Favorite Thanksgiving color? Bright green

With Thanksgiving coming up fast, I thought it would be nice to reminisce a little. I never had a big family that went all out for holidays, but the importance of tradition still makes up a large part of my memories. As a country, we celebrate Thanksgiving by eating the traditional meal; a turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, etc. You’ve got green beans, mac and cheese, gravy and the works. I particularly like sweet potato pie and how my mother has brought Korean dishes onto our holiday tables. I love that there are multiple cultures represented on our table and the myriad of cuisines we have normalized. However, one particular tradition that my family has adopted is a little strange. 

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It all happened the one year my aunt put way too many drops of green food coloring into her pie filling recipe. I don’t think I’d ever seen a dessert so bright in my life. Of course, most of my family members around the table were adamantly against putting the (bio)hazardously green pie into their bodies, but in my youth, I had a tendency to just go ahead and do things without thinking. Despite a general feeling of judgement from my family members, I remember blurting out that I would gladly eat this pie. It became a mission to consume more than one slice of this pie, even though my stomach was already full from Thanksgiving dinner. After the first bite, my tongue was stained green, but it tasted great. I kept going. After the second bite, I felt a sense of accomplishment because I was the only one willing to eat this pie. After the first slice, the entire border of my mouth had a slight green tinge. After the second slice, I’m pretty sure my vision was blurred with green spots. Maybe. 

Looking back, there was nothing actually wrong about eating the pie apart from its horribly bright color. The ingredients, per my aunt, were all the same as they normally were. Her hand had just slipped when coloring the filling and she shrugged it off. I think it’s funny that we won’t eat things unless they look a certain way, or that we have to train our brains to think it is okay to consume something that looks a little strange. Now, each Thanksgiving, my family laughs about that bright green pie and I joke that it changed my body chemistry forever. 

Overall, the traditions we have bring us together, especially around the holiday season. I love hearing about other peoples’ family traditions but I have yet to find another story about a violently green key-lime pie that was just as bright on the way out as it was on the way in.