This was posted 3 years ago on the OurBestBites.com blog. Click HERE to get the whole story.

I’m not sure I could ever write the detailed food memoirs that our best food writers entertain us with, but I do recall some personal favorite meals. As with most food memoirs, the food itself is important, but the people and the circumstances are what make the meal especially memorable.

We’ve had many wonderful Thanksgiving dinners. I’m fortunate that my wife is an excellent cook and that she has had the good sense to use my mother’s dressing recipe.

For many years, my parents would trek up to St. Louis from Birmingham to join us for the feast. Those were always great visits, especially when my dad was more spry and would head out for early Black Friday shopping with my wife. My dad pulled a Clark Griswold one year and got lost in East St. Louis, but the friendly ESL police pointed him back onto the right road.

One Thanksgiving in the 1980’s we entertained a pair of visiting British Navy men whose ship had docked in Philadelphia after a visit to the Falkland Islands. They loved everything about our wonderful American holiday meal—except pumpkin pie.

Pumpkin pie is very popular among one certain member of my family. For many years, my wife has baked two pumpkin pies: one for the family and guests and one for my daughter, who can finish one off in a hurry.

One of our more memorable Turkey Days came in the mid 1970’s. I had just taken a job in Erie, Pennsylvania. I had been hired by an old acquaintance from Alabama. He and his wife and kids were living in a motel while they were looking for a house. We had recently moved into an apartment and had limited furniture.

We invited them to join us for the Thanksgiving meal. My new boss’s dad, in town for a visit, was an additional guest.

This was my wife’s first big production solo Thanksgiving effort. She performed beautifully. The meal was a success and we scored important points with my new boss.

I recall driving to work that night as the first snowfall of the season fell, comfortable in the fact that I had a turkey sandwich with me for a late night encore.

I’m from Alabama and I love pecan pie. Just don’t overcook it!

Click HERE to get Food Network’s recipe for the Pecan Pie pictured above.

You can see some of your favorite Food Network personalities on Thanksgiving Live! Saturday, November 23, 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.

Ina Garten, Alton Brown, Bobby Flay and Giada De Laurentiis will answer Thanksgiving meal prep questions from viewers via call-ins and social media.

Along with TV content delivered to your home via Charter, U-verse, Dish and Direct TV, Food Network has useful resources online at FoodNetwork.com.

These buns were prepared in my home over the weekend. I can report that they taste as good as they look!

I’m not sure I could ever write the detailed food memoirs that our best food writers entertain us with, but I do recall some personal favorite meals. As with most food memoirs, the food itself is important, but the people and the circumstances are what make the meal especially memorable.

On a Saturday night in October of 1983, my wife and I and three other folks descended on Café Nola in Philadelphia for drinks and dinner.

Nola refers to New Orleans, Louisiana. Café Nola was on South Street in the 80’s. The place was dark. The margaritas were strong. And the food was excellent.

Joining my wife and me were my friend Greg Bass (who had flown up from Birmingham to catch the World Series), Charlie Steiner (who was in Philly covering the series for WOR radio and RKO network) and Bobby Rich (who was my new boss as program director of WWSH radio). Greg is a University of Alabama and WTBC/Tuscaloosa radio chum. I had worked with Charlie and Rich at KSTT in Davenport in the 70’s. They had each worked together later in Hartford and NYC.

When I think of Café Nola, I think of my wife’s favorite appetizer: Angels on Horseback. They were oysters wrapped with bacon and served with an amazing sauce. I generally ordered a seafood entrée, usually a shrimp dish, but I also recall getting their jambalaya. (This was before blackened redfish became a national rage, thanks to New Orleans chef Paul Prudhomme.) On occasions when I wasn’t stuffed, I remember enjoying their pecan pie.

Our evening was filled with baseball talk and radio stories. The Phillies had lost that afternoon and were down 3 games to 1 to the Orioles. Our radio station was fighting a tough uphill battle after transitioning into what would now be called Hot AC station, but Bobby Rich was (and still is) a master at generating buzz. (At one point during my tenure at WWSH with Bobby, we had a “No Michael Jackson” weekend, just to be contrarians at the height of the Thriller album’s popularity.)

Greg is still working in Birmingham making radio spots, Charlie is now doing play-by-play for the Dodgers and Rich has become a radio legend in Tucson. Café Nola has moved a few times and is now on 2^nd Street in Philly.