well you know november has come when it's gone away

I've been busy the last little while! November update first.

( New York: meandering through Manhattan on a perfect fall day, foliage, serendipitous Brompton test ride, C Pam Zhang reading, finally went up the Empire State Building after 27 years?! )

( Boston: bagel delivery service, proper trains, finally getting to ride the Community Path Extension, never enough time with friends )

( Stravinsky tech week )

( Monterey: Hyoun runs, I find all the good food and the last remaining bookstore in Carmel, you all are shocked )

And amid all this sleep-deprived timezone confused chaos, I may have gotten into overenthusiastic bikesplaining mode with a friend of a friend on Facebook re bike infrastructure, and only realized after the fact that said person was somebody I'd gone out on a couple of dates with back in the day (🔒). ROFLMAO. Hyoun cracked up listening to me come to this realization in realtime. Me: "What, you'd been reading my LJ for three years by the time we got together and you knew me for years before that, you knew what you were getting into!" H, smiling fondly: "Sure did." Some things have changed, but clearly some things remain the same. :D

I *thought* this was going to cover November, but we're already past the 1500 word mark and I'm only up to November 13; Thanksgiving next time, I guess!

Thanksgiving 2023

The archiving project I've been working on over the last six months is stalled out somewhere in 2004, mostly because I was working on another writing project and accidentally successfully NaNoWriMoed with it, with that project having crossed the 60,000 word mark by the end of November (and currently at 76,000 words(!)). WHO AM I.

But that means that my posts about the Asian American Thanksgiving thing we've been formally doing for the last six or seven years, where the majority of dishes we put on the table came from recipes by Asian American chefs? Sparked by the #MyAsianThanksgiving discussion of ... 2017? haven't made it over here yet.

Update: yeah, of course that was the impetus for me to fill in my Thanksgiving archives, regardless of chronological order. But they're all there now!

( chronology )

2001 and 2002, when I rolled my own, first solo, then with Andrew. 2003 and 2004 mrieser dragged a bunch of us out to Western Mass for Thanksgiving with Ninjamom. 2005, I took hyounpark to SF. After that, we started doing our thing at home most years.

Not that 2017 was the first time we've had Asian/Asian American elements on our Thanksgiving tables, far from it! The first Thanksgiving I cooked for on my own, I leaned heavily on Kay Chun's article and recipe collection about her family's Asian American Thanksgiving in Real Simple in 2001. But in the meantime, have 2023's version! (Pictures of Thanksgiving 2023 on the 'gram.)

This year, we made:

• Peter Som's Char Siu Wellington


• Next time we try this, we will definitely be adjusting the bake times, but the pork and gravy were delicious! But this is the second Peter Som recipe that has, er, not gone to plan, see the time we tried his sweet potato tian (a previous Asian American Thanksgiving year). Oh well!


• Joanne Chang's Roast Lamb


• This is a regular staple in our household; yes, it's the roast lamb from Flour Bakery's original lamb sandwich which is still the best lamb sandwich I've ever had in my life. Sometimes we'll make our own focaccia to eat it with, other times we are grateful to live within walking distance of Semifreddi's focaccia 🙂 But the lamb also pairs well with cranberry sauce!


• Molly Yeh's Pretzel Stuffing


• Tasty and worth tracking down pretzel rolls for!


• Kay Chun's Cranberry Asian Pear Chutney


• As mentioned above, a permanent denizen of my Thanksgiving table. Hall of Fame, MVP, every accolade. We gifted a jar to our next door neighbors this year as well and they loved it!


• Stephanie + Mike Le's Miso Butter Mashed Potatoes


• Everyone loved these; it's hard to believe this was the first time they made an appearance for Thanksgiving! Will almost certainly repeat next year.


• Andrea Nguyen's Greens with Magical Sesame Salt


• These also disappeared quite quickly; we put a bunch of assorted greens in.


• Eric Kim's Little Gems Salad from his cookbook Korean American


• Second year in a row, repeated by multiple requests, and we'll be leaning on the seaweed dressing in particular to encourage us to eat more salads this year.


• Betty Liu's Asian Pear Shrub with Rosemary and Prosecco


• We first served this to my dad at ... Thanksgiving 2021, I think? Forgot to break out the prosecco this year but the shrub was appreciated by all.


• Nancy Cho + Selina Lee's 수정과 (sujeonggwa, cinnamon punch) from their cookbook Korean Instant Pot Cookbook


• And we also had a warm drink! This, too, was a repeat.


• Leonard and Sara made honeynut squash 호박죽 (hobakjuk, pumpkin soup) and challah


• With the 새알심 (saelsim, the rice flour balls) and 팥 (pat, red beans) and 잣 (jat, pine nuts)! Challah served separately.


• My parents brought the wine and cheese, being oenophiles and turophiles


• Alana Kysar's Liliko’i Chiffon Pie from her cookbook Aloha Kitchen


• Back for a third year, though I preferred the previous years when we were able to get ahold of actual liliko'i pulp, even though it can be a PITA to prepare.


• And finally, Brie Burnt Basque Cheesecake


• More below, but this was STUNNINGLY easy. The cheese you use matters a lot; we used a local Brie and this was a winner.

That’s right. Yours truly, cofounding member of anti_cheesecake back in the day? Has, finally, at the ripe old age of forty-ahem, found a cheesecake I LOVE, wholeheartedly. All credit there to Breadbelly and their Mt. Tam Burnt Basque Cheesecake, along with every article about burnt Basque cheesecake where I noted just how many Asian American bakers were making them locally, and now I’m on a quest to try them all!

But obviously, it was the perfect dessert to add to our Asian American Thanksgiving table, where for six years running now, we have heavily featured recipes by Asian and Asian American chefs and cooks. Some of these recipes found a home on my Thanksgiving table long before that, of course; I think Kay Chun’s Cranberry Chutney has been at just about every Thanksgiving I’ve hosted since 2001!

I still detest brussels sprouts, though, despite decades of trying, and remain meh about celery though I appreciate its role in mirepoix and the holy trinity now, and picky about ham (thinly sliced, properly cured, never the honey baked crap), so that’s how you know I’m still me and some things are eternal. 🙂