A family Thanksgiving affair
As all 50 of us prepared for Thanksgiving, the day had its usual complications, mishaps and celebrations. My entire family began a tradition of hosting our Thanksgiving dinner at Cosimos restaurant located on Delafield Street in Poughkeepsie just a few years ago.
Before this tradition was created in my family, which consists of four matriarch grandmothers who are all now widowed and their children and grandchildren. Each family spent Thanksgiving at one of the four grandmother’s house and prepared the days meal within their home.
“We are all so fortunate to be here together,” said Maria Balbo, my grandmother who happily expresses these words every time she sees her entire family together on Thanksgiving day. The preparation in the big kitchen and the table decorations all become a morning long affair for whichever grandchildren are able to make it over to the restaurant.
With all the different recipes and cooking methods for preparing the turkey and stuffing, each grandmother gets to work with the help of their many children and grandchildren in hopes of passing down their traditions from one generation to another.
Everyone there looks forward to not only the dishes they have had prepared by their grandparents and parents year after year, but also get excited to try the new recipes and food family members have thought of.
When I tell people that my family gets together every Thanksgiving and have a large celebration, the first question I get asked is “What kind of pasta does your family make?” Considering we are a very Italian family, this question would not be so out of the ordinary to ask, but we try to keep things as traditional to “American” cuisine as possible.
The only pasta we eat on thanksgiving is macaroni and cheese casserole. Some of the other dishes prepared were corn casserole, twice baked potato, fried peppers, broccoli rabe and much more.
At home though the cooking continued for some of the family members- family that includes the surnames of Balbo, Citera, DiBrizzi and Costanzo. All families based out of either Poughkeepsie or Newburgh, New York. Each family gets tasked with one food item to bring, whether it be a side dish, an appetizer or something else!
“I like knowing that for this one day every year we are all basically forced to be at the same place at the same time,” said Mara Breglia, my 19 year old cousin.
Thanksgiving Day really is the one-day everyone in the family is bound to show up because really there is nowhere else to go and because everyone wants to be there more importantly.
The entire restaurant gets shutdown for the whole day as we begin to take over the many rooms that make up Cosimos in Poughkeepsie. We spread ourselves all over the place and sort of pick up our conversations from when we all last spoke and saw each other.
But before we do so, the recently prepared food has to go straight from the kitchen to the three tables set up just to display the food. Figuring out the placement of where each dish should be placed alone takes an hour, and each person walks into that room and adjusts the settings to the way they prefer it.
By the time the food gets placed around a bunch of different times for really no reason, our hunger begins to set in and the realization that the food is finally ready sets in.
“Besides the food, I really do look forward to seeing the family, hearing what every one has been up to and reminiscing about past holidays together,” said my aunt Mary Citera, from Margate, New Jersey but also an alumna of Marist College.
To have so many family members share a holiday together is not something that happens often. To be able to say that every year we all get together on Thanksgiving Day is really a prideful event for everyone involved and a way to express our appreciation for one another and on a holiday like Thanksgiving, that only seems appropriate.
