The We to Be

The kitchen resounds with creative anticipation as Doug Gosling puts finishing touches on the Mother Garden salad

Thanksgiving continues to be my favorite holiday, because it’s about gratitude and blessings, toasts and being with family and/or those you love most.

Our gathering at Soundcliff this year was slow, sweet, and amazingly delicious.

Our theme: The We To Be. Living the Future.

Our tradition includes a wonderful meal with courses brought by different guests, punctuated by poetry, beach walks, stories, and circles.

We had 11 for our repast, which began at 12:30 and went deep into the night.

Our first course included a quince paste with fromage blanc, lamb liver mouse, and goat cheese bruschetta with sun-dried tomatoes and roasted garlic.

Christopher Young chops rosemary while Whit Kimball shucks garlic as the meal takes shape, slowly and synergetically

Our soup was a mushroom delight – chantrelles and cauliflower mushrooms which Malcolm had foraged – in a light salmon broth. Local heaven.

The salad, from the Mother Garden at the Occidental Arts and Ecology Center, was a true work of art, complete with crostini and leek butter, baby carrots, beets, various kales, arugula, lettuces, tatsoi, rose petals, flowers from the Soundcliff garden, and dressed with a pineapple guava dressing. Doug Gosling always outdoes himself!

Gordon’s roasted brined turkey, cooked simply without stuffing, many said was the best they’d ever had. It was augmented by Christopher’s oven roasted vegetables and Mama Stamberg’s cranberry relish made and served with relish by Sequoia. Malcolm made rich gravy, and Michael Hathaway’s Brussels sprouts were so rich as to taste like foie gras (see recipe below).

Neil Robertson’s desserts, as always, were more than just. Having just won the prize for best restaurant dessert by Seattle Magazine for his chocolate upon chocolate special at Canlis, he decided to go “traditional” for Thanksgiving. That meant a deep dish apple pie that would have your mother’s mouth watering for weeks, a classic pumpkin pie with bourbon-whipped cream, and a pecan pie made with espresso and a hint of chocolate.

As part of our future theme, we celebrated the election of Obama in many ways. And the kickoff of the Big Joy Project, a celebration of James Broughton which includes a documentary which I'm producing. In honor of that, Michael Hathaway recited a poem he wrote for James at Eastertime, 1993:

SAP SONG

While admiring a white-and-cerise
blossoming Crabapple

for James Broughton

Here we are again, oh yes!, hear hear!
Oh Desirous! Oh God!
Oh light Love and oh bright Beauty!
Oh look where we are heading:
Oh yes, for Life again!
Be sweetly dazed and slightly dazzled:
Breeze me and sneeze me,
Waft me and small me,
Touch me and tell me: my petals, my bliss:
Don’t you just adore my special effects?!

Sprinkle picnics around me,
Weddings and prayers and trysts!
All hopes that rise,
and all fulfillments, all delights!

Doing our meticulous anabolizing work,
Transceiving the sun’s intents,
(which thus give form to ours),
We can only be Love Made Visible
again, now, so freshly, Oh Yes!!
And again, now, so freshly, Oh Yes!!

(more coming)

Michael Hathaway and Doug Gosling help prepare the traditional day-after-Thanksgiving evelskiver breakfast

It doesn't get much better than sunrise at Soundcliff!