Thanksgiving 2010: Building a menu

When I said yesterday that we hadn't yet started purchasing food for Thanksgiving, that wasn't quite true. We were at the farmers' market in Clark Park yesterday to pick up a few odds and ends for the week, when we stumbled across a stall selling butternut squash. This wasn't at all unusual, since they're the sort of thing that tend to be sold at farmers' markets 'round this parts at this time of year. What caught our collective eye was that these squash had extremely long necks:

Perfect for our squash dish this Thanksgiving! Why, you ask? Oh...not telling.

I'm being coy about the menu for a reason. I like the extra enjoyment that a bit of surprise adds to the proceedings. If people don't know what's being served, they can't form expectations, either good or bad, and just have to work with what's being served at that moment. It makes the appearance of each course just a little more interesting, a little more highly anticipated. So you want to know what's for dinner? As my grandfather would say, "You'll see it when it hits the table."

It's impossible to keep the menu entirely secret. For one thing, everyone knows that we're having onion soup, since that's basically become our tradition at this point. For another, one of the points of this meal is to showcase ingredients and flavors that are at their peak this time of year. A quick look around your local market can thus give you some idea as to what we'll be working with: squash, beets, carrots, mushrooms, hearty greens. Anyone who knows me also knows that dessert is pretty much guaranteed to have chocolate in it. Also, loyal readers (or people who click here) will know that our menu adheres to several simple rules: Use what's fresh and in season. Make as much as you can yourself. Keep palates fresh by serving lots of small courses. Never repeat a flavor.

But those are the only clues I'm willing to give out. I won't be telling how those ingredients are being combined, or in what order they'll be served, or whether they're the only ones we'll be working with. Let me keep some air of mystery, eh?