I first saw it in an email ad from Kroger about a week ago. The email featured coupons, menus, recipes, tips, and even a timetable for preparing Thanksgiving dinner, including appetizers, side dishes, and desserts. I was drawn first to the recipes, of course, and that’s where I saw the photo of a turkey-shaped cheeseball, complete with pretzel feet, cracker face, and a colorful bell-pepper tail. It made me laugh just to look at it, and I could tell it would be fairly easy to put together. A lot easier than the cheeseball turkeys I made a few years ago.

That recipe made individual, single-serve turkeys. The recipe called for meatball-sized cheeseballs set on a cracker, with pretzel sticks for the neck, golden dates for the head, carrot-slice beaks, and sliced almonds for tail feathers. They looked great in the photo, and seemed easy to make. But—not so in real life. At least, not my real life.

We had a “Friendsgiving” celebration that year, and my friend helped me put the turkeys back together when the pretzels kept breaking, the carrot beaks kept falling off, and the dates refused to stay attached, rendering the cheeseball turkeys headless. Not a pretty sight, but we eventually made it work.

We’ve already got our Thanksgiving dinner plans and menu set for this year, and I don’t intend to make any turkey cheeseballs, but I’m saving the new recipe for future use. I think this one really will turn out to be as easy to make and as cute as the photo in the ad.

I sent a text—including the photo and recipe—to the friend who helped me rescue the turkey cheeseballs several years ago. “I thought of you as soon as I saw this,” I told her, adding that it reminded me of that earlier Thanksgiving’s turkey-cheeseballs—the ones where the pretzels kept breaking off, and the carrot beaks weren’t working. “But you helped me put them back together,” I added, “and even if they weren’t photogenic, they were fun, and almost cute, and they actually tasted pretty good. Plus, they gave us some good laughs and memories. Who could ask for anything more?”

And that’s what’s really important, isn’t it? For Thanksgiving dinner or any meal—whether we are celebrating with family or with friends, and whether there are dozens of people around our table, or just a few. More important than how the food looks or tastes, if we’re with people with whom we can have fun, with whom we share laughs and memories, that’s something to be thankful for. At Thanksgiving, and throughout the year.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

November 23, 2024
©Betty Liedtke, 2024

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