Favorites: Stuffing, Aunt D's gravy, cranberry sauce (the good kind), pie, all the vegetables.

Please don't make me eat: Sweet sweet potato casserole of any kind, green bean casserole (the scratch kind is edible, but still not good, IMHO), jell-o salad mold (even if it's good tasting, it doesn't pair well with Thanksgiving dishes), pecan skins, hard lumps in stuffing (crunchy, like celery, is okay, but not hard like raw nuts).

DH keeps saying I fix too much at Thanksgiving and Christmas, so I took a survey of what to cut out for our family of 12. Not much. They all love the twice baked potatoes, fresh cranberry-orange relish, turkey, pumpkin bread, corn bread pudding, gravy and stuffing. So I can cut out the candied sweet potatoes, but I like those, and I think most like to have both. I no longer do a salad and a vegetable, just one or the other. I could cut out the pumpkin bread, but grandson loves it. And the dessert varies from year to year. I send the left over turkey home with guests. With 3 generations of 12 family members, it is hard to pare it down to just a few things, but this doesn't seem to be too much to me for a holiday meal.

Favorites:

I am a side gal. Do not really care about the turkey, but I love turkey gravy. My favorites are stuffing, mac and cheese and mashed potatoes. I put gravy on the potatoes and stuffing. And rolls. I am a carb queen on Thanksgiving.

My ultimate favorite and really the only thing I would miss if it was gone is pumpkin pie with cool whip. Oh so good!

My least favorites:

Sweet Potatoes in any form. Yuck.

Oh, and the raw veggie tray. So pointless.

Favorites:

Turkey

Fresh Cranberry Salad that I posted on another thread

Shredded Brussels Sprouts with Shallots and Garlic

Yeast Rolls

Least Favorites:

Everything Else

We prefer dark meat, so for just the two of us I will cook turkey thighs. Bread dressing is important and I like mine. I can do with out mashed potatoes, or sweet potato casseroles or THE green bean casserole. I prefer baked winter squash, frozen peas and peal onions as the sides, and homemade cranberry sauce. We typicalIy don't have rolls with our meal. I will make gravy, because DH likes it. Pumpkin pie or gingerbread for dessert with real whipped cream.

Linda, thanks for the giggle! You're right. Bad food is just bad.

I assumed the question to mean the things you like and dislike they way they show up every Thanksgiving in your family. I have three cousins who each make their sweet potato sweet casserole the right way, and I take a dab of each to be polite. They're all well prepared and aren't objectively bad. I just don't like 'em! But our family love the vegetable tray. That's home prepped, mind you, not one of those dried out generic monsters from the cold case. :)

Favs: Cornbread dressing, which I could eat every day of my life happily ... cream cheese corn ... mashed potatoes and gravy.

Least fav: pumpkin pie.

I don't play any favorites when it comes to traditional T-day fare. :)

eta: I thought we'd be discussing family issues. lol!

My favorites for the traditional family TD Dinner: (So, I did extra faves and four seriously un-faves.)

Turkey Thigh

Turkey Skin (crispy)

Mom's brown gravy with gizzard, neck and so forth)

Mom's special turkey stuffing/dressing. She used bread, onion, celery, Dean's sausage, and some other things I wish I had the recipe for. Best dressing ever. I don't want nuts, fruit or cornbread in mine.

Green bean casserole with mushroom soup and still crispy dried onions on top, and from scratch.

Unsweetened sweet potato casserole

Cheesy scalloped potatoes

Roasted Brussels sprouts. I hated them as a kid but love them now.

NOT so favorite and I avoid avoid AVOID.

Turkey Breast

Pecan Pie

The cranberry that comes out of a can.

Parents never did that sweet potato with marshmallow thing, for which I thank them every year I've been alive.

I like all of it except the sweet potato pie. I even like the green bean casserole, but I make it with a mushroom velouté sauce instead of canned soup, and the green beans are still a bit crunchy. I don't like overcooked green beans.

I make Brussels sprouts using ATK recipe, which is extremely good and quick:

I didn't write down the recipe - I just watch the video before I make them.

Roast turkey with all the trimmings is my most favorite meal and I could eat it any day of the year. In fact, if I was a condemned prisoner on death row, that's what I would request for my final meal :-) So there is not much about a traditional Thanksgiving dinner I don't like!

What is essential is the turkey, dressing, cranberry sauce and gravy. The rest of the sides can fluctuate or change as the menu may dictate. I don't require mashed potatoes as part of the mix, as the meal is already carb heavy, but I sure enjoy them when served! I also prefer some sides more than others - not wild about a sugary-sweet sweet potato casserole and green bean casserole would not be my first choice. When I cook this dinner at home, I usually sub mashed yams for the potatoes (both mashed and the sweet casserole), prefer spinach souffle or roasted or steamed sprouts with a lemon mustard sauce to the bean casserole and always, always include creamed onions as a side.

I can skip dessert altogether. Usually too full to enjoy it much so would save for another day.

And I am not overly concerned about the exact recipes being used. I have my favorites if I am doing the cooking but enjoy others' preparations as long as they are done well. Same with the cranberry sauce - I enjoy a homemade recipe but I am also perfectly happy with canned!

As long as the cook is capable, I am an easy to please guest :-)

If we are being frank....and I know none of my family knows how to find this place...I can post some things I hate!!
My daughter's mother in law always brought some sort of jello salad....either cranberries or that awful one with the pretzels and strawberry jello....I hate that!
Then there was the mixture of mashed sweet and white potatoes that someone else makes....why not just good old mashed potatoes?...Oh and my daughter oven roasts asparagus....little skinny asparagus and the tips get crispy and slightly charred....EWW! And then there is the vegan sister in law that always brings something strange, and my late mother in law would make some sort of casserole of cauliflower and carrots in a creamy sauce ( that may have been a can of soup!) baked for an hour....mush! And the sister-in-law who said..."I didn't think we needed gravy with all the other things"...turkey without gravy? Are you mad woman? And the chocolate cake....perfectly Ok chocolate cake (from a Duncan Hines box) but thanksgiving?? Really?
But then there are the good things...like the year my son made 3 turkeys...one on the grill, one in the fryer and one in the oven for the stuffing and the gravy. And the time that he told his friends he would fry their turkey for them....and every 40 minutes from 10:30 until about 4 someone arrived with a cleaned and naked bird to go into the hot oil, and Clay's mother's dressing which had to take one whole day to make, and the Chopped liver Julie always brought, and that wonderful sweet potato casserole from some old Virginia recipe with bourbon and no marshmallows from Cathy.
It's been more than 10 years since I have hosted thanksgiving, always at one kid or another or maybe an inlaws, but I always help and contribute as well...usually a pie and dinner rolls and a pear, apple and raspberry salad, that I am sick of but everyone wants. It wouldn't be Thanksgiving if there weren't some things we love as well as those he hate.

Things I don't like are green bean casserole, never, not one of us like it. Pretty much everything else I like. Love the yeast rolls, dark meat, and candied sweet potatoes. We will of course have ham also. You must have gravy home made of course or I don't want any mashed potatoes. Most all vegetables I think we like, give me the green beans with onion and bacon, salt, pepper and a tad of sugar.

Sue

best thanksgiving was years ago when the parents/grandparents were all alive and we celebrated ...

worst was the first thanksgiving with people missing ...

I agree, Dave, having the family around the table is the best thing about Thanksgiving. Of course, I love Thanksgiving, it's one of my favorite holidays. All that's required is that we eat and be thankful.

That said, I do have my favorite dishes:

Turkey, I prefer dark meat but any will suffice

Mashed Potatoes

Homemade Turkey Gravy

Mustangs/Cathy's Fig and Proscuitto Salad

LindaC's Cranberry Jezebel, but mild cuz I'm a wuss

Nearly any vegetable that's not covered with cheese sauce

Least favorites:

Stuffing. It's just greasy bread

Jello of any type, I can't even put it in my mouth without gagging

Green Bean Casserole, although my girls love it

Sweet Potato Casserole with marshmallows, another thing my kids love

Cheesecake

Yeah, I know. I'm weird.

Annie

Annie Annie!!! What's wrong with greasy bread???

Bragu, I feel the same. I miss my mother and brothers. We always spent Thanksgiving together, with their kids (my nieces and nephews). My mother always cooked with SIL's bringing food and helping.

Thanksgiving was always a big turkey, bread stuffing. candied yams (not casserole), peas (canned LaSuer), green beans (boiled), gravy...the best! Pumpkin pie with thick, home made whipped cream. My mom put out her best glasses filled with apple cider.

My mom always made her gravy from the drippings in the roasting pan and would boil the giblets, neck and add the water to the gravy.

Sad, they are all gone. I'm 72 and remember those Thanksgivings with love and delicious food. I now only cook for myself, husband and son. Our daughter and granddaughters live far away. Because of Covid, we can't all be together.

This year has been so sad and lonely.

Jane

(((Jane)))

Artemis_Ma, that sounds like the stuffing I make now that was my Mom's recipe. Here's my recipe:

My Stuffing (or Dressing depending on your frame of mind)

Growing up,
our family always used to stuff the turkey.
Thus, it was stuffing. However
with all the concern about bacteria and under cooking, I started cooking it in
a casserole dish. Thus, it is no longer
stuffing, but dressing.

Ingredients

16 cups of assorted
mild flavored stale bread

1 onion,
chopped fine

3 stalks of
celery, chopped fine

1-16 oz tube
of sausage (I like Jimmy Dean regular or sage)

2-4 cups
chicken broth

6 oz sliced
fresh button mushrooms

6
tablespoons butter

Poultry
seasoning (parsley, sage, rosemary, thyme, salt and pepper)

Whenever I
have ends of loaves of bread, or we don’t finish a loaf of bread, I’ll put them
in a freezer bag and throw them in the freezer until I’m ready to make
stuffing. You want to use mild breads
(any white bread, hamburger or hot dog rolls, whole wheat, multi grain, sour
dough, Italian, French, etc, work well.
Breads that have a strong flavor like rye bread, pumpernickel, garlic
bread, etc, will overwhelm the flavor of the stuffing. Don’t use these.)

Toast bread
in the toaster until golden brown. Tear
bread into bite size pieces and put into a large bowl.

In a large
skillet, cook the sausage until no longer pink.
Do not drain. Put sausage (grease
and all) into bread bowl and crumb sausage.
In the same skillet, melt 2 tablespoons of butter. Sauté onion until translucent. Add to bread and sausage (do not drain). In the same skillet, melt 2 tablespoons of
butter. Sauté slice mushrooms until
tender (until they start to sweat). Add
to bread and sausage (do not drain). In
the same skillet, melt 2 tablespoons of butter.
Sauté celery until tender. Add to
bread and sausage (do not drain).

Heat the
chicken broth (start with 2 cups) until boiling and pour over the bread and
sausage mixture. Add two heaping
tablespoons of poultry seasoning. Mix
everything with your hands. The mixture
should be moist but not soggy. If the
mixture is still dry add a little more chicken broth.

If stuffing
the bird, stuff the bird and cook according to roasting directions for the
bird. If making dressing, place the
stuffing in a greased casserole dish (or two.
I use two smaller casserole dishes. A 13x9 baking dish can usually accommodate
it.) Bake covered at 350 degrees F for 1
hour.

Party Music50, LOL! The thread would be a book if it were about family issues!