The 5 most argued about Thanksgiving foods

Thanksgiving foods are no stranger to controversy.

Many of the dishes on the holiday table aren’t eaten year-round in the United States. Because of that, they spark discussions each year about whether traditional Thanksgiving food is really worth the effort required to make it.

Even Martha Stewart recently said she was “turkeyed out.” (She later walked back the comment).

Look, I get it. Thanksgiving doesn’t make my short list of meals I love, but I still think there’s something irresistible about many of the classic dishes. But that doesn’t mean I don’t like to talk about which foods could be improved or totally left off the menu.

In that spirit, here are the five most polarizing Thanksgiving foods.

Turkey

Is turkey a dry and unbearable part of the Thanksgiving feast or is it actually tasty? That’s one of the biggest questions surrounding one of the most controversial foods on the table.

Some people really don’t like turkey. “Stop pretending you like turkey. It’s no good on Thanksgiving, or any other day,” a 2020 headline from Insider reads.

But turkey can be a flavorful meat. If you brine it, inject it and coat it with plenty of herb butter, you can end up with moist, juicy meat that has good flavor.

Still, until turkey skeptics try a truly well-prepared turkey with crispy skin, they’re unlikely to be convinced that turkey is anything other than too dry.

Stuffing

Let’s face it: Stuffing has a tendency to be flavorless.

I once read that Thanksgiving food has the issue of being bland and dry, and I agree that’s often the case. Stuffing is essentially stale bread with broth and vegetables. It doesn’t sound appetizing when you put it that way. But did you know that more than 50% of U.S. adults plan on eating stuffing this year, according to YouGov?

When given the choice between stuffing, which is cooked inside the bird, and dressing, which is cooked outside, I’d probably choose dressing because it’s easier to control the moisture. But still, I’m an active participant in the argument over whether or not stuffing tastes good.

Pie

You might have heard people wonder whether Thanksgiving pies are worth the hype. But the better question here is what kind of pie are you talking about?

Pumpkin pie is a common choice for Turkey Day, but I’m not the only one who’s asked whether it actually tastes good or if we’re all being fooled by a nostalgia factor.

It’s not that pumpkin isn’t a great ingredient for baking (pumpkin bread is delicious), but as The Wall Street Journal put it, “Turns out it’s hard to make a good pie out of a pumpkin.”

If you’ve gone to all the trouble of making a pumpkin pie from scratch only to wonder why it doesn’t taste as good as the canned pumpkin, it’s because the cans are filled with “Dickinson pumpkin” — a type of squash. Kimberly Holland described the pumpkin pie filling in an article for All Recipes as “gelatinous, gummy, coagulated.”

There are, of course, those who adore pumpkin pie. “After that overly rich, elaborate meal, it’s the basicness of a pumpkin pie that I need,” Monica Potts wrote for NBC News.

Here’s the deal: If you don’t have pumpkin pie on your table, but you do have other types of pie like apple or chocolate cream, that could be just as controversial. Because why would you have other pie on Thanksgiving?

Sweet potatoes

Sweet potatoes cause a fair amount of arguing. Do you top sweet potatoes with marshmallows or do you prepare them as a savory dish?

On the one hand, sweet potatoes are, well, sweet. It might make sense to lean into that sweetness and make a dessert that highlights that quality rather than tries to hide it.

But, on the other hand, there’s a healthier path to take. If you roast sweet potatoes and pair them with savory vegetables, fresh herbs and some spices, the potatoes’ sweetness can be balanced and the dish could work as a savory side.

Some families grew up with sweet potato casserole on their table and others grew up without sweet potatoes near their table. This food may be served as part of dinner, but it’s often pretty much a dessert.

Green bean casserole

Green bean casserole involves green beans, condensed soup and fried onions. It gives cream of mushroom soup a chance to shine.

“Campbell’s estimates that 30% of the cream of mushroom soup sold in the United States today goes into making this nostalgic, retro casserole,” according to the Martha Stewart website. The dish came into existence because it’s inexpensive and convenient to make and share with a group.

While some people think this preparation improves the taste of green beans, others believe it unnecessarily hides the flavor of the beans. Why eat them in a casserole when you can eat them steamed with maybe a little bit of garlic and lemon?

Best Thanksgiving foods

So are there any Thanksgiving foods that everyone likes? I think there are two that are more or less universally beloved.

Mashed potatoes

It’s really hard to mess up mashed potatoes. After cooking the potatoes, you mash them together with some kind of dairy and add butter, salt, maybe some fresh garlic and freshly ground pepper. Voila, you have a delicious dish.

Unlike sweet potato casserole and green bean casserole, mashed potatoes don’t typically involve add-ins that cause controversy (like cream of mushroom soup and fried onions).

Rolls

A pillowy soft, piping hot roll that causes the pat of butter you put on it to melt can turn a meal around. Even if the rest of the food isn’t good, the rolls can be consistently good.

It’s rather easy to mess up making bread (yeast is temperamental), but even just okay rolls can be drastically improved if they’re warm with some butter.