Someone Like You 57/61: Family portraits - Beecher/Stabler

[drsquidlove]

Someone Like You
by Dr Squidlove
drsquidlove @@@ livejournal.com

Oz/Law & Order: SVU crossover

Tobias Beecher's trying to rebuild his family in the shadow of the man he was in prison. Elliot Stabler's struggling to continue in the wake of divorce while his job eats away at his soul. It makes for an odd friendship, but it works.

Comments

Couscous salad

[wycombe]

One small thing. Unless a family is from the Levant or North Africa, vegan, or simply not interested in a traditional Thanksgiving menu, it is unlikely that couscous salad would appear on most US tables at TG. Maybe Holly is just throwing in her own eccentric twist on the menu. Otherwise, the couscous salad eating demographic is pretty slim on any other day of the year, let alone on TG.

In general people here are rigidly resistant to deviating from the standard menu of heavy fare. I think part of it is that children like the relatively bland main courses and the once-a-year multiplicity of rich desserts that they know and like. Adults may just like it because it reminds them of a family holiday when they themselves were kids.

Thanksgiving is historically about celebrating a gift of unexpected plenty under circumstances of austerity. In religious families, I think the repetition of this menu has become to some degree an unwritten religious ritual. Even with the increasing public discourse about healthy diets, Thanksgiving has long been a marathon of eating a variety of heavy, rich food that is the equivalent 3 normal meals at one sitting. Couscous? Not so much.

So, if at least Dicky and Elizabeth don't balk at the couscous salad, I would be very surprised, unless Maureen, or even Kathleen, kick them under the table if they detect any funny faces coming on. Even so, it might trigger a contagious and inexplicable eruption of giggling that could turn into a general riot of uncontrolled laughter. The sort of thing that can happen when everyone is trying to pretend that there isn't a farting elephant in the middle of the room and the little kids aren't buying it.

Re: Couscous salad

[wycombe]

Sorry to riff on something so irrelevant to this wonderfully crafted story. I didn't mean to be crass. My mind just ran away with this vision of a picky and temporarily agitated child's reaction to a relatively unfamiliar food appearing at a holiday meal whose menu is an immutable construct that absolutely nobody ever EVER questions. And kids can be very funny about food. Nothing will make a kid act out like when all the adults are straining to keep a smile on their faces, expecting the kids to follow suit, and all of the kids see through the hypocrisy of it all, as they always do. It just takes one kid giving a certain kind of twitchy look to another kid over some little unspoken thing that they both get, and everything comes apart, hilariously.

Re: Couscous salad

[drsquidlove]

Okay. So. A few things on this. Yup, I do know that couscous is not traditional, and I know that you guys are freakin' weird about Thanksgiving.

Admittedly, part of what I'm doing stems from me being quite appalled by Thanksgiving. (Like iskra suggested.) From all description, it's a holiday so unspeakably awful that one could only have affection built in via childhood reinforcement, in much the same way Australians eat Vegemite, or Americans call Hersheys 'chocolate'.

But this is not going to be 'most' US tables. Holly has picked out the menu, and she's a food wanker. (Hence Toby commenting on the drive that she'd wanted to scrap it all for a seafood extravaganza.) She was raised by rich grandparents, where it's not unlikely that they would have gourmet versions of traditional food, and in the last year she's become the sort of precocious foodie who'd choose to cook Caribbean stuffed snapper. So it seemed logical to me that she'd be doing twists on some of the traditions.

While the couscous demographic might be slim across the American population generally, I wouldn't say that's true in NYC. (For Thanksgiving, sure, but not at a restaurant or dinner party.) I'm totally okay with Dickie and/or Elizabeth balking at breaks with tradition, but (aside from Holly) the only kid at the table is Harry. And Holly might well stick spiders in his bowl, so she doesn't care if he doesn't like it.

There's also a little influence here from my experience of Christmas (which admittedly, is not straightjacketed in the menu like Thanksgiving). There's a movie idea that the Christmas family gathering is one day, but for plenty of people, it's two or three separate occasions, as you cover divorced parents and/or in-laws. You don't want the same meal three days in a row, so you change it up. This may be Thanksgiving for these four, but it's actually Saturday, and Elliot's kids did the down-the-line turkey dinner with Kathy on Thursday. So while it's weird to change the menu, it seems weird to me to stick as tightly to the menu as I did.

So, yeah. There are reasons.

Thanks wycombe.

S.

Re: Couscous salad

[wycombe]

Well, of course you know what you’re doing. What was I thinking?? I can’t believe how many little things you know about the US and the setting of this story, not that people can’t travel and learn things if they are from somewhere other than they are writing about.

Yes, TG is very weird, at lease insofar as just about everyone insists on having this same dreary gag reflex inducing meal every year, no matter how broad a food universe they have during the other 364 days. Otherwise, the “unspeakably awful” baggage depends on the person and their history. As you obviously know, the one good thing about this holiday is that most people get concurrent vacation time that enables them to host or travel to connect with friends and family that they would like to connect with.

I have little affection for this holiday or its menu. I thought that the drunk uncle, and his yelling at the TV football game was right one the mark. I would love to join forces with someone with Holly’s food sensibilities at Thanksgiving. I just thought I was the only one.

“Food wanker”. Hilarious. Well, of course she is. She’s artistic. And, like Toby, for related reasons, she probably likes to be in control of whatever she can control. Food is big. And for Holly, who can see what’s at stake here, this get-together needs a whole lot of controlling.

Aside from this particular weekend, it’s something that Toby and Holly can have fun with doing together, including watching all the cooking shows and pouring over all of those glossy and brainy cooking magazines. It all makes perfect sense. And yeah, NYC. When she said what size pieces she wanted the peppers chopped up, I could see it all. But their Vermont stove top must be as big as Texas.

The one thing that I am hoping to get out of this precocious meal planning is a flaming dessert that will make everyone applaud and yell when they bring it on. It’s just a question of which one…I couldn’t possibly guess. I suppose we’ll just have to wait and see.

Thanks for explaining your perspective on all of this. It was interesting.

Re: Couscous salad

[drsquidlove]

I do live part time in the US, so I've got a pretty good line on a lot of stuff, but I've never spent Thanksgiving, for which I am increasingly thankful. Digging out the base menu wasn't too hard; it's working out how it all goes together that's complicated, so for that I chased my friend Elayna, who was kind enough to give an incredibly detailed explanation of when you cook what and what's expected of guests, all the nitty details. And that's when I learned about ambrosia, which I still suspect may be a joke at my expense, much like all those people who pretend to like kale chips.

Heh. My google searches for fancy Thanksgiving variants suggest you are not the only one who'd want to change it up. Though I have to say, I wouldn't eat any of Holly's additions, either. But I do like the idea of them bonding over learning to cook together. I picture Toby, fresh out of prison, wanting to know how to look after himself, getting frustrated that cooking simple meals isn't nearly as simple as he assumed it would be, but when Holly comes into the kitchen he has to curb his temper. And together they figure it out, and it becomes a symbol of their united push for independence. Yay!

Ha. No flaming desserts. They've got to save something for the future.

Your comments were really helpful; I had reasons for what I did, but this was a good reinder that I needed to work those justifications in a little better, so I did some adjusting on the next couple of chapters.

Thanks, wycombe!

S.

Re: Couscous salad

[sahem62896]

Since I seem to recall in an earlier chapter she and her father picking out recipes for TG dinner, I'm willing to support the idea that this was Holly mixing things up a bit. Even so, I think it's okay to let this slide because (a) every family does things differently, (b) ideally the celebration of there being plenty to eat and having family around is really more important than the actual meal itself, and (c) this story is too freakin' good to let such a little matter be bigger than it is. 😜😄❤️

Re: Couscous salad

[iskra667]

Being French (and Dr Squid is Australian) that's still the type of info that I like to learn.

From the comment, it seems Americans are a lot like Brits regarding Holiday food. When I had my first Christmas dinner in the UK, I was weirded out by the Turkey and sprouts fetish, bordering on obsessive reverence. The most because it's totally beyond me how boiled sprouts can be considered any kind of festive food. I'm not a traditional person, and would rather pick the best food/ideas/habits from each country, but there are a few things that make me just go WTF? and sprouts at a festive dinner are definitely one them them... :D And the turkey thing I just don't understand why just turkey, because back when my mum was still cooking large dinners, we sort of sampled different types of poultry and found out that goose was much tenderer and tasty, while still being white poultry like turkey, and duck was real nice though a little redder/less traditional so maybe not for everyone. So we just ditched the turkey because there were tastier equivalents around. But British people I know don't think like that when cooking Holiday dinners, it seems more about the traditions that the food itself.

Re: Couscous salad

[sahem62896]

I think the reason we eat turkey is because it's HUGE. A good sized bird can feed a large family and still leave some for leftovers. It's also relatively inexpensiove compared to other some meats and easier to find.
Supposedly, at the first thanksgiving they ate venison (deer) which is also very delicious and can last a while long after everyone has eaten their fill. However, venison is not often found in an American supermarket (or at an affordable price if so). In most cases, if you are determined to eat deer, you have to hunt it.... and not too many people these days seem to want to go to that kind of trouble.

Re: Couscous salad

[drsquidlove]

Thank you, sahem!

Yup, that was the thinking. Bless Holly, I find her additions to the menu just as gross as all the traditional dishes, but it made sense to me that she'd change it up. Damn, I wish I'd thought of venison, through. I'm sure non-hunters could get it from a specialty butcher, and Holly could have done something awesome with that.

I do welcome nitpicks, for curiosity's sake as much as anything, but it also means a lot that someone else sees the plan.

S.

Re: Couscous salad

[drsquidlove]

Thanks iskra!

I do like to learn. And I have been interested to find out what niggles people with my attempt to cover Thanksgiving. But it's also a relief that it's being picked up as a Holly thing.

Yes, yes yes. Turkey tastes like someone dragged their poultry out of the old chicken's home. I know it can be done well, by an extraordinary chef, but generally, it's dry and stringy and tasteless. And seriously, if someone dragged me through terrible traffic to serve me turkey and cranberries and root vegetables, and then put pumpkin in my *dessert*, and then turned on a football game, and there weren't even any presents or chocolate, I'd stab them with a turkey bone.

There's been a nice evolution in Australia. We clung to British Christmas traditions for a long time (not the boiled sprouts, thank goodness, which could only reasonably be a festive food in a Russian gulag), but winter roast dinners don't make so much sense when it's nudging 40degC, so these days you're just as likely to find cold cuts or salads or seafood. If we do roast something, it could be turkey or ham or lamb or a leg of pork. I did a barbecue for Christmas this year, kangaroo and prawns, and it was great. And we've ditched Christmas pudding because it's disgusting and nobody likes it except for really old people.

S.

Re: Couscous salad

[iskra667]

not the boiled sprouts, thank goodness, which could only reasonably be a festive food in a Russian gulag

LOL! Even in Oz, it would cause a riot :D

Re: Couscous salad

[edub82]

Since I haven't commented in a few chapters, I figured I may as well jump in on the couscous debate. I'm also an American and from a family who has pretty regular Thanksgiving traditions. However, I'm on board with Holly's couscous. Squid's Holly is definitely the type to want to appear cool and different. She's trying to impress. And she certainly doesn't seem to identify herself as a child. I can see myself at that age trying to throw something different or multicultural into the mix when given some responsibility in holiday meal planning to look "cool and worldly." Toby is trying to establish some familiarity and tradition into a celebration, but this day is a whole whirlwind of different. It's also a mixing of families. So why not mix in some Mediterranean with their American Holiday? Granted this is coming from a girl with a family of mixed Western European and Lebanese ancestry, but I digress :) Toby is handing Holly the reigns as much as he can on this, which I think is pretty important on a grander scale. Leave it to a precocious kid to mix things up a bit.
-E

Re: Couscous salad

[drsquidlove]

Thanks E!

I do love that this has become a debate.

This is what I figure. Holly's a bit of a food wanker. She likes doing fancy food, so I can't see her not trying to do something with her first ever big entertaining meal.

These families may both be whitey-white, but they're also New Yorkers. Admittedly, my New York friends-circle is heavily weighted towards lapsed Jews and ex-pats and hippies, but they're all far more worldly and food-experimental than the American TV standard. I wouldn't be surprised if they were used to full traditional at home with their parents, but with most of the middle-aged and younger, I'd be surprised if they didn't put their own stamp on the meal.

S.