day, my mom would grill turkey thighs and basically recreate the whole meal, but with a little snobbery added into it. Over time, we started our own traditions and stopped going to that big party, but I still have great memories of it.

Years later, when I worked at the Tasting Room, I used to buy these amazing Japanese sweet potatoes from the farmers market and I'd put marshmallows on them and serve them with pork loin in November. It was just me and Paul Carmichael working together in the basement. I called them "trick or treat" potatoes and they were/are really good. It just goes to show you how you can elevate anything just a little with careful shopping and a little nostalgia, which is definitely in order at Thanksgiving.

These days, though, I don't really want to cook on Thanksgiving. I usually go to one of my sister's houses. I like to cook in my restaurant when I have access all the ingredients that I could ever want. However, I won a big green egg this summer, so I think we'll be cooking the turkey in there this year. It's like a giant Dutch oven that can smoke. I'm scared of the egg; it weighs a lot. We're going to roast the turkey because just smoking makes for rubbery skin. I think everyone should be able to eat crispy skin on the bird on that day. The Big Green Egg apparently holds even heat really well, for a really long time, so we'll probably let rip it in there, and then hit it with a little smoke at the end.

Hopefully no one will talk about how dry the bird was on their drive home this year. Or maybe I will…..

This article originally appeared on MUNCHIES in November 2014.