Thanksgiving in Serbia Part 1
So of course, there is no Thanksgiving in Belgrade while the term is used for a holiday of giving thanks for the harvest or bounty that we have received, it is a unique country-specific holiday. I know nothing of the Canadian Thanksgiving, for example, as up to know I have only celebrated the American holiday. There is a tradition of having turkey in the former Yugoslavia in late November it was the Day of the Republic celebrated on November 29th beginning in 1945 and continued to the final dissolution of Yugoslavia in 2002 to celebrate the beginning of the Republic after WW2
We decided when before we moved to Serbia that since Thanksgiving was my favorite holiday, we would keep the holiday and make it our big party for the year. We started planning 6 months ahead of time thinking about who as coming and what extras we could make and how to accomplish a Thanksgiving dinner in an apartment we had just moved into. What was the oven in the new apartment like, where would we get the turkey, the cornbread and the celery for my mother stuffing that my wife has made so much better, the wine, the Rokia (Serbian brandy) so many details, not knowing if we would even have an apartment ready for this as we started?
For the turkey, there are several options in Serbia. There are places that cook pig and lamb and turkey on the spit to order and we looked at those. I wanted to cook it myself but wanted it cut up. I have cooked whole turkeys before and you end up with perfect white meat or perfect dark meat, and Bon Appetite had the plan to cut it into parts and cook them so you can pull out the white meat at the proper temp and leave the dark meat to cook a little longer.
We also knew it was going to have to be a big turkey for 25 people coming all evening long. We found a purveyor in the market across the street from my mother in law, a 20-kilo turkey cut into parts we got to keep all the bones and got four breasts and four legs and all the parts for soup and stock. It ended up being too much for sure. We cooked two breasts and two legs and still had more than we needed but they were perfect.
More to come in Part 2 find out about the wine and Rakia, the pies and making of the stuffing and in Part 3 the party