Tim and I were pleased to have been invited to a Thanksgiving feast at the home of an American couple we know. I think there will be eight or nine people there – mostly Americans. Our contribution to the meal will be a pumpkin pie, an apple pie, and a veggie tray. The Big Day is still four days away, but I’m already starting to get nervous about cooking.
Now, I’ve never claimed to be much of a cook, but during my happy homemaker years I managed to keep a husband and most of the kids from starving. My specialty was reasonably nutritious, well-balanced meals that could be prepared with typical equipment found in most 19th century homes. It’s true that I once had an out-of-town friend borrow my kitchen to prepare a birthday dinner for her daughter who was attending a local college. Before she got there, I’d placed a skillet and a saucepan on the stove, and got out of her way. After I found the friend going through all the cupboards and drawers in the kitchen, I asked her if I could help her find anything. She asked me where I kept my pans. I looked at her incredulously and pointed to the stove. “They’re right in front of you,” I said. She actually wanted plural pans! I never managed to acquire fancy pots and pans, an expensive blender/chopper/whirrly thing, or gourmet utensils, but I provided meals day in and day out for many years. I baked bread, threw together delicious salads, turned out hearty casseroles, and could even manage to roast decent chicken, pork, or beef. For years, I managed two kinds of pies for every Thanksgiving meal. So, what’s different about this year?
I’m cooking in a foreign land. We had our first real run-in with the challenges of overseas cooking early in the COVID-19 lock down of 2020. Tim and I decided we could fill some of our empty hours baking bread, as we’d done in the early years of our marriage. I’d had the foresight to pack a few of my favorite tried-and-true recipes into our meager luggage when we made the big move to Portugal in 2018. We happily spent the better part of a day crafting several loaves of our greatest hits of bread. We had to guess a little on where to set the temperature dial on the oven to approximate the Fahrenheit temperature shown in the recipes, but that was an easy adjustment. The loaves took longer to brown up but were under cooked when they finally came out. The texture was subpar and the flavor was unfamiliar. (Not in a good way.) After attempting several recipes, there was not one decent loaf in the bunch, and certainly none worthy of giving to nearby friends. We knew the flour produced in Europe has a fraction of the gluten that has been engineered into American flour, but we never dreamed that difference would have such a pronounced impact on the quality of our bread. We’ve eaten enough scrumptious Portuguese bread to know that their flour produces excellent results, but apparently not when using American recipes.