Ten years ago, my volunteering supervisor Lauren gave me a ‘Thank You’ card for Thanksgiving. When I asked about her shopping plans for Black Friday as that was my only association with Thanksgiving, Lauren’s blue eyes sparkled with a trace of surprise.
I learned from her about the Pilgrims, being thankful for the harvests, counting our blessings, and the American-style Thanksgiving dinner of roasted turkey, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, etc.
Lauren mentioned to me about her family’s Thanksgiving dinner. She was born and raised in America to Scottish- Italian parents and was married to a Peurto-Rican. I recollect her saying how inevitable was it for her parents to have a Scottish pudding and Italian pasta on any occasion and rave about their memories around it, let alone Thanksgiving. So was her husband’s most comfortable bowl of Peurto-Rican rice and beans, flavoring his childhood.
Her multi-cultural family had their picks for the dinner platter, but the underlying fact was that each of them had unique connections to their choice of food.
Even after ten years, the imagery of Lauren’s mixed-ethnic Thanksgiving dinner is vivid in my mind’s eye. I wonder what the stories would have been about the pudding, the pasta, or the rice bowl.
If we all pause for a while and reflect, we may indeed have at least one such food that takes us to an Eden of recollections. Well, I do!
My grandmother was an indulging and visual storyteller. The story of The Crow and the Serpent was one of her favorites from the Panchatantra¹. She narrated it to me time and again during my early childhood while feeding me rice balls with ghee² and sambar³.
Even today, when I relish a ball of piping hot rice with ghee and sambar, it reminds me of this story from the Panchatantra. My imaginary visuals of the tree, the crow’s nest, the Serpent’s hole - it all flashes through my mind. It gives me comfort and a feeling of Déjà vu.
Food becomes an emotion with a combination of taste and reminiscence.
Thus, it makes the choices unique and personal.
¹ The Panchatantra is an ancient Indian collection of interrelated animal fables in Sanskrit verse and prose, arranged within a frame story.
² Indian style clarified butter
³ Sambar is a staple South Indian lentil-based stew/soup, cooked with vegetables, spices and tamarind broth.
