STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — I love Thanksgiving—always have.
After more than two decades of covering it for the Staten Island Advance, I’ve collected plenty of backstories from the 24-hour Turk-A-Thon days. Not gonna lie — those nights were brutal after midnight, when no one was truly cooking and only the stragglers were out on the busiest bar night of the year. The downside? Falling asleep in my smashed potatoes the next day. Still, the bleary aftermath was worth it for the war stories — and for the column fodder I’m sharing now in the spirit of my favorite holiday.
It’s a pleasure to dole out cooking advice, especially when it all goes well. Pamela SilvestriThe Blog Days: Turning Tables
Back then, my blog was called Turning Tables, a nod to restaurant life and flipping the script. By Year Three, I had cemented a Thanksgiving Eve tradition: revisiting the WKRP turkey drop and channeling my best Les Nessman. And in 2008, I added something extra — live help for last-minute turkey questions. From 7 p.m. Thanksgiving Eve through 11 a.m. on Thanksgiving Day, I answered cooking queries and shared stories from Staten Island’s restaurant community. Topics ranged from “Those Dreadful Dishes” to “Is it safe to feed table scraps to the dog?” — all aimed at keeping the holiday stress-free…and readers mildly entertained. Those who tuned in could leave comments or email me (which you still can) at silvestri@siadvance.com.
Can’t bake? A professionally made pie from Mother Mousse in Travis might be a good option.Pamela SilvestriHoliday Emergencies: Cookie Crisis at Midnight
Now, I’m a decent baker, although it is totally not my strong suit. One year, a reader reached out near midnight with a cookie crisis: her Spritz cookie press had broken. I thought, “OMG—a true food emergency!” Cortisol pumped. Determined to help, I jumped in. I’d never used a cookie press in my life, but even pre-children I knew my way around plastic wrap and zippered bags. Pulling from the practical food universe, I suggested rolling the dough into a log and slicing it into pucks. A few days later, she emailed to say it worked. We still keep in touch.
Those moments gave me enormous empathy for colleagues navigating the chaos of early blog culture: the early days of bots, quirky screen names, plus my comment-section regulars and/or snarkers like Maestro, IDineYouEat, PlatoonWife, SIWatcher, PizzaKing, BagelQueen, and SIRoadkill.
Cranberry jelly can be eased out of the can to show off the ribbings of the can, if one so desires — tap, tap.
And that brings me back to my own table traditions—Norman Rockwell-style in East Brunswick, New Jersey, complete with turkey, dry humor, and a few culinary curiosities.
At Aunt Grace and Uncle Wes’s house, there was no lasagna at the Swedish-Irish feast—just turkey with dry humor to match. A few microwaved marshmallow experiments rounded out the menu. Uncle Wes’s grace was short and sweet: “Tweet tweet. Thanks for the meat. Yay, God!” My grandmother’s prized dish was Mold—fruit and marshmallows suspended in a shimmering Jell-O ring. I think that’s a Depression-era thing, but not to be dismissed. And Aunt Grace’s elevated cranberry sauce? A perfect cylinder of ribbed Ocean Spray eased from a can onto a plate with a few gentle taps of a knife.
One year, my Uncle Jim — who owned a restaurant in Manhattan — managed to insult Aunt Grace with what sounded like a compliment: “Wow, Aunt Grace, the turkey is good this year.” She was as offended as my father was by Uncle Wes’s jokes about Albert Shanker and the UFT — jabs not taken lightly by the rank-and-file “Bored of Ed” teachers like my Dad.
In the meantime, I wish you a Happy Thanksgiving, plenty of love around a bountiful table, and the kind of holiday memories you can laugh about now and cherish forever.
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