Holidays are just moments of the year when we get to push the boundaries outwards and also turn our hearts inwards in equal measures.
Today my children wanted me to prepare a story in a plate. Instead it turned out to be many stories in a saucer.
The first story was of my first holiday dinner in the U.S., back in November 1989, in South Haven Mississippi. My name is Njathi Kabui, and I am from Kenya. As a young adult, I had a dream to immigrate and attend college in the United States of America.
I had been in the U.S for barely 2 months. I had been married for less than one month, and was unsure just how long I could survive in a system that was so alien to me that I couldn't compare it to anything I had imagined. Yet no one knows what tomorrow brings or takes away.
I compared that dinner event with the last food event held at my village five months prior to that date, for a fundraiser for my college fund. The women in my family cooked outside, behind our house, until 3:00 in the morning. They went home and took a nap before waking up, then prepared for the fundraiser that afternoon at the local primary school.
Many people from the community showed up and contributed in cash and “in kind”. One woman brought some eggs for auction, while my my aunt donated a goat for the same. It was an amazing sign of generosity. In the end, we collected about the equivalent of what I charge now for one hour of work.
My children will never know that kind of life. They will never know what life in the village feels like. Whenever they visit, they are outsiders looking in. Such is life. But what it does offer is the re-creation of a version of the flavors that marked that era. Those flavors are unforgettable. I therefore prepared a small serving of pastured lamb with a rub I made, and fermented with fruit of the African Sausage tree. It was baked in the oven, and the skillet was deglazed to sauté a mixture of 4 types of greens, straight from our backyard here in North Carolina. Those home-grown greens were, namely, Swiss chard, lacinato kale, curled leaf Kale, dandelion and sorrell. I added Shitake mushrooms to the greens, then added some shredded purple radish. The portions were small, to remind them of the challenges ahead. We then made an herbal tea from some of the roots from the backyard, and sweetened it with honey. I made chickpea pie, with only 6 ingredients. These were: chick peas, banana, avocado, maple syrup, and blue berries, and a pinch or two of cinnamon. It's one of my simplest recipes but yet the flavors couldn't have been more eclectic, even across the generational divide between me and my children. My dinner was just a prelude for a bigger dinner. It was also a harbinger of things to come in the next 33 years, and beyond! Today marks my 33rd Thanksgiving, here in the U.S.