To ask what's on your thanksgiving menu this year?

[AllRoadsLeadBackToRadley]

For those who celebrate.

Soul food here- ribs, chicken wings, mac and cheese, etc.

If you’re having green beans, toss them in chilli oil, and add pine nuts and crispy bacon.

You’ll thank me later

What I really love about Thanksgiving as an American is that it's not about gift giving, it's about being thankful for the good things in your life.

And Black Friday shopping of course.

I'm pretty sure I'll be cooking Thanksgiving dinner again.
Probably traditional Turkey dinner, with all the trimmings and pumpkin pies and cheesecakes for dessert.

What I really love about Thanksgiving as an American is that it's not about gift giving, it's about being thankful for the good things in your life.

Me too. It is a lovely holiday. Also perfectly timed so you can do thanksgiving with one side of the family and xmas with the other - or one holiday with family and one by yourself.

My flatmate is American and we've said we'd like to celebrate thanksgiving. I've done it twice with previous flatmates and it was fantastic. I think we're going to roast a chicken as have a shitty oven that won't let a turkey in, and she's said probably usual trimmings - stuffing, cranberry sauce. Dessert wise I'm not very sure, she's lactose intolerant and GF - I'm sure she'll have some ideas. Previous years we had apple and caramel pie, pumpkin pie and once homemade croissants and ice cream.

The one thing that always interests me is the sweet potato part - last time I had a thanksgiving meal they were cooked with marshmallows and would have tasted very sweet? I turned them down as wasn't too sure how it would work!

The one thing that always interests me is the sweet potato part - last time I had a thanksgiving meal they were cooked with marshmallows and would have tasted very sweet?

You probably were offered something like this:

allrecipes.com/recipe/24330/candied-sweet-potatoes/

They won't be super sweet like apple pie, but mildly sweet and spicy. The sweet potatoes themselves are only slightly sweet. They're often cut up and cooked in oil like french fries (chips).

And speaking of sweet, it's really lovely of you to do this with your flatmate.

All sounds scrumptious. Aside from the mash. To me mash belongs on a shepherd's pie on a wet Monday evening. Not in a celebratory meal like Thanksgiving. Show a bit of love to the roast potatoes.

And pumpkin pie. It's my nightmare food. I've tried a few times to get on board but I just can't. I think you have to be brought up with it to love it.

But everything else, scrumptious!

Loved thread.

We do cheesy mash and roasters for Christmas dinner. Love both. Or toasters and cauliflower cheese yum.

It is a lovely holiday. Also perfectly timed so you can do thanksgiving with one side of the family and xmas with the other

This is a huge help with managing the in laws, who all want to have access to the grandchildren. To be scrupulously fair about it, some families alternate years so that no one family has a monopoly on Christmas, which is considered a bigger holiday.

I do love Thanksgiving.

But Thanksgiving has been and gone in Canada. We had goose. And realised that at the table there was only one adult born in Canada. So why we were all partaking I've no idea!

No fucking pumpkins. They are rubbish food only fit for carving.

Hahaha mrsTP. We had no adults born in Canada and still had a big thanksgiving meal. We always get together with another British family who we used to live near 9 years ago - we started doing it because everyone else had family over etc, so now it's our own tradition. Three out of the five kids were born in Canada though. We always do turkey - did goose once in the dim and distant past and it's hard to get enough leftovers for our insanely ritualistic post-holiday meals...
I'm not a fan of pumpkin pie, but we always have it anyway as everyone else likes it. Some years we have pecan pie as well, or egg custard, which are marginally more tolerable. I'm quite content with the roasties though, although we do occasionally branch out with the sweet potato offerings.

Misconduct US, please can you post the recipe for holiday potatoes?

I live on an "international" Caribbean island so lots of different nationalities and given the melting pot of people here, we celebrate everything - Canadian Thanksgiving, US Thanksgiving, Bonfire Night, Christmas, Jamaican Independence and any Filipino holiday that comes around.

This year for US Thanksgiving, I will be eating pumpkin pie. That is all. I love homemade pumpkin pie - I might do a chicken (don't like Turkey) roast dinner with sweet potato and roasties, but my main consumption will be all things pumpkin.

For Christmas I do roast beef and a small chicken with stuffing/pigs in blankets etc.

My favorite time of year here is from Halloween (which people go all out for), because shortly after we have Pirates Week, then end November the Christmas tree lighting event and then bang! It's 1 December and the countdown to Christmas is on....

the amount of Americans who are astounded that the rest of the world doesn't celebrate thanksgiving is amazing

Even funnier is the number of American managers I've had who seem surprised to find that their random UK-based brit (ie me) isn't celebrating Independence Day. We weren't that glad to be shot of you.

Happy Thanksgiving!

@ErrolTheDragon. You can celebrate with them...

@NUFC69 please can you post the recipe for holiday potatoes?

Happy to. This recipe makes a large casserole dish, easily a dozen servings so scale up or down according to your needs. Let me know if anything needs clarification.

Holiday Mashed Potatoes

5 lb bag of potatoes, russet or Yukon Gold, peeled and halved
2 3 oz packages of Phildelphia style cream cheese (low fat is fine)
1 pint sour cream (low fat is fine)
Sliced or grated cheddar cheese, about a cup
1 stick (4 oz or 8 tablespoons ) of butter
2 tablespoons sea salt (or to taste)

Preheat oven to 350 F. Cook potatoes in boiling salted water until tender (about 20 minutes). Mash them until smooth (a hand mixer works well). Add the remaining ingredients and beat until light and fluffy. Put in a casserole dish and cover with sliced or grated cheddar cheese and bake at 350 for 30 minutes.

Leftovers can be made into patties, coated in flour and pan fried in butter.

Will catch up when Mad Hour is finished here...

I should have mentioned though- I'm American. (Born in Bham though! On the way BACK to America.. I was early!😁) and we celebrate every year. It's the only thing I can truly do to honor my nan, who taught me to cook in the first place ("don't tell me you can't see the fucking pan...you can hear it when it's boiling" you get the picture. My nan took no shit 😁)

low fat sour cream is fine

Do you think vegan creme fraiche would do the job?

I usually do a Thanksgiving dinner, just because i love all things American, love food and cooking and it coincides with my birthday (25th November)
I'm not this year as its my 40th and I'll be away celebrating in my favourite restaurant, the Kitchin, in Edinburgh.
I am basing our Christmas meal around Chef Art Smith's Homecomin' restaurant in Disney springs, Orlando, because it looks amazing. I do a different Christmas meal every year.

I'm in the Southern US; we will have turkey, corn bread dressing (not called stuffing when it's cooked outside the turkey) sweet potatoes (no marshmallows), mac and cheese (this is more of a Southern thing for Thanksgiving); green bean casserole (only time of year we have it); brussels sprouts roasted with bacon; cranberry sauce; crescent rolls; pumpkin pie, apple pie, and Kentucky Derby pie (chocolate pecan pie with Bourbon in it).

if turkey is the traditional Thanksgiving Dinner what do you have at Christmas? Is it the same, or a different traditional meal, or is there not one fixed thing for Christmas over there?

We usually have ham for Christmas; this is also a Southern thing. DH's family, from up North, usually have roast beef.

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. When I was a student in the UK, I always found other Americans to celebrate with and quite a few other nationalities as well.

What is now called Thanksgiving was the UK's (and still is other countries) Harvest Festival.

I'm only 50, but it used to be a much bigger deal, with a Celebration Dinner (and School/Church) lunch etc.

I'm from a Native American background and purposely don't associate it with that Holocaust/Genocide, as some do, on FB.

If you look at it from that POV, then it was transported over from the UK and Europe.

Mind me asking where all us American-English-whatever people-who-are-celebrating are from?

Maryland here.

Do you think vegan creme fraiche would do the job?

I don't think I've every had vegan creme fraiche, but I'm sure it would be fine. The recipe is so flavorful that it's very forgiving of substitutions. I've also used plain yogurt when I didn't have sour cream and it came out fine, though that obviously wouldn't be vegan.

Maryland here

Hudson Valley, New York here. Nice to meet you.

DH has family in Maryland and goes to Annapolis on business from time to time.

MissConduct thank you! I'm dairy free, and don't eat meat, so I'll be stealing and tweaking your recipe! 😁😁