Borek said:
Before criticizing I would like to see how the family behaved in the previous years. Could be this mail is just a tip of an iceberg.
In my family (either side of the family) Thanksgiving was a huge mash-up with everybody contributing what they wanted. When I was a kid, we didn't have a telephone, so it wasn't as if my mother could coordinate with my aunts. I think that it was understood that the person hosting the event would supply a roasted turkey, make gravy, and supply mashed potatoes. Aside from that, it was a free-for all.
If we were celebrating with my father's family, it was pretty much expected that his baby sister would bring a wonderful pie made of brandied mince-meat. She brought a lot more, of course, but the fact was that my food-hound father would always save room for her pie. It was served in the dessert-phase, along with the apple, pumpkin, cherry, lemon-custard pies and ice cream. His mother always made her famous lemon chiffon pie (his favorite), so he had to save room for that, too.
As for serving-spoons, knives, etc, none of us were rich enough to have a surplus of that stuff. If you had to grab the "big" spoon out of the mashed turnip to grab a helping of squash or potatoes, that was just the way it was. Want another helping of steamed pearl onions and green peas? You might end up "contaminating" them with the garlic-y mashed potatoes, but after you covered them with turkey gravy, who could complain?
