On Thursday I celebrated American Thanksgiving with Sarah and Anthony Nicalo and their family and friends. It was a great day of eating, drinking and laughing.

The day started with a shopping trip to Granville Island to meet up with Boris and Evan. Coffee. Bagels. Goodies.

Lemon Tomato

We arrived at Sarah and Anthony’s just in time for sausage making.

Sausage Me This

Boris got down to work on his dinner contribution.

Dinner in the Works

I got down to lunch.

Lunch

In the meantime, Anthony carried on with the sausage making.

Anthony's Sausage

Aside from being skilled at eating, I’m also pretty good at taking the juicy bits out of pomegranates. James was reassigned.

James Mashes Pomegranate

Jeff was our mash potato guy.

Jeff Mashes Potato

The afternoon prep kept us all hard at work.

All Hands on Deck

Evan took over making the sausages. Little did he know, this was a 5 hour task. Hello Zen moment.

Making Sausage

Making Dinner

One of the first signs of dinner was the squash soup, served in a pumpkin. Amazing! And that’s where those beautiful pomegranate bits made an appearance.

Squash Soup: Gourd it up

Squash Soup: Gourd it up

The other hands-down, tastiest dish was this turkey rillette. Turkey, pistachio, cranberry yumminess.

Best bit of turkey

Boris’ dish was also very good, especially with the salty yam chips on top.

Making Soup and the Boris Special

Making Yam Chips

Rachel added the finishing touches to the potatoes. Cream baby!

Rachel

Now for the climax of dinner shots.

Grilled salmon.

Dinner Is Served

Turkey sausage.

Dinner Is Served

Veggies.

Thanksgiving Dinner

Dinner 1. (Yes, there was dinner 2.)

Thanksgiving Dinner

Christine & James.

Christine & James

Rachel, Sarah, Anthony, Boris.

Getting Food to the Table

Overflow eating.

Hanging Out

Family & Friends

Between dinner 1 and dinner 2 was the intermezzo. Candied salmon and olive oil gelato.

Smoked Salmon & Olive Oil Gelato

Post dinner there was more drinking and storytelling.

Dinner is served ...

Rachael & Boris.

Racheal & Boris

IMG_6518

And, of course, dessert. Here are 2 of the 5 desserts on offer.

Torte

The evening ended with the taking of pictures …

Christine

and the drinking of oil olive.

Evan

One of the best Thanksgivings I’ve ever celebrated. Thank you Sarah, Anthony and the artisan farmers who produced the amazing naturally farmed, handcrafted wines that we drank.