Sonoma County's immigrants share Thanksgiving dishes from around the world

Most American food, even the treasured dishes of Thanksgiving, came from the kitchens of immigrants or from the dishes adapted from the Native Americans, who shared their survival techniques and farm-to-table fare of shellfish and wild fowl, pumpkins and corn.

The melting pot that is California’s bread basket often speaks with an Asian and Latin American accent, thanks to our proximity to those regions. But all of our intrepid immigrants - arriving by land, air and sea, over many miles and many decades - have contributed to our ever-evolving cuisine, providing spicier, more complex and more delicious fare for everyone.

This Thanksgiving, we gathered up the stories of three immigrant families who have put down roots here in Sonoma County, to find out what kinds of dishes they bring to the Thanksgiving table from their own culture - or, like the Pilgrims, what dishes they have adapted from others - to provide the comforting flavors of home, both past and present.

Their stories are now woven into the American story, as the American story has become inextricably woven into their lives.

From Vietnam, with gratitude

When he lived in the thriving port of Rach Gia on the Mekong Delta of South Vietnam, Quyen Nguyen of Santa Rosa made his living as a fisherman. But after the North Vietnamese took over South Vietnam, Quyen and his wife, Be, immigrated with their four kids to the U.S. in 1982. They lived in Washington state and San Jose, then settled in Santa Rosa so Quyen could fish commercially out of Bodega Bay.

Meanwhile, Be started honing her considerable culinary talents at local restaurants, from Pho Vietnam to Cam Ranh Bay in Santa Rosa, which she eventually purchased and reopened as Simply Vietnam in 2006.

At that point, Quyen started helping out with the family restaurant, where Be serves as head chef, daughter Kieu works as a prep chef, son Jon serves as manager and youngest daughter Linda - the only child born in America - is in charge of finances.

Like many immigrants who land in America, the Nguyens wanted to faithfully imitate the Thanksgiving meal they had only seen but had never tasted - at least at first.

“We had to do what we saw on TV,” Jon said. “It was the turkey and the dressing,”

But over the years, the family started integrating some of their homeland’s flavorful dishes into the holiday feast, including delicacies such as lemongrass crab, coconut prawns and the spicy beef stew known as Bo Kho.

Of all the dishes made by his mom, Jon is most fond of that savory beef dish made with onions, ginger, garlic, lemongrass, fish sauce, tomato paste and fresh basil. Just thinking about dunking a crunchy baguette into the fat-laden, flavorful broth makes Jon’s mouth water.

“The beef stew my mom makes has various kinds of meat, like brisket and oxtail,” he said. “I love the oxtail.”

This Thanksgiving, the Nguyen clan will once again gather together for a traditional Thanksgiving at their parents’ home in southeast Santa Rosa. Linda often hosted the holiday at her Fountaingrove home, but she and her husband’s home burned down in the October fires.

Not all was lost, however. Three years ago, the family business was doing so well that they expanded, opening Simply Vietnam Express on Cleveland Avenue. The family was forced to consolidate their business at the new restaurant earlier this year after they were unable to come to an agreement for continuing their lease.

The Tubbs fire, which roared across Highway 101 on its explosive path toward Coffey Park, destroyed the Mexican restaurant right next door to them. During the firestorm, Linda’s husband, Shawn Gardner, climbed up a ladder and sprayed the Simply Vietnam Espress roof down with water, keeping errant embers at bay.

Miraculously, the restaurant survived unscathed and was able to open just one week after the fire. And the family members that came here 35 years ago with nothing still have each other, and their livelihood.

“I’m grateful that we still have our restaurant,” Jon said. “And my sister and our family are still alive.”

The following recipe is reprinted with permission from Charles Phan’s “Vietnamese Home Cooking” (Ten Speed Press, 2012). The beef stew recipe is similar to the dish made by Be Nguyen for Thanksgiving, who serves it with French baguette rolls. Phan is chef/owner of The Slanted Door in San Francisco.

Lemongrass Beef Stew

Serves 6 to 8

3 pounds boneless beef short ribs, cut into 1 1/2-inch cubes

4 tablespoons canola oil

1 teaspoon kosher salt

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

2 cups diced yellow onion

2 teaspoons minced garlic

1/4 cup finely minced lemongraass

3 tablespoons tomato paste

- 2 by 1-inch piece fresh ginger, peeled and smashsed

2 whole star anise pods

1-2 Thai chiles, stemmed, plus 1 teaspoon minced, for garnish

6 cups beef stock

3 carrots, peeled and cut into 2-inch lengths

8 ounces daikon radish, peeled and cut into 1-inch lengths

2 tablespoons fish sauce (approximately)

1/4 cup finely sliced fresh Thai basil, for garnish

Place the beef in a bowl. Drizzle with 1 tablespoon of the oil, sprinkle with the salt and pepper, and stir to coat. Let stand while you prepare all the other ingredients.

In a large Dutch oven or heavy-bottomed pot, heat the remaining 3 tablespoons oil over high heat. When the oil is hot, working in batches, add the beef and cook, turning as needed, for about 8 minutes, until browned on all sides. As each batch is ready, transfer it to a rimmed baking sheet.

Decrease the heat to medium and add the onion to the now-empty pot. Cook, stirring frequently, for about 10 minutes, until the onion is deep golden brown. Stir in the garlic and cook, stirring, for 30 seconds more. Add the lemongrass, tomato paste, ginger, star anise and whole chile to taste and stir to combine. Transfer the mixture to a large clay pot.

Add the beef and any accumulated juices to the clay pot and pour in the stock. Bring the liquid to a boil over medium heat, decrease the heat so the liquid is at a gentle simmer, cover and cook, stirring occasionally, for 1 1/2 hours, until the meat is just tender.

Add the carrots and daikon, re-cover, and cook for 30 minutes longer, until the vegtables are cooked through and the meat is very tender. Remove from the heat and stir in the fish sauce, 1 tablespoon at a time, to taste.

Serve the stew directly from the clay pot. Top each serving with some of the basil and minced chile.

Sebastopol ?by way of Cuba

Cuban native Marta May, who runs Champagne Taste Caterers in Sebastopol, arrived in the U.S. from Cuba in June of 1968 when she was just 12 years old. By Thanksgiving, she and her mother were determined to prepare a traditional Thanksgiving feast and decided to stuff their first turkey.

“My poor mother, trying to integrate into society, bought a very large turkey for the four of us,” she said. “She and I stuffed it, following the recipe on the box. As the turkey cooked and shrunk, the stuffing grew and broke through the turkey ... we were cleaning stuffing for weeks.”

Both Marta and her mom swore they would never stuff a turkey again.

So when May started her own catering company and was asked to prepare Thanksgiving dinner for a party of 1,100 employees from Kaiser Hospital, she invented a new recipe for dressing.

“I came up with an incredible stuffing recipe, and people are still asking me for it,” she said. “But stuff a turkey? Never. I was young and highly traumatized.”

Cubans rarely bring their own foods to the Thanksgiving table, she said, except for a few side dishes of traditional black beans and white rice.

“Personally, being from Cuba (where we do not have stuffing but love rice,) I prefer a rice stuffing,” she said. “But this stuffing has become a part of our family tradition.”

The following recipe is from May’s upcoming cookbook.

Marta’s Fantastic ?Stuffing

Serves 8

2 red apples, diced

1 lemon, juiced

1 stick butter

2 small onions, diced

4 carrots, diced

6 ribs celery, diced

1 head garlic, mashed

¾ cup unsulfured apricots, diced (organic)

¾ cup golden raisins or currants (organic)

¾ cup walnuts (organic)

1 tablespoon oregano, dried

2 tablespoons cumin powder

6 cups of your favorite bread, cubed

1½ cups turkey giblet stock (see recipes below)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Toss cubed apples with lemon juice in a glass bowl and set aside.

Melt butter in a large skillet on medium heat. Sauté the onion, carrots and celery for five minutes. Add in the mashed garlic toward the end. Add and briefly sauté the diced apricots, raisins, walnuts, cumin, oregano, apples and bread cubes. Slowly incorporate the turkey broth, a half cup at a time. While still very hot, transfer to a Corningware dish with a lid. Hold at room temperature. Place in a 350 degree oven and cook for a half hour before eating.

For turkey giblet stock: Combine all ingredients in a large pot: neck and giblets of a 12- to 14-pound turkey; 3 cups water; 4 cups chicken broth; 3 ribs celery, chopped; 3 carrots, chopped; 1 onion, quartered; 2 bay leaves; 1 tablespoon oregano; 1 tablespoon ground dried cumin; 2 tablespoons powdered garlic (or 8 cloves fresh garlic, mashed in a mortar); 1 teaspoon black peppercorns.

Combine all ingredients and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 1 hour or until it is reduced to about 5 cups. Stock may be made up to 2 days in advance.

The land of lamb

Greek food is not Greek to Sofia Petridis-Lim of Santa Rosa, who grew up in the northern port city of Thessaloniki, known as the San Francisco of Greece. She was cooking with her “ya-ya” by the age of 5.

“Grandma put me to work,” she said. “She created the foundation and love for cooking and baking.”

After finishing up college, Petridis-Lim wanted to see the world so she got a job with an American charter airline with a contract with Saudi Airlines. Through that job she met her husband, a commercial pilot, who brought her to the states in 1983.

“This is my home now,” said Petridis-Lim, who graduated from the Santa Rosa Junior College Culinary Arts Program in 2012 and ran her own restaurant, Taverna Sofia, in Healdsburg from 2012 to 2016.

When her daughter was younger, she used to cook only Greek food at Thanksgiving. But since her daughter is an American, they started splitting the holiday table into two: the Mediterranean fare on one side, the American fare on the other.

“Now she does the American part, and I do the Greek part,” Petridis-Lim said. “I always do the lamb, because I come from the land of lamb.”

Like the turkey, her roasted lamb shanks are a labor of love. She marinates them for four hours with lots of herbs, red wine and vermouth, then she roasts them slowly for another four hours.

“It’s time-consuming, but it’s amazing, and it melts in your mouth,” she said. “At the restaurant, I served it with rice pilaf or roasted potatoes and a Greek salad … people swore to me that it wasn’t lamb, and it fell off the bone.”

For the Greek half of the Thanksgiving feast, she often makes stuffed rice dolmas with tzatziki sauce, creamy eggplant moussaka and the honey-nut pastry known as baklava for dessert.

The following recipe is from Petridis-Lim.

Lamb Shanks

Serves 8 to 10

6 lamb shanks

½ cup olive oil

- Salt and pepper

1 bottle red wine

6 carrots, diced

4 onions, diced

6 celery stalks, diced

8 large cloves garlic, diced

½ cup chicken broth

1/4 cup vermouth

3 bay leaves

3 cinnamon sticks

1 tablespoon ground nutmeg

Prepare the lamb shanks for cooking by removing any silver skin and visible fat. French the ends of the shanks by inserting a paring knife along the bone near the top of the narrow end of the shank. Slide knife upward to sever the tendon attached to the bone. Repeat, working your way around the bone. Frenching the shanks allows the meat to pull away from the bone while cooking, giving it more attractive presentation.

In a large pot, heat olive oil on medium-high heat. Season the shanks with salt and pepper and brown them in the pot on all sides. Once they’re browned, remove them from the pot and place them into a large baking pan.

Add the chopped vegetables to the pot and saute with the garlic and oregano. Once they begin to soften, deglaze the pan with a whole bottle of red wine. Cook until the alcohol is reduced by a half cup.

Add ½ cup of chicken broth and 1/4 cup of vermouth. Add the bay leaves, cinnamon sticks, ground nutmeg and salt and pepper to taste. Pour the semi-cooked veggies and broth over the shanks in the baking pan and cover tightly with foil.

Bake at 350 degrees for four hours or until the meat is falling off the bone.

Serve with rice pilaf or rosemary roasted potatoes and sauteed mini bell peppers.

Staff writer Diane Peterson can be reached at 707-521-5287 or diane.peterson@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @dianepete56.