“To everything there is a season and a time to every purpose under the heaven.” Illustration by Betsey Clark. (Photo courtesy Calvin Dodge collection)
In this article I want to refer back to the days and months of preparation which lead up to our great family Thanksgiving Day dinner and the week that followed. The everyday pace of life was much slower back in 1950 and I was 14 years old at that time.
My sister and I still helped our parents in everyday activities around our home with no complaints along with our daily chores and odd jobs. We were not being confronted with 24-hour news on the TV and there was no internet. We got our news from the local radio station or by reading the Portland Press Herald morning or evening newspaper and the local news from The Lincoln County News or a chat on the telephone from a neighbor.
The weather for the month of November was much colder and ice froze on the small ponds much earlier and we could have a good snowstorm anytime. In 1950, my father would open his Christmas tree business in the second week of November and close in the second week of December.
Dad and his small crew would cut and tie and haul home from other wood lots in the area about 2,500 bundles of Christmas trees and sell them on the Boston market. There would be one to four trees in each bundle. I used to work for my father on weekends to earn some extra money for Christmas gifts.
I now refer back to the early preparation for Thanksgiving dinner.
In the middle of October, my mother would make about eight pies: five apple and three mincemeat. She would store them unbaked in our deep freezer and take them out and bake them a couple days before Thanksgiving.
My sister and I would peel and slice the apples for her while Mother made the pie crust. Then Mother would let us place layers of sliced apples into the bottom pie crust and she would add the sugar and spices and slices of butter. Then she would put on the top pie crust and seal the edges. So one could see, this was a joint family project.
Then my mother would make three beautiful fruitcakes and store them in one of her stoneware crocks. Each fruitcake was wrapped in cheesecloth and placed in the stoneware crock, one on top of the other.
Once a month, it was my job to go downstairs and sprinkle each fruitcake with some black cherry rum to add flavor and keep them fresh. Mother would only use these fruitcakes on special events and occasions. Even today I miss the flavor and great taste of these fruitcakes, just great bygone memories of the past.
My mother would also make a very special English plum pudding. She would steam it in a very special tin container and serve it with a warm sugar vanilla sauce.
Mother would also make a couple of dozen sugar cookies, filled with a wonderful tasting date filling that went great with a cup of hot coffee or a cold glass of milk.
Mother would also bake a real nice walnut cake that had a great flavor and was full of ground up walnuts. My sister and I would crack open the walnuts and remove the fresh walnut meat inside for her to grind up later when she made the cake. I remember the walnut cake would stay quite moist if kept in a covered cake dish.
I checked back into my mother’s diary. I found that my father had been given a half section of deer a friend had shot and tagged one November. This friend of dad’s always loved mincemeat made from venison.
I remember that some years when dad got a deer and made some venison mincemeat for a Christmas present and they told my parents they greatly enjoyed every ounce of it.
So according to mother’s notes on Nov. 3, 1950, Dad and Mother, with the large amount of deer meat, started the process of making the venison mincemeat. According to my mother they used a recipe that had been passed down through the family for years.
They started by using five pounds of ground venison and 2 pounds of suet and boiled and cooked it till tender. You should end up with about 10 cups of ground meat and chop suet.
Then, in a very large kettle put the 10 cups of ground meat and suet and add 20 cups of chopped apples, four pounds of brown sugar, 3 cups molasses, 4 quarts cider, 4 pounds of seeded raisins cut in pieces, 3 pounds currants, 1/2 pound finely chopped citron, and a quarter-pound each of candied orange peel, lemon, grapefruit peel, and candied cherries.
Then 1 quart grape juice, 1 and 1/2 tablespoons nutmeg, 1 1/2 tablespoons of cinnamon, 1 tablespoon powdered cloves, and salt to taste and cook very slowly for the next two or so hours.
Stir the hot mixture and put into hot sterilized jars and seal. This recipe should make about eight quarts. This recipe made many mouthwatering pies over the long winter months or nice sugar cookies filled with mincemeat.
My mother even made mincemeat tarts; they were all so good.
Every one of these products made the holiday table fit for a king and brought love and joy to all who sat around it over all the holidays.
I recall like yesterday, after my parents made the mincemeat, the whole house had a wonderful aroma of spices for two or three days.
Now when it became time to get our fresh locally grown turkey, dad would always buy a good size turkey off of Mr. Vanes who had a farm in Nobleboro out on the Duck Puddle Road. It was a beautiful old farm and buildings which set back on a long driveway and went to the edge of Duck Puddle Pond.
The farm had been in the Vanes family for many years. My father would often resurface the driveway with a fresh coast of gravel each spring. I always enjoyed going to the Vanes farm and seeing all the large white feathered turkeys and they always seemed so content and well fed. Just another childhood memory shared with my parents.
I often recall my mother saying to Dad and us children how well Mr. Vanes prepared the turkey for his customers. There was never a pinfeather or a quill end left in the bird and the bird was always dressed and cut very well.
When stuffing the bird, Mother would say there was always ample skin left so she could sew it up to hold the stuffing inside the bird while baking. The stuffing would hold the moisture inside the bird to keep it tender and help flavor the bird.
I recall the turkey from Mr. Vanes would weigh from 18-24 pounds. Mother made the most wonderful gravy, which everyone enjoyed on toasted hot turkey sandwiches with a side order of cranberry sauce and some kind of beverage.
The days that followed Thanksgiving were always special. There were still all kinds of food left over to enjoy in many ways. Sometimes warmed up food tastes even better.
While on school vacation, us children would go ice skating with other children on our small pond. Mother would invite us into the house after an afternoon of ice skating and she would make hot chocolate with a large pan full of all types of cookies, squares, slices of cake, and pieces of homemade fudge for each of us.
I heard many of the young children say so often, these types of food taste so good after an afternoon out in the cold fresh air skating around the little pond. If the weather was too cold some of the children would come in and sit on the floor around our coal fired pot bellied stove and play a game of Chinese checkers where six could play at a time with marbles or just plain checkers or some other board game.
Just wonderful memories of Thanksgiving week as a child and as a family. Good times are never forgotten with a close family.
As I remember as a child our family always had close ties with other families in the neighborhood. These wonderful memories still continue today even though many have moved far away.
We still call or write each other on holidays and birthdays and even share photos of our families, just wonderful great memories of past family ties.
