Thanksgiving We invited over several friends for our Thanksgiving celebration; my first time making it all by myself and their first time celebrating it. Andy and I debated on whether to make it a blend of two cultures, but in the end everyone wanted an "authentic" American Thanksgiving. I managed to make all of the essentials for a Thanksgiving feast; I even baked a pumpkin to make pumpkin pie. We made everything from scratch and our menu consisted of: poached turkey strips (we could not find a whole bird), mashed potatoes with gravy, cabernet cranberry sauce, green bean casserole, stuffing, pumpkin pie, and pear tart. Below are the few photos that were taken that evening.

My Homemade Thanksgiving Turkey	A side view of my turkey	A close-up of my turkey	Some of the leftover red wine
Poached turkey strips; they were very tender and delicious with my homemade cranberry sauce	Fresh bread; I just love the crispness of this photo	Delicious mashed potatoes (Unfortunately, we took photos of the food after everyone had eaten)	Homemade stuffing; really easy to make and fabulous!
I also made fresh green bean casserole; luckily, I found the onion crunchies at the store, so not everything was home cooked :)	Evelie's pumpkin soup; this has a really funny story behind it (see the bottom of the page)	Our Thanksgiving Feast; you can catch a glimpse of the chocolate crunch before it was devoured	Our first Pumpkin pie in France (with a streusel topping) We had to sneak a slice out to taste test since it was my first time making fresh pumpkin pie
Pear Tarte Tatin; I learned how to make this in my cooking class, but I kinda messed up the caramel sauce on this one	My pear tart might of had a little too much butter in it, but it was still yummy!	Delicious chocolate crunch that Evelie brought over	A close-up of the crunch; you can see the layers! When everyone left, Andy and I devoured the other half of this baby!
To illustrate how fattening it was, but since it was a holiday it is okay :)	Left to right: Jean Claude, Sylvie (Christophe's wife), Juline, Nina, me, Marieuse, Sevric, and Sebastien (Evelie's husband)	Valerie and Jean Claude's present to us; cheese cutlery	We ran across the store where our cutlery was from and took a picture

Unfortunately, we were in more of a hosting mood than picture taking mood. We ended up taking pictures of the food after everyone had gotten a plate, and we never got a good picture of all of our friends that came out to celebrate. MIA from the above photos: Ed, Christophe, Evelie, Valerie, and Andy. We had a wonderful night filled with delicious wine and champagne, and we even got some friends to try our homemade root beer and banana beer (which we discovered in Germany). Now for the story of the pumpkin soup. Evelie had told me that she was going to make a pumpkin pie, but I don't think she knew what that meant. Her and Sebastien debated on it and ended up bringing pumpkin soup , which they thought was pumpkin pie!?!?! We thought it was hilarious, but it was everyone's first time ever having pumpkin pie (or even hearing about it), and they all loved it! The night was a great success, I only wish we would have taken more pictures in order to remember the evening better.

New Year's Eve Below we have some pictures of Montpellier around Christmas time and some pictures of us on NYE. In Montpellier, for the whole month of December, they hold a Christmas Market downtown. (I am pretty sure they do this in about every city.) There they sell all sorts of goodies and art. When we visited the one in Marseilles, we tried vin chaud (hot wine) avec herbes de provence, and it was really good. Most of the alcohol probably boiled out, but it was a delicious comfort on a cold afternoon. For NYE, we went out with some friends to "Chez Boris", one of the few chains in Montpellier, but about the only restaurant open as well. The food was still amazing. I had chapon (similar taste to chicken) with scalloped potatoes wrapped in prociutto and stuffed mushrooms and tomatoes. After hearing how they actually raise this bird, I don't think I will ever eat it again, but during my innocence it was delicious. I think Andy had swordfish wrapped in prosciutto with asian veggies. We also tried marrow that night. Sounds creepy, but it was alright. It had a very salty taste. Also, note to self and wine lovers, AVOID wines with "Amour" in the title. Our first white bottle was called, "..amour" tasted and appeared a lot like water. It is really hard to tell when reading a wine menu what will be good, but fortunately our second white was fabulous! After dinner, we went to la Comedie where people were gathering in front of the opera house watching the clock. I am pretty sure it was too fast though. It was weird for us, because no one did a countdown. So, we did a mock countdown and had our NYE kiss. About two minutes later, Andy's phone alarm went off telling us that it was 11:59. :) We saw a few fireworks, but nothing really planned by the city. Shortly, afterwards we headed home for some well needed rest.

The hanging 3D lights in Montpellier	Montpellier's Christmas tree	Our Christmas Market (but closed)	Andy and I on NYE
Trying to capture the Arc de Triomphe behind us	A better picture of the arc (but still a little blurry)	Laughing it up	I think these were some of the more photogenic pics we have taken
Part of the crowd on NYE; waiting for midnight	Everyone is looking to the opera house

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