Sunday, November 30, 2014

Friendsgiving

Yesterday we hosted a "Friendsgiving" dinner at our apartment building for our fellow American friends (and non-American friends who wanted to see what all the fuss was about). Since we essentially skipped Thanksgiving on Thursday, it was so much fun to finally celebrate/eat. Peter and I (read: Peter) did the turkey. We weren't sure how easy it would be to find a turkey here but turns out our local grocery store, Woolworth's, had plenty. 
Here's our turkey after defrosting for a day or two. 
My main contribution to the turkey was chopping up fruits and vegetables to stuff inside. 
In the spirit of Thanksgiving, we had football on in the background. 
The turkey all ready to go in the oven. I mixed together some butter and herbs to spread on top. Second contribution! 
After triple checking our temperature conversions (our recipe was in Farenheit), the turkey went in the oven at about 1:30 pm. Our oven is brand new and we had never used it for anything more serious than an oven pizza, so we read the manual and figured the turkey would need to cook for three and a half hours. 
We moved the turkey and all of our supplies down to the apartment kitchen and dining area around 3:30 pm. We noticed at this point that the turkey, after only cooking for about 2 hours, looked pretty done. Peter checked the temperature and it was in fact ready to go. We couldn't believe how fast it cooked and we kind of panicked, as people weren't set to arrive until about 5 and we didn't plan to eat until 6. So, we just covered it in foil and kept it in the oven on a low temperature for another hour or so (and crossed our fingers). In hindsight, most of our guests probably wouldn't have known if it was overdone, as it was their first Thanksgiving experience. We still don't know if we just bought a freak turkey that cooked really quickly, or if perhaps the fact that the oven was new influenced cook time. 

The turkey actually turned out just fine after all. 
The finished bird, ready to eat...almost. 
Peter carving the turkey, and Katie photobombing. We may or may not have watched several YouTube videos on how to carve a turkey in the hours before this photo was taken. 
One of our Australian friends, Bec, made this adorable fruit turkey! 
The most amazing buffet ever. 
The whole group before digging in. 
My (first) plate. 
Peter got a little eager and broke his plastic fork on his first bite. The strangest part about our apartment kitchen is that you have to supply all of your own utensils. I suppose they're worried about someone swiping them, but most people probably don't have enough silverware to feed more than 5-10 people. Therefore, we ate with plastic silverware, plates, and cups. Classy!
The best part! We had an apple tart, pumpkin pie, and pecan pie, all SOOO good. The pumpkin pie was a novelty, as most of our non-American friends had never tried it. 
It definitely felt strange to be celebrating Thanksgiving yesterday, as it was 95 degrees. We hung out on the deck for a bit before cleaning up. I think I could get used to a summer Thanksgiving! 
Beautiful sunset
Late last night, we snuck up to the top floor of our building with our friends Matt and Lauren, and enjoyed the awesome views of the city! It was a perfect end to a great day with friends.

7 comments:

  1. Thanks for arranging it. We had great fun at our first thanksgivings experience :-)

    ReplyDelete
  2. We had a Friendsgiving the weekend before to teach Australian's about American Thanksgiving food and show our thankfulness to them for being our friends. It was so much fun, so glad you are spreading Thanksgiving around Australia also. www.eatallovertheworld.weebly.com

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes! So fun to introduce foreigners to Thanksgiving!

      Delete
  3. Laura and Peter-what a great way to entertain friends and introduce them to our custom of
    Thanksgiving. You people are a wonderful example of the type of people US Citizens really
    are. The US Gov't should portray you as an example to all the Ambassadors and their aides.
    Thanks for all you are doing and enjoy the great friendships.;

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks, Grandpa and Grandma! We had a lot of fun showing our friends Thanksgiving traditions. Plus, the food was really good!

      Delete

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Welcome! I started Laura and Peter Down Under in July 2014 when my husband and I moved from the States to Melbourne, Australia for his job. I blog about expat life, our travels, food, and whatever else comes to mind. Follow along on our adventures Down Under!

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