You don't want to cook? Here are 23 places to go for Thanksgiving dinner. (2023)

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You don't want to cook? Here are 23 places to go for Thanksgiving dinner.? ›

So, to the question “What did the Pilgrims eat for Thanksgiving,” the answer is both surprising and expected. Turkey (probably), venison, seafood, and all of the vegetables that they had planted and harvested that year—onions, carrots, beans, spinach, lettuce, and other greens.

So, to the question “What did the Pilgrims eat for Thanksgiving,” the answer is both surprising and expected. Turkey (probably), venison, seafood, and all of the vegetables that they had planted and harvested that year—onions, carrots, beans, spinach, lettuce, and other greens.

Thanksgiving leftovers are often times more revered than the Thanksgiving meal itself. Seventy-nine percent of Americans prefer their precious leftovers over the original feast.

As was the custom in England, the Pilgrims celebrated their harvest with a festival. The 50 remaining colonists and roughly 90 Wampanoag tribesmen attended the "First Thanksgiving."

The Wampanoag brought deer and there would have been lots of local seafood (mussels, lobster, bass) plus the fruits of the first pilgrim harvest, including pumpkin. No mashed potatoes, though. Potatoes had only been recently shipped back to Europe from South America.

I have tried to discern when, in fact, the average American family sits down to Thanksgiving dinner, and unfortunately I came upon conflicting results. According to the market-research firm the NPD Group, a little more than a third of Thanksgiving meals start between 5 p.m. and 6 p.m., and the peak start time is six.

Thomas Jefferson refused to endorse the tradition when he declined to make a proclamation in 1801. For Jefferson, supporting the holiday meant supporting state-sponsored religion since Thanksgiving is rooted in Puritan religious traditions.

It is also worth noting what was not present at the first Thanksgiving feast. There were no cloudlike heaps of mashed potatoes, since white potatoes had not yet crossed over from South America. There was no gravy either, since the colonists didn't yet have mills to produce flour.

What's the average cost of a 10 person Thanksgiving dinner? ›

The average cost of this year's classic Thanksgiving feast for 10 will cost about $64.05 or less than $6.50 per person. This is a $10.74 or 20% increase from last year's average of $53.31.

Today, about 4,000-5,000 Wampanoag live in New England. There are multiple Wampanoag communities - Aquinnah, Mashpee, Herring Pond, Assonet, Chappaquiddick, Pocasset, and Seaconke - with smaller groups and communities across the United States and world.

"The first Thanksgiving proclaimed by the settlers was in 1637 by the governor to celebrate the massacre of 700 Pequot men, women and children." Thanksgiving is the latest difficult holiday for many Indigenous communities in a fall season that is full of them, according to Munro.

About 4,000-5,000 Wampanoag live in New England today, and only six visible tribal communities remain from the original 69 in the Wampanoag Nation. Recently, relations in the Caribbean islands have been found. These people are descendants of Native Wampanoag People who were sent into slavery after King Phillip's war.

Just like us today, the Pilgrims usually ate three meals a day. But how they ate these meals is a little different. Many people would “break fast” in the morning with a little bread and butter, or cheese, or something left from the day before.

California is the state that consumes the most turkey each year. Over 675 million lbs of turkey are consumed on Thanksgiving Day. California consumes the most turkeys and turkey products.

Well, Thanksgiving bummer among bummers ... no pumpkin pie. Certainly, they ate pumpkin in some way — probably roasted and mashed or cubed and added to a stew, but with no wheat (flour) and little to no butter available, there was no crust. And sugar was a precious and rare commodity at the time.

A few days later, President George Washington issued a proclamation naming Thursday, November 26, 1789 as a "Day of Publick Thanksgivin" - the first time Thanksgiving was celebrated under the new Constitution.

Despite being an American holiday, Thanksgiving continues to make inroads into China. The holiday was once primarily celebrated by American ex-pats living in China. However, over the years, it has become more widely embraced as the Chinese people have drawn their own meanings and connections with it.

Their study found that nearly 30% of all American adults dislike turkey. The most disliked Thanksgiving food goes to cranberry sauce with 30.51% of American adults saying they could do without it year in and year out.

What is everyone's favorite Thanksgiving food? ›

Turkey. Turkey is reliably present on most dining tables on Thanksgiving, being a traditional staple of the holiday.

Campbell's recently released its State of the Sides report, which identifies stuffing as the favorite Thanksgiving side dish, followed by mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, green bean casserole and mac & cheese.

Among those traditions is the time for the annual feast. In some families, Thanksgiving is a noon-time affair, while others prefer a late start around 7 p.m. Neither, however, is the most-popular time.

Perhaps the answer lies in history. We didn't always observe the meal times we recognize today. “Dinner” was once the main meal of the day, served around one or two in the afternoon, while “supper” was a much lighter meal, or even just a snack, eaten around sundown.

Franklin D. Roosevelt to push the holiday back a week in order to give people more time for holiday shopping. Roosevelt agreed, but many saw the move as nothing but a money grab by retailers, and several governors declared that the holiday would be celebrated in their states on the traditional last Thursday.

A traditional Thanksgiving dinner consists of roast turkey, turkey stuffing with onions and celery, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, corn, dinner rolls, cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie.

What do they eat in Japan for Thanksgiving? Although Thanksgiving dinner in Japan is not as big a deal as in the USA, and typically they don't eat turkey on the day, the Japanese do still have a common traditional meal of fish, rice, and tea with their close family.

It might not be surprising to know that the "first Thanksgiving" didn't resemble what we were often taught in school. There was likely no stuffing, turkey, or pumpkin pie. But there was definitely no shortage of options, as Native Americans marked celebratory meals with plenty of fish, produce, and wild rice.

One lesser-known Jefferson take was his reluctance to endorse Thanksgiving, though he felt he had good reason. To be clear, Thanksgiving as a national holiday didn't exist during Jefferson's time in office (1801-1809); Abraham Lincoln formalized it in 1863.

88% of Americans surveyed by the National Turkey Federation eat turkey on Thanksgiving.

Which president moved Thanksgiving up a week? ›

By late August of that year, President Roosevelt decided to deviate from this custom and declare November 23, the second-to-last Thursday, as Thanksgiving that year.

Don't discuss your own body in a negative way, and certainly don't criticize anyone else's body, appearance, diet or health. “Discussing your own or someone else's weight or appearance is, unfortunately, an all too common topic at holiday dinners,” she says.

By the 1860s, cranberry sauce was so ingrained as an American dish, that General Ulysses S. Grant reportedly ordered that cranberries be served to soldiers as part of their Thanksgiving meal. Whichever cranberry recipe you end up eating on Thanksgiving, it just might be the most venerable dish on your menu.

Perhaps the most popular Thanksgiving dessert, pumpkin pie is an easy favorite. Traditionally, pumpkin, either freshly roasted and pureed or canned, is mixed with a spice blend of nutmeg, cinnamon, ginger, allspice, cloves and mace.

Most Traditional Thanksgiving Foods. A traditional Thanksgiving meal consists of roast turkey and many sides including stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy, corn, green beans and cranberry sauce, with pumpkin pie as dessert.

It's pumpkin pie, served with or after the meal. Stuffing specifically, in the bird, is the most popular side in every single state in the Northeast and all six states west of the Rockies, save for Alaska (where green bean casserole rules the late November meal).

For each person, plan for 1.25 pounds of turkey (that's including the bones). If you're a turkey-sandwiches type and love leftovers, go for 1.75 pounds.

How much food do I need for Thanksgiving for 20 people? “A good rule of thumb is to plan on 1 1/2 pound of turkey per person,” says Sarah Carey, editor in chief of Martha Stewart Living. “That means you'll need a 10-pound turkey for 20 people.”

Supply chain issues stemming from the war in Ukraine pushed the cost of Thanksgiving menu items higher, as did higher input costs for farmers and ranchers like feed, fuel, and fertilizer. Every Thanksgiving meal item tracked by the Farm Bureau rose in cost this year, except for one: cranberries.

What food did the Pilgrims eat on the Mayflower? ›

They most likely had dried meat and fish, cheese, dried fruit, biscuits, grains, flour, and dried beans and peas. When their water supply became unfit to drink, the Pilgrims drank beer.

Did they eat turkey? We don't think so. The Wampanoag guests brought five deer with them, so venison was on the menu. The English brought fowl, "probably migrating waterfowl like ducks and geese, which were plentiful in autumn," says Beahrs.

During the Mayflower's voyage, the Pilgrims' main diet would have consisted primarily of a cracker-like biscuit ("hard tack"), salt pork, dried meats including cow tongue, various pickled foods, oatmeal and other cereal grains, and fish. The primary beverage for everyone, including children, was beer.

In 1621, those Pilgrims did hold a three-day feast, which was attended by members of the Wampanoag tribe. However, typically, when these settlers had what they referred to as "thanksgiving" observances, they actually fasted.

The Pilgrims also brought farm animals with them, including pigs, chickens, goats, and later, sheep and cows. These animals provided meat, eggs and dairy products for the colonists. Families in Plymouth planted enough in their fields to feed themselves. Their main crop was a kind of corn they had never seen before.

They dried Indian corn, hams, fish, and herbs. Dinner for BreakfastThe biggest meal of the day for the colonists was eaten at noon and it was called noonmeat or dinner.

Instead, the table was loaded with native fruits like plums, melons, grapes, and cranberries, plus local vegetables such as leeks, wild onions, beans, Jerusalem artichokes, and squash. (English crops such as turnips, cabbage, parsnips, onions, carrots, parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme might have also been on hand.)

The real history of the first Thanksgiving

Historians long considered the first Thanksgiving to have taken place in 1621, when the Mayflower pilgrims who founded the Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts sat down for a three-day meal with the Wampanoag.

Massasoit sent some of his own men to hunt deer for the feast and for three days, the English and native men, women, and children ate together. The meal consisted of deer, corn, shellfish, and roasted meat, different from today's traditional Thanksgiving feast. They played ball games, sang, and danced.

Just like us today, the Pilgrims usually ate three meals a day. But how they ate these meals is a little different. Many people would “break fast” in the morning with a little bread and butter, or cheese, or something left from the day before.

What food did the Pilgrims not eat? ›

Waterfowl. Ducks, geese and swans were all on the Pilgrims' table. The birds suffered greatly during the uncontrolled market-hunting years of the 1800s.

It is also worth noting what was not present at the first Thanksgiving feast. There were no cloudlike heaps of mashed potatoes, since white potatoes had not yet crossed over from South America. There was no gravy either, since the colonists didn't yet have mills to produce flour.