How To: Expat Thanksgiving

by Danielle 

In honor of my fourth year celebrating the holiday in the UK, here are my top four tips for making sure your expat Friendsgiving goes off without a hitch. Read on and learn from my mistakes so you can look good in front of your cool new friends.

Tip 1: We're Not in Kansas Anymore

Turkeys are saved for Christmas here and you're a month too early. Don't make the same mistake I did my first expat Thanksgiving and expect to find a turkey for less than £60 on the day (i.e. if you're reading this for Thanksgiving 2014, you're probably already too late, sorry). Depending on where you are, a fresh turkey may be hard to come by. You can usually find decent frozen turkeys in the bigger supermarkets, including ASDA, Sainsbury's, and Waitrose (a Tesco Express will probably be of little use to you). Waitrose and Whole Foods both cater to American expats and if you haven't spent the bulk of your November budget on Asos, you can order a fresh turkey from either in advance. If you have a car (or someone you're feeding does), trek out to one of the UK's 26 Costco stores for deals on fresh turkey crowns (and all your other Friendsgiving needs). Bonus points if you stop for hotdogs mid-shop.

Similarly, if you're a cornbread person you're going to run into some trouble. (Unless you're not a failure of an American and can make it from scratch.) Whole Foods has a gluten-free mix that I've yet to try, but the best cornbread I've had here was from a Trader Joe's mix I brought back after summer holidays in California. So, you know, plan ahead.

Tip 2: Birds of a Feather (Eat Thanksgiving Dinner Together)

Invite one or two of your fellow Americans along. While your British friends will surely appreciate the free food, they've probably never had the experience of tracing hand turkeys or making paper pilgrim hats. Your American friends will hopefully also help you pointedly ignore whoever decides to bring up the whole mass-genocide-and-land-theft thing. Maybe they'll even retort with a brief history of British Colonialism. Yeah, that'll shut the Brits right up. We're all terrible, help yourself to another serving of green bean casserole.

Which brings us to the next tip...

Tip 3: Don't Let Them See You Making the Green Bean Casserole

They'll think it's gross. Let's face it, when you found out how green bean casserole is made you probably thought it was a little disgusting too.

Bonus tip: You can get French's French Fried Onions from various American food websites (Google it) and online food retailer, Ocado. (The latter is also pretty good for turkeys.)

Tip 4: Skimp on Dessert

Unless you're some mystical dessert-making goddess, buy your pies pre-made (trick your guests by transferring it from its packaging into your fanciest cookware when no one is looking) or convince someone to bring it. This will save you a world of effort (especially if, like me time and time again, you've gotten a little overexcited and invited half of London), and the Brits generally know their way around a pie.

Don't like cooking? TimeOut London has a list of restaurants doing special Thanksgiving dinners in the city.

Don't live in London? Try Google. I'm busy trying to fit a giant turkey into a fridge shared between five people.