Amie Fulton / thanksgiving

Last Thursday was Thanksgiving in the USA. On this day, you are supposed to give thanks for all the things in your life. I’m very thankful for my crazy and amazing family. Each year on this day, I call Thanksgiving HQ so that I can talk to each of them. They pass the phone around to everyone….. it takes some time…. I have a big family.

On this day, I also made plans for the Thanksgiving meal I was to cook for friends the following evening. Planning and shopping for our meal reminded me of cooking for the people participating in this project. In fact, I bought my vegetables at the same organic shop that we got many ‘exotic’ items for the Perthshire weekend.

The shopping wasn’t so stressful for this weekend, Jules and I managed to shop at one of the smaller supermarket chains. We found more fair trade and organic produce. We still haven’t managed to purchase completely local, but then I’m only pretending to be a real cook!

Preparing and planning to cook in Perthshire felt less scary - similar to cooking for friends. This time I went to great lengths to ensure that the meals were completely inclusive. I planned to make meals that everyone could eat - no matter what their dietary requirements. This meant that the menus needed to be vegetarian, wheat and gluten-free.

It was really nice to design inclusive meals. I hoped that meal time made people feel like they were being cared for. By planning inclusive menus (rather than veggie options for example) I thought that I could put my heart and soul into each meal. Especially as I wouldn’t have to worry about making several different dishes for various requirements!

The kitchen in Perthshire was located further from the workshops than in Knoydart. However, I think (and hope) that the inclusive meals, and the large dining table provided another important space for the participants - similar to my huge family’s Thanksgiving table.