PLANNING THE PORTIONS, OR HOW MUCH IS TOO MUCH?

I bought the turkey for our extended family Thanksgiving dinner – 21.3 pounds at $.27 per pound at Albertson's with additional $25.00 purchase. It's not hard to spend the additional $25.00 these days. I brought the turkey home and managed to fit it into the freezer by removing the box containing Hallie and Nick's cake tier. It's now in the refrigerator freezer.

I thought the turkey would be big enough for a gathering of 22 people – almost a pound per person. Of course when you discard all the juice that bakes out, you no longer have a pound per person. But an article I read last night said to plan a pound and a half per person, which would allow for leftovers. Whoever heard of a 33-pound turkey? And who would want one? And I'M NOT roasting two turkeys. In point of fact, I'm only responsible for providing turkey for the dinner at which 22 will be present. Our hostess will also provide a nice ham.

Our extended family dinners aren't so much potlucks as cooperative affairs to which participating families agree to bring assigned food. Our blogger on "Retro Modern Housewife" points out that if you step outside your assigned area to provide additional food, it upsets the balance. She related an incident wherein she was assigned the pumpkin pie and she made two. Someone else decided to bring pie also, just because she wanted to. In the end there was too much pie, and our writer carried home her untouched pumpkin pies, which don't keep. I had never thought of the provision of additional food in that light.

But – it's evidently an age-old problem. Here's what Ina wrote about a cooperative Christmas dinner in 1934: "Aunt [Bertha, Ina's sister] helped me out by dressing a fat young rooster and bringing it ready for the roaster. She also insisted on making pies since I had my hands full – mince and pumpkin. One of each would be plenty, I said, but no – here came two each and ginger cookies frosted. She'd tried a new recipe. So we had mince and pumpkin pie with whipped cream on it, ginger cookies, fruit cake and do-nuts, and fruit and whipped cream for that, coffee, oranges, nuts and candy besides the after dinner mints. Well, we just parceled out the leftovers amongst the guests. I got thru it just fine. It was a good day."

At first I thought that fat young rooster was surely not enough for a gathering of 12 adults. It looked as if they would have very little meat per person, especially in consideration of all the dessert on hand. In re-reading that letter, I found Ina had also prepared roast beef. It was a feast in a lean year. To me it proves one thing. The tradition of holiday feasting, at least in my family, goes way back and is not just a modern-day development. KW