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Thanksgiving is almost upon us, a time when many Americans gather together to eat turkey and talk about what they’re most thankful for. Growing up in the United States, almost everyone can recall the “First Thanksgiving” story they were told in elementary school: how the local Wampanoag Native Americans sat down with the pilgrims of Plymouth Colony in 1621, in what is now present-day Massachusetts, for a celebratory feast. However, this story is far from the truth - which is why many people opt out of celebrating the controversial holiday. For many Indigenous communities throughout the US, Thanksgiving remains a national day of mourning - a reminder of the devastating genocide and displacement that occurred at the hands of European colonisers following their arrival in the Americas. Every year since 1970, Indigenous people and their allies have even gathered near Plymouth Rock to commemorate a National Day of Mourning on the day of Thanksgiving. “Thanksgiving Day is a reminder of the genocide of millions of Native people, the theft of Native lands, and the erasure of Native cultures,” states the official website for the United American Indians of New England. “Participants in National Day of Mourning honour Indigenous ancestors and Native resilience. It is a day of remembrance and spiritual connection, as well as a protest against the racism and oppression that Indigenous people continue to experience worldwide.” This year, the 54th annual National Day of Mourning takes place on 23 November - the same day as Thanksgiving. While not everyone can support the event in person, there are still many ways people can raise awareness toward issues affecting Indigenous communities from wherever they are - by “decolonising” their Thanksgiving dinner. Decolonisation can be defined as the active resistance against settler colonialism and a shifting of power towards Indigenous sovereignty. Of course, it’s difficult to define decolonisation without putting it into practice, writes Eve Tuck and K Wayne Yang in their essay, Decolonization Is Not a Metaphor. Rather, one of the most radical and necessary moves toward decolonisation requires imagining and enacting a future for Indigenous peoples - a future based on terms of their own making. Matt Hooley is an assistant professor in the department of Native American and Indigenous Studies at Dartmouth College, where he teaches about US colonial powers and Indigenous cultural production. “Decolonisation is a beautiful and difficult political horizon that should guide our actions everyday, including during holidays like Thanksgiving,” he tells The Independent. “Of course, Thanksgiving is a particularly relevant holiday to think about decolonisation because the way many people celebrate it involves connecting ‘the family’ to a colonial myth in which colonialism is inaccurately imagined as a peaceful event in the past.” By decolonising our Thanksgiving, we can celebrate the holiday with new traditions that honour a future in which Indigenous people are celebrated. This year, we can start by understanding the real history behind Thanksgiving as told by actual Indigenous communities. While Americans mainly dedicate one day a year to give thanks, Indigenous communities express gratitude every day with the Haudenosaunee Thanksgiving Address - often called: “The words that come before all else.” The Haudenosaunee Thanksgiving Address is the central prayer and invocation for the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, which comprises the Six Nations - Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, Seneca, and Tuscarora. When one recites the Thanksgiving Address, they’re giving thanks for all life and the natural world around them. According to Hooley, one of the most straightforward actions people can take to decolonise their Thanksgiving includes supporting Indigenous land acknowledgments and land back movements. Land back is an ongoing Indigenous-led movement which seeks to return ancestral lands to Indigenous people and the recognition of Indigenous sovereignty. While the movement is nowhere near new, it received international attention in 2016 during protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline - which continues to disrupt land and water sources belonging to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. This year, sit down with family and friends to discuss an action plan and highlight the concrete steps you plan on taking to support Indigenous communities. “Another, even simpler way would be to begin participating in what’s called a ‘Voluntary Land Tax,’ whereby non-Indigenous people contribute a recurring tax to the tribal communities whose land you occupy,” said Hooley. Food is perhaps the most important part of the Thanksgiving holiday, with turkey, stuffing, and mashed potatoes taking center stage. However, there are many ways we can make sure our dinner tables honour Indigenous futurisms too. Donald A Grinde, Jr is a professor emeritus in the department of Africana and American Studies at the University at Buffalo. Grinde - who is a member of the Yamassee Nation - tells The Independent that crops such as corn, beans, squash, tomatoes, and potatoes are central to Indigenous history and future. “A good thing is to be thankful for the abundance in the fall and note that Native people created over 60 per cent of modern agricultural crops,” he said. “People can be thankful for the crops that Native people created, medicines created, and traditions about democracy, women’s rights and environmental rights.” Rather than buying food from major corporations this year, Hooly also recommended people consciously source their Thanksgiving dinner from Indigenous producers. “Industrial agriculture is one of the most devastating contributors to the destruction of land and water everywhere, including on Indigenous land,” he said. “Instead of buying food grown or made by colonial corporations, people could buy their food from Indigenous producers, or even simply make a greater effort to buy locally grown food or not to buy meat harvested from industrial farms.” Thanksgiving is just a day away. While it’s important that we’re actively working toward highlighting Indigenous communities on this special holiday, decolonisation efforts are something that should be done year-round. “People can also learn about political priorities of the Indigenous communities near them and support those priorities by speaking to their representatives, participating in a protest, or by making sure that their local school and library boards are including Indigenous texts in local community education,” Hooley said. Read More I made an air fryer Thanksgiving dinner so you don’t have to From turkey sandwiches to casseroles: What to do with your Thanksgiving leftovers Slandering mayonnaise doesn’t make you a foodie – it makes you boring I made an air fryer Thanksgiving dinner so you don’t have to From turkey sandwiches to casseroles: What to do with your Thanksgiving leftovers Slandering mayonnaise doesn’t make you a foodie – it makes you boring

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I haven’t turned on my oven since I was given an air fryer three Christmases ago. This may seem unbelievable, but, living in New York City, where the kitchens are closet-sized and a dishwasher is the thing of dreams, it’s a reality I’ve become resigned to. In the last three years, my air fryer hasn’t let me down once, whether it be cooking salmon or zucchini fries. If anything, I’d say I’ve become a better cook because of its existence. Because I love my air fryer more than anything, or at least more than any other kitchen appliance, I happily offered to host a Friendsgiving dinner this year for my nearest and dearest. After all, armed with my miniature oven, I’d be able to whip a traditional feast up in no time. To my dismay, after I’d informed my friends (all three of them) of my planned cooking method, they all decided to cancel. One was more upfront about it, citing a fear of salmonella, while the other two suddenly remembered conflicting plans. I wasn’t deterred. Thanksgiving is my favourite holiday, and I am one of the few people who actually loves Thanksgiving food. Is there anything better than smothering a plate of beige foods with beige gravy? This air fryer Friendsgiving would be a dinner of one. After deciding on the menu, I headed to the grocery store, where I picked up a teeny, tiny Cornish hen as a turkey replacement, a sweet potato and some mini marshmallows, a can of crescent rolls, seasoned bread crumbs and chicken stock for stuffing, Brussels sprouts, gravy, pumpkin pie filling for a premade pie crust, and some tinfoil. I felt like a TikTok chef, ready to be the star. My first mistake, of which there would end up being many, was timing, as I didn’t consider exactly how long this dinner would take if I were air-frying all of the components separately. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what I did. If you do embark on a similar journey, I’d say this is the most important thing to consider. Like any other Thanksgiving meal, creating a spreadsheet of what needs to go into the oven when would have helped immensely. At 6pm, I promptly set out on my dinner preparation. By 6.15pm, I was bleeding and covered in BBQ sauce after a jar fell out of my cupboard and smashed on my kitchen floor while I was reaching for spices to season my chicken - a step I recommend avoiding. My faith in my ability to successfully make this meal had already begun to wane. Despite the setback, I seasoned my chicken and plopped it in the air fryer breast down, as recommended by a recipe I found online. According to the instructions, I was to set the air fryer at a temperature of 380F for 20 minutes, and then flip the chicken and cook it for an additional 10 minutes. When the 30 minutes were up, I opened my air fryer with glee to find a perfectly crispy chicken. I was beyond impressed with myself. If I could make this mini Thanksgiving main course, I could make anything. As it turns out, the mediocrely cooked chicken was the extent of my good luck, and even that was pushing it. When it came to the stuffing, which I decided to make next, the air fryer turned it nearly as hard as rocks when the recipe instructions promised it would come out a golden brown. The pieces that weren’t hard enough to crack my teeth were somewhat tasty though, so I’d say that was almost a win. The sweet potato, which was meant to be sweet potato casserole, proved to be one of the biggest disappointments of the meal, with me solely to blame. Although I’m not sure exactly how I would have cooked canned yams for the base of the dish in the air fryer, attempting to cook a rock-solid sweet potato didn’t work either. By the end of 30 minutes at the highest temperature, my potato was still mostly raw. I finally just covered it with marshmallows, which crisped up nicely in the air fryer, and called it a day. If you are going to follow my lead, I do think canned yams would make more sense, or at least cutting up the sweet potato into smaller chunks so it takes less time to cook. The Brussels sprouts were, thankfully, easy to make in the air fryer, and one of the only components that didn’t turn out completely terrible. It turns out it’s pretty hard to mess up Brussels sprouts, even for the worst chefs among us. I’d even go as far as to say this is a quality replacement for a true, oven-roasted Thanksgiving side, and a way to cut down cooking time on the actual holiday. I assumed the most foolproof part of the meal would be the crescent rolls, which looked nearly perfect when I took them out of the air fryer, where they’d cooked for a mere six minutes on a bed of foil. Unfortunately, my first eager bite resulted in a mouthful of raw dough. As someone who has relied so frequently on my air fryer for sustenance, I was both surprised and disheartened by the massive failure the endeavour was turning out to be. By this time, after an hour and a half of going at it, I had just two components left: gravy, which I confidently assured myself I could heat in the air fryer, and a miniature, makeshift pumpkin pie that I’d made. After creating a little gravy boat from tin foil, which I assured myself was safe to put in the air fryer, I poured the premade gravy in and wished for the best. After five minutes, during which I’d stopped to stir the goopy mixture, I removed the gravy to find that, for all intents and purposes, it had worked. The gravy was lukewarm, which seemed like a win. However, a quick taste test proved that it was one of the grossest accompaniments I’d ever tried, but I’m unsure whether this was due to error on my part or Whole Foods. At this point, at 8pm, I plated my Thanksgiving air fryer meal. And, to my surprise, it looked absolutely perfect. It was one of the most beautiful meals I’d ever made myself, and looked like it would be at home on any Thanksgiving table. My pride slowly seeped out with each bite, however, as I gave the meal an overall rating of two out of 10. The chicken that I’d so painstakingly seasoned and then flipped? Both extremely crispy and dry, while also a concerning colour of light pink. I ate a leg before I reminded myself that I didn’t have time to get sick from salmonella this holiday season. I moved onto the sweet potato, which had hardened on top from the marshmallows and, it turns out, was not even a little cooked inside. I ate the marshmallows, but begrudgingly. Fortunately, the edges of the crescent rolls were cooked enough to be edible, so I nibbled on those while I contemplated whether or not pouring the disgusting gravy on top of the rock-hard stuffing would make it more palatable. I sat in disappointed silence as I ate my Brussels sprouts, which are obviously the worst part of any Thanksgiving meal, but which were the only edible part of mine. As for the pie, I put it in the air fryer to cook while I ate my dinner, only to be too concerned by the pie tin setting on fire, or worse, ruining my air fryer, and removing it while still raw. My air fryer Thanksgiving dinner was disgusting and time-consuming and, ultimately, inedible. But, did I have fun? Also no. If you do follow in my footsteps, maybe pick just one Thanksgiving component to air fry, such as the vegetables, or a turkey breast, rather than an entire bird. With a day to go before Thanksgiving, I’ve travelled home, where I will happily enjoy a Thanksgiving feast made in an oven. Read More Mayo slander doesn’t make you a foodie – it makes you boring Best wines to pair with Thanksgiving dinner Three easy cranberry sauce recipes to try this Thanksgiving Mayo slander doesn’t make you a foodie – it makes you boring Best wines to pair with Thanksgiving dinner Three easy cranberry sauce recipes to try this Thanksgiving

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