From our family to yours: Food & Dining Magazine wishes all of our readers a warm, happy Thanksgiving in 2024. For a bit of holiday humor, the following exploration from Jay Forman first appeared in this space in 2012.
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The Thankspigging Manifesto.
On November twenty-something, most Americans will sit down to a Thanksgiving dinner. They will eat turkey with gravy, mashed potatoes, dressings and casseroles. They will finish with pumpkin pie, wipe their mouths, and push back from the table, thinking that they have had a good meal. They are wrong!
A new power is rising: Thankspigging. And this is the story of the made-up holiday that must be told.
It began with a spark of divine intervention. While browsing the bins of medicine-ball sized frozen turkeys a few years back, my friend Teddy was struck by the fact that turkey, frankly, is boring. An avid pit master and pork devotee, he recognized – correctly – that the pig was a far tastier creature. But with hundreds of years of tradition and millions in marketing behind it, Thanksgiving was not going to easily give up the bird. Being a man of action, Teddy approached me with the concept of a new holiday, a better holiday; a holiday that involved not bland, cottony wads of corporate fowl but deliciously decadent pigs. The term “Thankspigging” was coined, and it has since become a special occasion we celebrate every year. I wish to share it with you in the hopes of spreading the good word, and to hopefully bring new participants into the fold.
A Brief History of Thankspigging
“As God took rib from Man and Made Woman, Man took Rib from Pig and Made Thankspigging.”
— Thankspigging Proverb (author unknown)
Thankspigging is more than an excuse for porcine indulgence; it is a celebration of the joys of life’s blessings. Take the Pig. Why else would God have given us such a tasty animal if he in his divine wisdom did not wish us to slow-smoke his providence over hardwood charcoal with perhaps a nice garlic and peach glaze? Thankspigging is held the day after the Holiday Who Must Not Be Named. It combines the best of both worlds – leftover side dishes, along with slow-smoked pork butts and ribs. Add some homemade beer, special pig-shaped hats and door prizes, good friends who happen to be in town for the holidays, and you have all the ingredients for a great...Read more
