Sunday was a Turkey Day 🙂

Daily weight loss: 0.2 lb/0.1 kg
Total weight loss: 48.2 lb/21.91 kg

Today was a great day! I got to cook for my Italian friend Chiara and her Chinese husband Joe and Joe’s family a full on American Thanksgiving. Chiara lived in the U.S. as an exchange student and was just as excited as I was about making a Thanksgiving dinner. Joe’s family is a very traditional Chinese family and this was a step outside the box experience for them 🙂

For breakfast I had 2 Tea Eggs… went for an early morning walk and picked up the tea eggs on my way back upstaiars.

Then Chiara and Joe picked me up around noon and off we went to their house. Let me start by saying they don’t have REAL ovens in China… the Chinese stir fry just about everything and what they don’t stir fry the boil or steam, so no need for ovens!  So I was using a very teeny table top oven (I’ve seen toaster ovens nearly this size!) and my turkey was 13 pounds!!!

My first surprise was that when I went to remove the insides his head was stuck up his ass!!! I let out a scream… LOL

You don't find THIS in a Butterball Turkey!!!

Ugh!!! Anyway, onward I went and I stuffed my bird with my favorite ingredients and some ingredients of the garden there in the back yard…

Garlic from the garden in the backyard

And basil

So garlic stems, fresh basil, a whole onion, a whole garlic pod and my secret ingredient, which isn’t so secret now… a whole cut of pear! That’s all I put inside.

It's what is inside that counts!

And then I tied his legs up to help him fit better in the oven… poor guy! Had to use sewing thread because there was nothing else available 🙂

I'm tied up right now!

I covered him in olive oil, ground sea salt and ground lemon pepper and stuffed all 13 pounds of him in the little oven.

Can I have a little more leg room, please? Note my finger holding him in!!!

Then off to prep the veggies. Most of the veggies in tonight’s meal were from the family’s vegetable garden… how awesome is that?

Fresh veggies! YUM!

Then after 3.5 hours, the bird was cooked….

He's Done!

And we ate… and they LOVED it and that makes me very thankful!!! Life is so much more fun when you get to share it with others… learning new cultures and showing my culture has helped me grow as a person… While we were having dinner, other family members and friends that lived nearby stopped in and tried the food… it was a hit! Here we are eating my Thanksgiving dinner…

The Whole Family

Home by 9 p.m….. and happy!

Ciao!

Quote of the day: Be nice to people… It’s a wonderful legacy to leave behind!