Thanksgiving 2024

Stuffed turkey breast, brioche dressing, pumpkin cheesecake, and more...

Hand-drawn illustration by Daniela Bracco

WELCOME to Buona Domenica, a weekly newsletter of Italian home cooking and baking. I’m a journalist, cooking teacher, occasional tour guide, and author of eight cookbooks on Italian cuisine.

Please note the temporary schedule changes to this newsletter. I’ve scaled back slightly while I work on my book. This is a bonus newsletter for paid subscribers (free subscribers receive a preview); the next newsletter for all subscribers will go out on Dec. 1.

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Ciao a tutti,

Last week, as Daniela and I were discussing the theme of today’s newsletter, I told her I was planning a low-key family Thanksgiving weekend, with a somewhat pared down turkey dinner and walks in the woods. And she came up with this exquisite, hand-drawn illustration. I am in love with it, the colors, the spiky texture, the sense of wonder, of expectation and foreboding, of heading into the unknown.

Since this holiday is supposed to be about gratitude, I want to say how grateful I am to have such a talented artist working with me on this project. Grazie, Daniela!

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THANKSGIVING 2024 MENU

Photos from left: David Leite for Leite's Culinaria; Christopher Testani, for NYT; detail from my November 1999 issue of Fine Cooking magazine

I promised to share my Thanksgiving menu once I finalized it. A few dishes are still being debated, but it’s nearly there. I hope you find some inspiration and/or enjoyment browsing through it.

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THE ANTIPASTO

I recently made a batch of my favorite peperoni in agrodolce, which I try to do every year in late summer-early fall. (Those of you who have been subscribers for awhile know that sooner or later, these peppers always reappear.) I’ll be using them to make peperonata and ricotta bruchetta for our Thanksgiving antipasto.

To drink: 2018 Mille Brut, by Mawby Vineyards, chosen by my Michigander husband/house sommelier.

THE TURKEY

I am one of the few people in this world who actually enjoys roast turkey. Not only turkey, but turkey breast, which I have always preferred to the leg and thigh. This is the third year in a row that I’ll be making a stuffed and rolled turkey breast. Last year, I riffed on a recipe for pork loin with anise biscotti stuffing from Pat LaFrieda’s book MEAT: Everything You Need to Know, subbing turkey breast for the pork. In 2022, it was Cathy Whims’s “Turchetta,” which gives turkey breast the porchetta treatment. (Here’s a link to that post, where you’ll also find links to a dozen Thanksgiving recipes.)

This year, I am making Pancetta and Herb-Stuffed Turkey Breast (pictured above on the left) from Leite’s Culinaria. LC has long been one of my go-to recipe websites, not just for its commitment to rigorously testing recipes before publishing them, but also for founder

David Leite

’s excellent writing and dry wit. David publishes here on Substack as well, and if you’re not already a subscriber, you should become one.