You do the math: Thanksgiving + ridiculously early “dinner” + big-ass turkey + too many desserts + amazing people + big container of leftovers for midnight “snack” = ??
A freaking enjoyable night, but the worst food coma the next day after. I was groggy all day today, and only climbed out of bed when it was 1 pm. Oh well. It was all worth it…t’was the best Thanksgiving dinner I’ve ever had!
Actually, that was my first Thanksgiving, and I’m now a bit miffed that I had been denied a true Thanksgiving dinner for 21 years of my life. You see, I’m Asian (sorry to bring in the race card), and we just don’t celebrate Thanksgiving the way Americans do. For the past Thanksgivings in my life, I’ve been forced to choke down fried rice and chow mein and sweet-and-sour pork. Oh boy.
However, even with the horrible Thanksgiving food, one thing I’ve never ever been denied was wonderful, beautiful company. I’m so blessed…wherever I go, I seem to be constantly surrounded by people whom I really love, people who care about me, and people who I know for certain that God placed in my life. Oh, praise the Lord!
So. This post is dedicated to all the great people who stuck by me throughout all these years, and especially to all the new friends I’ve made in the past 11 months.
To my family: Thank you…for always loving me, no matter how flawed and terrible I’ve been. I would not be who I am without you.
To my church brothers and sisters in Virginia: Thank you…for always praying for me, always having faith in me, and rejoicing with me in my triumphs and joys.
To my church brothers and sisters in Singapore: Thank you…for helping me find laughter again, for encouraging me to challenge myself and eventually watching my daily progress in recovery. The 5 months I’ve spent with you was a turning point in my life.
To my best friends: Thank you…for not forgetting about me, even though I’ve tried to push you away. Thank you for treating me like a normal person, for viewing me and reminding me of who I am, without the ED stigma. Thank you for not forsaking me.
To my new friends in USC: Thank you…for breathing life into me again as I live a new, restored life as a normal college student. Thank you for all the joys, laughter, and delight you’ve brought to me. I look forward to many more stories we’ll share together.
To my blog friends: Thank you…for reading, even though at times I’ve been grumpy and bitchy. Thank you for being there for me, always ready with warm words of comfort, advice, and support. Thank you for keeping me on track, for touching me with the wonder that it is possible to form such beautiful relationships even through the faceless communication of the Internet. You guys have restored my faith in humanity…that people really are beautiful.
To God: Dear Lord…You already know deep into the depths of my heart. Tears and words cannot express how much I love and thank you. You are the reason that I live, and I cannot repay you for all the grace you’ve bestowed upon me…except to give my all to you. Dear God, please accept my very being, and shape it into yours.
And lastly: Thanks to Elda, David, Renee, Ben, and Jane for cooking my first Thanksgiving dinner ever (though they are included in the “new friends in USC” category)!!!
In lieu of the special occasion, I donned my favorite socks: 
And boy, oh boy…there was so. much. freaking. food. My head was swimming and I didn’t know which one to dig into first! But first, let me share the decorations they did for the dining room: 
Very, very cool. Simple, yet classy and elegant. 
I especially loved how they had little name cards. Makes me feel special to see mine: 
Woo-hoo! Sophia!! What a beautiful name! 
And now on to food. A pretty table ain’t nothing without good food! Everyone zoomed in… 
With their cameras?!! Um, I swear, they are not food bloggers…But what’s great about these people is that they’re total foodies like me! 
Anyway, here’s the arrogant dish that thinks it’s centerpiece when it’s actually only good for leftovers: 
The 17-lb turkey, plucked, roasted, and exposed for our gastronomical pleasure.
Then ham: 
Home-roasted. Sweet, yet intensely meaty.
Stuffing: 
Apples, French bread, walnuts, cranberries. It was freaking amazing. I went back for seconds and thirds. Hands down, my favorite dish of the night! 
4-Cheese Mac & Cheese: 
With Parmesan cheese, white cheddar, gorgonzola, and goat cheese. Say what? All my favorite cheeses in one dish? 
I went for seconds and thirds again. Definitely a close favorite! 
Candied yams: 
Honestly, I did not think I would like this at all because it would be too sweet for me, so I only took a tiny bit. But it turned out pretty good. Good enough for seconds! 
Mashed potatoes: 
Damn it, my mashed potatoes never turned out this good! 
The most freaking amazing cranberry sauce: 
Homemade, with fresh cranberries, orange rind, apple cider, liquer, and…Whatever. I can’t remember, but it sure saved the boring turkey!
Also, fresh-baked cheese and herb biscuits: 
Light, buttery, flaky, cheesy. What’s not to love? 
After that superfluous dinner, everyone wobbled to the living room to sing some praise songs together, because who best to thank on Thanksgiving than God, right? 
La la la la~ 
Tra la la la~ 
These guys are wondering, “When the heck is dessert time?” I can just read it in their heads! 
I know I was!
And then it was dessert time!
Somehow, an Asian dish slipped into the mix: 
Korean rice cakes. But that’s okay, at least it wasn’t fortune cookies.
The quintessential pumpkin pie: 
Pumpkin bread!! 
And banana pudding: 
Embarrassed to say, but I was most enamored by the banana pudding, which turned out to be the least homemade dessert (pudding mix and Cool Whip). A true Gourmand I am not!
For this pecan pie, we stuck a candle into it: 
And we sang another song, this time a birthday song, because it was this little fella’s first birthday:
How cool is it that his birthday is on Thanksgiving? The look on his face seems to indicate that he doesn’t know what the hell is going on though. Tee hee!
Eggnog was passed around… 
…and we were divided into “Love-it” and “Hate-it” camps. I’m in the “hate-it” camp. Yeck. Too sickening rich…it’s like drinking custard that someone puked out.
It’s amazing how much you can stuff into your stomach if you put your heart into it. Here’s Renee, not afraid to chow down some more:
She is so pretty. And huggable. I love her!
After dessert we settled down, nursing our food babies… 
And real babies… 
And we talked some more. I loved this group of people. I didn’t know half the people here, but we were an interesting, ecelectic mix from all over the world: Nepal, Kazakhstan, India, Singapore (me), Taiwan, Korea, Romania… 
Can you tell who is from where? No matter…we are all beautiful!
The baby started sleeping… 
…and thus it was time to leave.
I had the most wonderful, heart-warming night. Thanksgiving rocks. It’s now officially my favorite holiday ever. Hopefully my next Thanksgiving will be “kung-pao chicken”-less as well!
Question of the day: What is your favorite Thanksgiving dish? Do you have a non-traditional Thanksgiving tradition?
Oh, and Egg-nog: Love it or hate it?
Related posts:
{ 87 comments… read them below or add one }
← Previous Comments
What a fun Thanksgiving! (It’s nice to see you on your blog sometimes too!)
Oh my..life justs gets better and better for you!!!!! Thanksgiving is not Thanksgiving without whipped sweet potatoes and my mom’s stuffing with sweet peppers.
What a Thanksgiving spread and what fun to share with friends!
what a fabulous, delicious and heartwarming thanksgiving. you are too dang cute, and i am glad you got to experience all the love of this holiday – which is why it is one of my faves!
that baby is too cute too!
fave dish – STUFFING!!!!
eggnog – HATE IT!
love you girl!
Looks like a beautiful and delish Thanksgiving celebration! Love that you guys sang praise songs after dinner, too.
happy thanksgiving sohpia! i am thankful for your bitchy posts, you gotta keep it real girl. that one of the many ways that you identify with and help others. being real and open and honest. so thanks for YOU!
and sophia is one of my favorite names. it truly is beautiful, and represented well in you.
Looks like a super Thanksgiving!!
Our Thanksgiving tradition here is that, um, we don’t celebrate it.
(Really… what’s wrong with giving thanks every day??)
<3 <3
This post is amazing! I’m so glad you had such a great time, girl! Happy first thanksgiving! Your friends really know how to make a thanksgiving feast fit for a king! Yummmmmm!
<3 jess
xoxo
I LOVE egg nog but I don’t like thinking about raw egg in it
That turkey looks so freaking good Sophia! I’m determined to visit America during Thanksgiving one year!
Jeezz girl, thanks for finding my blog and I had no idea you were out here! Wow…normally there are blogs I know of, just don’t go to b/c my reader is already on max. But I honestly had no idea. But being I’m the 60th comment, you’re clearly a popular lady!
I love your writing style and prose.
Just moved from So Cal to Phoenix 8 weeks ago. Still finding my way out here and kinda missing San Diego. We are homeowners now but it’s a trade off leaving the familiarity of So Cal for AZ. When I read you went to USC…well many years ago I got accepted there and almost went. And ended up at a really small school.
Anyway this is a very random comment, I am giving you my life history. But I like your style chica
Wow…Sophia! Happy thanksgiving! 3 things:
1. Yes, you have a beautiful name
2. Now that I can finally see how you look with less of the grey, ashen, scary, gaunt face, omg, you are actually so pretty! I don’t know why in u mentioned in one of ur previous posts (quite long ago) that u always envied the pretty girls in school
Keep it up! May you most importantly shine with the radiance of our beautiful Savior.
3. I am actually so thankful for ur friendship, even though we’ve only met on our blogs
hehe. Look forward to read ur posts everyday, and whenever u update, I eagerly savour it like a yummy dish… as they are filled with wisdom and amazing recipes…which never fail to lift up my spirits… (even if it’s an angry post, haha!)
Love you, dear sister.
the food looks amazing and if i was present, i would have demolished every dish and be totally unapologetic about it. the side dishes always taste better than the turkey anyways…and that mac and cheese looks so good! thanks for stopping by my blog
Happy Thanksgiving!
What a tremendous feast! Looks like you all had a lovely time
Sophia, oh Sophia. I’m so glad that you enjoyed yourself! And thank you to you too, for being such a wonderful, inspiring person. No worries. I’m Asian too, so I completely understand about being denied. Hehe… But I did have roasted turkey when I was studying in London and I loved it! Hopefully, I’ll get to try the rest of the delicious looking food in your photos… someday….
I’m glad that you had such a nice Thanksgiving. All the food looks amazing, but I had to pause when I got to the cheese & herb biscuits. I so wanted to eat one right now!! What is it about me & cheese??!!!? (If just my gallstones could tolerate it a bit better… Oh well).
We have a pretty traditional Thanksgiving meal, but we always “have to have” rice & kimchi with the meal…
Ha ha, thats indeed a great thanksgiving. Wonderful feast….
Anything with sweet potatoes! And… love it.
love your Eggnog review lmao. I never used to like it until about last year… now it is like crack to me lol. I love it as a coffee creamer too!
That mac & cheese looks soooooooooo good. Glad you had a great holiday!!!!
Oh Sophia…. Sophia …. I am so happy that you had a wonderful Thanksgiving. Lovely to read that it was your first one with Traditional Thanksgiving meal. Especially with a lot of family and friends. Great mix of ethnicity. Very lovely Sophia. I like to serve traditional Thanksgiving dinner, although we are also mix race family.
Eggnog? I never served this at home, never tried it, and not even sure if my family will like it. It sounds unappetizing.
Cheers,
elra
I know what you mean! My boyfriend is Chinese, and they don’t have a traditional Thanksgiving either — he and his brother and sister were really begging for mashed potatoes, but I don’t think they got any. I’m hoping that if I show him pictures of my family’s Thanksgiving (trifecta mashed potatoes!) I can bribe him to come to NC with me next year haha
Soy Nog (by Silk!) is really good — it’s much thinner than regular eggnog, which always made me feel a little sick to drink.
Hate it on the egg nog, but all the other food you had looks AMAZING!
Especially that mac n’ cheese
beautiful post, so much to be grateful for! what a wonderful thanksgiving!
i love eggnog, but only a few tablespoons at a time!
You had me at FOUR CHEESE MAC N CHEESE! What a wonderful dinner!
I love egg nog!
Looks wonderful! I like eggnog, but then, I have a super sweet tooth.
Hence, my fave is usually the yams. My fave to make is my famous cheesy mashed potatoes, which I didn’t get to make this year!
Sounds like you had a wonderful Thanksgiving! Yummy food and your friends seem so very nice!
This makes me so smiley to know you had a social and happy Thanksgiving!
What a fabulous first Thanksgiving!! I think my favorite dish has always been sweet potato casserole-minus marshmallows
Is that you in the pink sweater? I love putting a face with bloggers.
oh my what a feast! banana pudding?! that sounds fantastic!!!! I love the beautiful asian dessert! it looks like a rainbow
fav thanksgiving dish is sweet mashed potatoes with marshmellows on top! mmmm
happy sunday my dear!
How beatiful
I’m so glad you had such a lovely Thanksgiving meal…with people you love! Everything looks awesome…but um, can I have the recipe for those amazing biscuits!?
Beautiful pics, you are so blessed !
And that food!!! wow! candied yams, cranberry sauce and biscuits!! All looked simply divine! so jealous!
What a great thanksgiving! The food, the company, the singing!
I can’t decide my favorite dish but it is definitely one of the sides!
Beautiful post. I am so happy your first real Thanksgiving was so incredible! May it always bring such great memories!
(by the way… I grew up with lasagna (Italian mom) and stuffed grape leaves (jordanian dad) for Thanksgiving until my first real one a few years ago!
What a beautiful Thanksgiving! Good friends, food, and laughter…truly perfect!
I like the flavor of eggnog but I either have to thin it out with milk or just have a sip or two since it’s so rich. Or I skip it and have eggnog tea…have you tried it? It tastes just like eggnog but without the richness…soooo good!
Happy Thanksgiving! I’m glad you had such a lovely celebration with your friends!
Looks like you had an amazing bash with so many great people and YUMMY food!!
Btw, I love your pink sweater!!
One of my fav colors!
Loving the addition of some non-traditional dishes in the mix. It all looks delish!! :O)
- Beth @ http://www.DiningAndDishing.com
Aww what an awesome thanksgiving! Lovely table settings and amazing dishes!
← Previous Comments