KLMNO
Food
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 22, 2020. SECTION R EZ EEBY BECKY KRYSTALA
sk anyone in food media about the annual jokes
and dread about Thanksgiving. What on Earth
are we going to do differently this year? How
many ways can you possibly roast a turkey? And it
never happens, but anyone who denies they’ve
never even fantasized about skipping coverage of the holi-
day entirely is probably lying.
I’ve been on The Washington Post’s Food section team
going on 10 years now, so I can personally attest that the
struggle is real to come up with something unique and brand
new (at least in a non-pandemic year). Was it always like this?
Am I just one small cog in a long line of food writers
constantly trying to reinvent the wheel?
Because I love history and because time-traveling seemedlike a fitting escape in these unsettled times, I decided to go
through 143 years of Post Thanksgiving food coverage, as far
back as I could research from my home office/bedroom.
The experience was enlightening, not to mention fun. It
also confirmed two inevitable cliches: Everything old is
new again, and the more things change, the more they stay
the same. No matter the era, people always found ways to
talk about how to cook the turkey (or not to cook a turkey at
all!). There were the sides, the pies and, naturally, the
leftovers. In fact, just about every type of Thanksgiving
story you can think of has appeared in The Post, likely
many times over. Naturally, patterns began to emerge.
Here’s a sampling.
SEE HISTORY ON R10THANKSGIVING 2020143 years of words about birds
A fun audit of holiday
coverage reveals that times
have changed more than
our traditionsDANA SMITH FOR THE WASHINGTON POST; ORIGINAL PAGES AND IMAGES FROM THE WASHINGTON POST, INCLUDING BY DEB LINDSEY, TOM MCCORKLE, MELINA MARA, THE WHITE HOUSE, ASSOCIATED PRESS AND ISTOCKLeftovers are not a problem
This New Orleans-style po’ boy will make a delicious
mess of the remnants of Thursday’s meal. R2
ALSO INSIDE:
l Quinoa and Roasted
Vegetable Bake
With Gruyere R2
l Portly Pear R8THIS IS THE SECOND OF
TWO SPECIAL THANKSGIVING
FOOD SECTIONS. THE FIRST
WAS PUBLISHED NOV. 18.
l Find our recipes for five
complete sheet-pan dinners at
wapo.st/thanksgivingmenus.
l Then for dessert, learn how
to build a pie just for you
at wapo.st/pies.
l For even more options,
search “Thanksgiving” at
washingtonpost.com/
recipes.
PHOTOS BY TOM MCCORKLE
FOOD STYLING BY LISA CHERKASKY
BOTH FOR THE WASHINGTON POSTAll about sprouts
Brussels sprouts are available all year, but seem of the
moment in fall. Find out how to use them. R6Don’t put away that sheet pan yet!
A crispy cornbread dressing makes for an easy side
dish that should fit nicely in a crowded oven. R7