home

Edwards' Clever Thanksgiving Donation Request

I just received an e-mail from the John Edwards campaign, written by John's mother Bobbi. It's very clever -- on two levels. She writes:

As a member of our campaign family, If you donate just $20.08 (for the year we'll elect my son the next president of the United States!), I'll send you Elizabeth's recipe for bread pudding, David and Judy Bonior's recipes for "Sweet Potatoes with Apples" and "Mushroom Soup," along with Joe and Kathy's recipe for "Old Fashioned Down on the Farm Country Stuffing" -- and my own special recipe for one of John's favorites, Mac n' Cheese! Click here to make a contribution and get five favorite Thanksgiving recipes!

Level one: You get something back for your donation -- that's a great selection of "comfort food" recipes and it gives you a homey, warm feeling just reading the list: Mac 'n Cheese, sweet potatoes, bread pudding.

Level two: While I have no data on this, I suspect that it's mostly women who are in charge of the family thanksgiving day menu and interested in holiday recipes. By offering the recipes, it seems like Edwards is targeting women voters, trying to take some from Hillary.

I've put a short poll below as to who chooses the Thanksgiving day recipes (not the menu)in your house:

< Tancredo Catches Heat Over "One Language" Speech | Mike Tyson Sentenced to One Day on Coke, DUI Charge >

Poll

Who Chooses theThanksgiving Meal Recipes at Your House?
Male 11%
Female 55%
Both 33%

Votes: 18
Results | Other Polls
  • The Online Magazine with Liberal coverage of crime-related political and injustice news

  • Contribute To TalkLeft


  • Display: Sort:
    At scribe's dinner, (none / 0) (#1)
    by scribe on Mon Nov 19, 2007 at 12:15:27 PM EST
    the menu is pretty much fixed from year to year, regardless of where the dinner is to be held or who's cooking.  Even the recipes are pretty solid:

    Turkey - roasted, with filling.  No brining, marinades, deep-frying, braising, deboning, turning into a turducken, or other fancinesses.
    Filling - so called, because it is.  Where scribe comes from, we don't call it "stuffing" (chairs have stuffing) or "dressing" (It's cold outside, and we're already dressed.).  It's a secret derivation from a regional recipe all have memorized and is made from scratch.  No boxes or bags here.  It starts with bacon, though, and it's based on torn bread, not rice, cornbread, wild rice, or any of the other strangenesses.  The big debate is often over whether to include the turkey's liver and heart or not.  I'm almost always in favor.
    Sweet potatoes - from the can, with carefully-caramelized sugar (start with a pile of granulated sugar in a frying pan over medium heat.  Melt and carmelize, but avoid igniting it.) as the base for an orange sauce (real oranges used), but never marshmallows.  The big option here:  raisins or no?
    Mashed potatoes - real potatoes, mashed with butter and milk and a little pepper
    Green salad - usually iceberg and bitter fall lettuces and plain oil and vinegar
    Cranberry sauce - carefully extracted from the can so as to preserve the ridges the can leaves and presented upright, so all can admire the can-opener's skill.
    Turkey gravy - made with real roux, pan drippings and broth from cooking the turkey neck.
    Vegetables.  Here's where the debate can begin.  Sometimes it's green beans.  Sometimes, brussels sprouts.  Sometimes corn.  Sometimes (too rarely for me) it's frozen lima beans.  Since the veggies are usually an afterthought, no one gets too agitated about the choice, and sometimes we have a couple.
    Dessert - pumpkin pie, without whipped cream or similar goop, is a given.  Coconut custard pie, also a big hit, has been gaining in popularity in recent years.  Apple pie is often an afterthought, but nonetheless welcome.
    Coffee.
    Sometimes wine - usually a white.

    The nicest part of having a pretty-fixed menu is that there's little room for a fight to start.  It's like wetting down the tinder-dry field before parking in the grass.  If enough people keep their attention on the food, weather, football game and dog and off politics, family jealousies and old wounds until they pass out from tryptophan, open warfare can be easily avoided.

    scribe, (none / 0) (#2)
    by cpinva on Mon Nov 19, 2007 at 01:18:48 PM EST
    stuffing is what you put in something, hence a "stuffed" bird. for that matter, after the feast, stuffed people. :)

    no oysters in the stuffing? gad, what uncivilized part of the country do you live in?

    white, granulated sugar on sweet potatoes? who taught you how to make candied yams? geez, everyone knows you use brown sugar, and top them off with marshmallows. by the way, a bit of food trivia: only sweet potatoes grown in louisiana can legally be called "yams". same tuber, different name. why? i haven't a clue.

    you left out the ham. what kind of thanksgiving dinner would it be without va baked ham? oh, you're probably one of those that thinks the first thanksgiving was in plymouth, in 1621. not so my friend, it was at berkeley plantation, in 1619. why'd they wait so long? they were good virginians, they didn't want to be hasty.

    i like the coconut cu