Don't forget! New Yorkers, you can still submit your Thanksgiving stories, photos and videos for the NYPL's upcoming exhibition. We want what you're having! →

What Was On Your Thanksgiving Table? We Want To Know!

Another Thanksgiving is in the books - and we want to hear all about your menu. Did you have turkey? Turnips? Sushi? Eels? What did you do with your leftovers? Do you have any unique traditions? Share with us! Visit NYPL’s newly launched Thanksgiving Project to submit photos, videos, stories or audio clips about your experiences with one of the year’s most beloved midday meals - Thanksgiving. Select stories will be part of an upcoming exhibition focused around “lunch.” So share! We want what you’re having!! In the meantime, we have some amazing examples in our Digital Gallery of prior Thanksgiving meals, including The Plaza Hotel’s menu from 1899, a soldier’s hand-written description of Thanksgiving in 1918 and a menu from a train passenger station from 1899 (which is seen above and included potato chips, celery and green peas).

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! To mark the occasion, here is an incredibly weird 1907 holiday postcard from our Mid-Manhattan Picture Collection depicting two turkeys driving a car. Makes sense, right? Happy Turkey Day! Just a reminder, NYPL is closed today for the holiday (although you can download our eBooks). Be safe and enjoy!

Thanksgiving - one of the country’s most popular mid-day meals - is just around the corner and NYPL wants to know what you’re cooking! Send us your photos, videos, even old home movies of the Thanksgiving meal and it may be displayed in an upcoming NYPL exhibition about another mid-day meal known as… lunch. Whether you stuff your turkey with couscous; skip the turkey altogether and make a vegan feast; prepare bok choy over brussel sprouts; or prefer sweet-potato pie over pumpkin - we want what you’re having!

Need a last-minute Thanksgiving veggie recipe that involves lots of bacon and butter? Jean Strouse, head of the prestigious NYPL Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers, has got you covered. Her recipe for shredded Brussels Sprouts (adopted from a 1990 NY Times recipe - she added lots more fat) is so darn good, even the most staunch sprout hater will ask for thirds. The recipe appears in the new book Eating For Beginners by Melanie Rehak, a former Cullman fellow who calls the recipe “the most important thing” she learned from Jean. Check out the video - shot and edited by NYPL filmmaker extraordinaire Elena Parker - to see Jean and Melanie fatten up some sprouts.

For now, here’s the short version of the recipe:

1 - Core and remove the hard leaves of about 5 pints of Brussels sprouts. Shred them in a food processor.

2 - Put about one pound of bacon in a skillet and fry it up, rendering the fat. Remove and drain the bacon and put it aside.

3 - Toast about a half a pint of pine nuts in the bacon fat.

4 - Add the shredded sprouts into the pan. Add AT LEAST a stick of butter to keep them moist so they don’t burn. “Shovel everything around.”

5 - After the sprouts soften, break up the bacon pieces and add them.

6 - Eat!