Short Story- Love’s Thanksgivings Bounties (Thanksgiving with the Blackstone's)

 my book Love's Labours Won- The Stone Chronicles - Book 1

Please enjoy my short story below based on the characters in my book,

Love’s Thanksgivings Bounties

        It was Thanksgiving and Sarah was grateful, after a couple of years of no one to share Thanksgiving with she had much to be thankful. The table looked magically, a turkey fresh out of the oven now sat in the middle of the table Darius’s contribution. Darius had insisted on not making the dressing inside the turkey. He said health regulations advised against that so he had made cornbread dressing in the oven along side the turkey. 
The dressing was something Sarah had never tasted before and Sarah wondered if she would like the unique flavours of it. She liked cornbread it was delicious so maybe as a dressing it too would be scrumptious. Dressing in the Dexler’s turkeys had been the standard dressing of bread with celery poultry seasoning onion and celery. The Dexler’s dressing for their turkeys was always delicious and Sarah had enjoyed every bite of those turkeys prepared by the Dexler’s housekeeper. Darius was an expert in cooking so surely Sarah would like this dressing as well?  It had something in common with that dressing she remembered having onions in it but there were also green onions in it and laden with turkey broth. The pies on the counter looked delicious too as they were hand made by Aunt Iva and Sarah herself. Sarah prided herself on her homemade crust which was flaky and delicious. No store bought frozen crust for this girl. Aunt Iva had even complimented Sarah on her crust. Then she had offered her preserves of strawberries, rhubarb, cherries and peaches for the pies. When Sarah had commented she had hoped to make apple pie Aunt Iva had supplied a bushel of apples from the root cellar.

        Sarah had wondered if she had overdone the pies as she looked at the side table laden with ten pies. There were after all only six people for dinner but Aunt Iva had said they would be lucky to have pie left over for tomorrow with three boys at the table. Sarah laughed at this Aunt Iva still called Darius and Demetrious’ boys. The table was beautifully decorated by Janelle, with the leaf lined table cloth and the beautiful horn of plenty in the middle of the table. Janelle had the eye of decorator when it came to details like these and made it look like something out of a magazine. Everything looked wonderful and Sarah felt a tear come to her eye when she recalled what she had gone through in the last year. She now had family, a home and a job. As she looked around and saw all the people she had become friends with and she now considered family sitting and laughing; she thought what more could a girl ask for? Sarah was truly thankful.

©Sheilagh Lee  November 14 ,2011

Southern Style Cornbread Turkey

In a large pot take cooked two turkey wings and giblets and season with salt pepper and boil until tender. Set aside broth

Take cornbread you have baked in oven in large skillet and crumble into bowl.

Bake cornbread in large black skillet breaking cornbread into large bowl. Add cut up green onions, round onions, celery, 2 to 3 beaten eggs, and 3 chopped boiled eggs. Add 1/2 loaf of cut up bread mixed with cooked onions and celery with poultry seasoning. Toss together then add as much broth (you may take some juices from baked turkey which you have set aside before making gravy.) Be careful not to make dry by adding juices (broth to keep wet ) Make sure it doesn’t get dry. Place in shallow baking dish (glass is good because it preserves heat.) serve warm to table with turkey.

Cornbread recipe baked in oven in skillet

1cup of cornmeal

2 cups of flour

1/2 cup of white sugar or 1/4 cup of molasses

Enough butter or and milk to moisten

Cook until slightly brown and cooked throughout (think cake like).

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