Three Acts of Friendsgiving: A Turkey Named Sharon

And like a film, my Friendsgiving had three acts: the dry run, the prep day before, and the actual dinner itself. It was an ordeal and quite an undertaking, but after a week of recovery, I can finally write about it, much less think about it. The headline, now looking back, is that it was a success: food all came out on time, everyone showed up, no one got salmonella, and we had too many leftovers.

My friend Sara and I decided to host Friendsgiving this year. Sara's apartment is huge by Hong Kong standards, and it only seemed appropriate to host a big dinner party in a three-bedroom flat in Hong Kong's Mid-Levels district. Thankfully, her parents were in town this year, so Sara's mom, Maritza, was able to help out with the festivities as well.

We did do a dry run earlier this month, and with two roast chickens under my belt, I felt pretty good about tackling the real thing come Friendsgiving. What did we learn from the dry run? Sara didn't have good knives, so I brought my Japanese santoku and my Chinese cleaver. Oven space is at a premium—roasting two chickens is no problem, but if you were to add a pie, a side, and cookies on top of that, we'd have to wait another two hours before we could even begin to eat anything. So the lesson there was that I needed to bring my portable, trusty Kenwood toaster oven.

Okay, we learned something, so we should be ready for the big day... right?

No. Absolutely not.

So Friendsgiving was on Saturday, but the turkey that Sara supposedly got from work was going to come in on Friday morning. Except the turkey was frozen. And didn't come in till 4 PM. Those of you who've made a turkey before know that it takes several days for a turkey to defrost in the fridge, so we had to improvise.

But first, to take the edge off: I poured myself a glass of wine.

You know how people say they can taste the joy in the food that's being prepared for them? I was going to "choose" joy, and by joy, I interpret that to be a nice crisp white. I was for sure not going to turn into Donna Berzatto from The Bear this Friendsgiving.

The second thing was to draw the turkey a bath. Most of my online research said that if we were going to defrost the turkey, we had to change out the water every 30 minutes. But honestly, no one was going to chaperone a turkey every 30 minutes from 4 PM on Friday to Saturday morning. I figured that most of the advice about changing the water every 30 minutes had to do with the volume of the turkey in relation to the volume of water the turkey was submerged in. If that assumption is correct, then... a larger body of water would be able to do the same thing but over a longer period of time.

So the turkey, which Sara has now named Sharon, took to the bathtub, submerged in water with workout weights holding her down.

At this point, it was good luck and godspeed to Sharon for defrosting her icy exterior and interior enough for Saturday's dinner.

The Wine-Fueled Prep Marathon

So with wine in hand, I prepped the holy trinity mirepoix of carrots, onions, and celery. I halved three large kabocha squashes, scooped out the seeds, and cleaver-ed my way to two Ziploc bags of bite-sized squash pieces. I made compound butter—softened butter with chopped rosemary, garlic, salt, and pepper mixed into it like beautiful, delicious wrapping paper. Cookie dough was made and frozen. Apple crisps and pumpkin blondies were baked. Kale was cleaned and chopped. Stale bread for the stuffing was torn. The sausage and vegetables were sautéed.

It was a good six hours before I left, and I was feeling the half bottle of wine. I also realized that I probably hadn't eaten much, which is ironic—surrounded by so much food, I felt like I was full, but I hadn't actually eaten anything.

All we could do now was pray to the Turkey Gods that Frozen Sharon was going to become Defrosted Sharon by Saturday morning.

Sharon was, in fact, defrosted. But unfortunately got the ax.

For the record, I was right—Sharon was fully defrosted. But I left it to Sara to decide if we should serve Sharon. I was 85% sure it was fine to serve and that nobody was going to get salmonella, but Sara was the ultimate decision maker and wanted people's memories of Friendsgiving to be "Wow, that was so fun, I can't wait for the next one," and NOT the 15% chance that people would say, "Oh wow, I got sick at that Friendsgiving. Never again with these Americans."

So Sharon got the ax, and instead of a turkey, we had to pivot to three chickens. So I'll say this: in the two times I've gone to her apartment to make dinner (because my place is so small), I have made five chickens. I am chicken'd out.

We did, however, have the foresight to know that 15-pound Sharon wasn't going to be enough to feed our 14 hungry guests, so we got a turkey breast that was defrosted in time, and I made a turkey porchetta instead. Turkey did make an appearance and a surprise hit of the evening, along with the compound butter.

Because we no longer had to slow-cook Sharon for 3.5 hours, I suddenly found myself with so much more time. Dinner was at 5:30 PM, which meant people weren't really going to come till 6:00 PM, so I ended up having enough time for lunch.

It ended up being really chill actually—having a piece of pizza and a coffee before assembling everything starting at 2 PM.

Had we not done the prep the day before, I would've been a lot more stressed and couldn't have enjoyed the beautiful day outside. But thankfully I did. I guess Sharon's absence was a blessing in disguise—she had to go so I could have a stress-free Friendsgiving.

Pictures speak louder than words, so here's the final tally of what ended up on our roster:

Appetizers:

Mains:

Desserts:

Drinks:

Note that even though I made three roast chickens, only two were served due to limited real estate on the serving table. We had a whole friggin' chicken that didn't even get carved up and displayed in all its glory—it would make great sandwiches the week following Friendsgiving.

Another interesting note: our guests did not drink as much as we imagined, so we had way too much alcohol and wine left. We did get through half a 750ml bottle of Bulleit Bourbon in the Old Fashioneds. Perhaps our guests were already too bourbon-ed up to consume more. The one surprising thing we forgot was the most essential of all—water. In retrospect, make sure you hydrate your guests.

And we ate on time! On regular people time at 7:30 PM, not at some insanely late hour like 9 PM and after. No one got salmonella, and it was a merry time.

The real success of a dinner party hinges on two questions. One for the guests: Would you come again? And one for the host: Would you do it again?

The guests did mention they would come again, which is great for a potential Christmas-themed party in the coming weeks. For me... I would do it again if Sharon came earlier, was defrosted safely, and we didn't have to pivot last minute to chickens.

So there you have it. That was my Friendsgiving. Three acts, five chickens, one bathtub-defrosted turkey that never made it to the table, and enough leftovers to last until Christmas.

Whether you're vegging out on the couch, wondering whether to make the Geller's Moistmaker tomorrow (a leftover turkey sandwich with a gravy-soaked piece of bread in the middle to keep that moisture), I hope you had a Happy Thanksgiving and that no one ends up eating your sandwich at work.

How was your Thanksgiving this year? And more importantly, did your turkey make it to the table, or did it pull a Sharon?

Savoring this moment with you,

Kevin L