31 Thanksgiving Dinner Recipes To Try This Year

34 Thanksgiving Dinner Recipes To Try This Year

Planning Thanksgiving dinner recipes in September is not early, it is strategic, and I say that as someone whose grown kids now FaceTime me from their own kitchens halfway through one of my recipes. There are 31 here and they cover the whole table: a no-fail roast turkey, a spiral ham for the people who quietly prefer ham, three kinds of cornbread dressing, rosemary rolls, melting sweet potatoes, a crispy potato roast and a pumpkin cobbler with a scone-like top. Some of them cook in the slow cooker so your oven stays free, and a few can be made the day before and reheated without anyone being able to tell. Perfect for a first time hosting a holiday dinner, a table of twelve, a smaller Thanksgiving for two or three, or a Friday of leftovers you actually planned for!

1. Cranberry Apple Pecan Wild Rice Pilaf

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Wild rice simmered in apple juice and chicken broth with Dijon, butter, a bay leaf and dried herbs, which is why it does not taste like the plain side dish it looks like. It needs 45 to 60 minutes covered on the lowest setting, so start checking at 45 and add water if the pan goes dry before the grains are tender. Apples and onion get sautéed separately, then folded in with toasted pecans and dried cranberries.

Get the full tutorial at Carlsbad Cravings.

2. Pumpkin Cobbler

Pumpkin pie with the crust problem removed. A custard of pumpkin puree, evaporated milk, egg, both sugars, flour and pumpkin pie spice goes in the bottom and a biscuit topping made with cold cubed butter and buttermilk goes on top, so you get a scone-like lid over the filling. Use plain pumpkin puree, not pie filling, because the spices and sugar are already in the recipe. It serves fifteen and bakes in about 35 minutes.

Get the full tutorial at Liv for Cake.

3. Rosemary Dinner Rolls

Three and a half tablespoons of fresh chopped rosemary go into the dough itself, which is what makes these read as holiday rolls rather than everyday ones. Two temperatures matter: the water at 110 degrees to wake the yeast and the milk at around 80 so it does not kill it. Keep the dough slightly sticky, because extra flour is what turns a light roll heavy. Makes twelve in about an hour and fifty minutes, and they are made for olive oil and cracked pepper.

Get the full tutorial at Cooking Classy.

4. Classic Traditional Thanksgiving Stuffing

The whole recipe turns on one instruction: dry the bread properly. A pound of day-old French bread goes into a 250 degree oven for about 45 minutes, or you dry it overnight on the counter, and skipping that is how stuffing becomes mush. After that it is a cup of butter, two and a half cups of onion, celery, and a serious amount of fresh parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme, bound with broth and two eggs and baked uncovered at 350 for a crisp top.

Get the full tutorial at Averie Cooks.

5. Roasted Vegan Thanksgiving Bowl

A full plate rather than a sad plate of sides, which is what vegan guests usually get handed. Acorn squash, carrot, brussels sprouts and garlicky broccoli all roast, creamer potatoes get mashed with vegetable broth and vegan butter, and the gravy is made from vegan butter, flour and broth with onion powder, garlic powder, thyme and oregano. It serves two or three in about 55 minutes, so scale it up if you have more than one vegan coming.

Get the full tutorial at I Love Vegan.

6. Creamy Cinnamon Apple Walnut Fruit Salad

Four pounds of crisp apples, and the trick that saves the whole bowl is soaking the diced apples in lemon water for about a minute and draining them on paper towels, so they do not go brown before dinner. The dressing is Neufchatel whipped with brown sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg for a full three minutes, then sour cream and vanilla. Walnuts and dried cranberries go through it, keeping some back for the top. Serves twelve.

Get the full tutorial at Cooking Classy.

7. Healthy Green Bean Casserole

Vegan, dairy free and it still tastes like the casserole everyone is expecting. The cream comes from cashews soaked for 30 minutes and blended, the mushroom base gets depth from soy sauce, a little white wine and a pinch of nutmeg, and the crispy onions are baked at 400 degrees for 20 to 25 minutes rather than fried. Watch them at the end, because they go from golden to burnt fast. About an hour, serves eight.

Get the full tutorial at Hummusapien.

8. Pumpkin Dinner Rolls

These are shaped like little pumpkins and the method is genuinely clever: kitchen string tied around each ball before it bakes makes the ridges. Real roasted pumpkin goes into the dough, about 300 grams of it, roasted at 355 degrees for 20 to 25 minutes and pureed, so the color is natural. The dough rises about an hour and fifteen minutes, then gets divided into nine pieces of roughly three ounces each.

Get the full tutorial at As Easy As Apple Pie.

9. Crockpot Candied Sweet Potatoes

Three pounds of sweet potatoes in the slow cooker, so the oven stays free, and the syrup gets boiled for three full minutes on the stove first so it is actually syrup before it goes over the slices. Here is the smart part: a triple layer of folded paper towels under the lid catches the condensation that would otherwise water everything down. High for two to three hours, marshmallows over the top at the end. Serves twelve.

Get the full tutorial at Flour On My Face.

10. Brown Butter Garlic Honey Roasted Carrots

Twenty-five minutes, one skillet, seven ingredients. Butter gets browned in an oven-safe pan until it foams and goes golden, then garlic goes in for seconds only, then a pound of baby carrots with salt, pepper, honey and thyme, and the whole skillet goes into a 425 degree oven for 15 to 20 minutes. Garlic burns fast in brown butter, so move quickly once it hits the pan. It serves three, so double it for a holiday table.

Get the full tutorial at Rasa Malaysia.

11. Pineapple Honey Glazed Ham Recipe

For the people at your table who are quietly hoping for ham. A nine or ten pound spiral ham goes in covered with foil at 325 degrees for roughly 10 to 12 minutes per pound, and the glaze of pineapple juice, honey, sugar and stone ground mustard only goes on for the last 20 minutes. That timing is the whole thing: glaze it early and the sugar burns before the ham is hot through. Five ingredients in the glaze.

Get the full tutorial at WonkyWonderful.

12. Green Bean Bundles with Bacon and Brown Sugar

Wrapping a vegetable in bacon is not hiding it, and I want that on the record. I never hid vegetables from my kids the way the cookbooks tell you to. I made dessert conditional on the vegetables getting eaten, and my kids eat vegetables. Bacon would have been the easier route. Sara at dinneratthezoo bundles 8 to 10 thin green beans into a half slice of bacon, tosses them in melted butter, brown sugar, garlic salt and pepper, then roasts them at 400 degrees for 15 to 20 minutes. Two steps decide this one: blanch the beans 2 to 3 minutes and shock them in ice water so they stay bright green, and par-bake the bacon 7 minutes first so it’s still floppy enough to wrap. Assemble the day before, bake right before dinner, and this is the green thing on the Thanksgiving table that comes back empty.

Get the full tutorial at Dinner at the Zoo.

13. Turkey Pot Pie Soup

This is the answer to the Friday after, when there is still turkey in the refrigerator and nobody wants another plate of it. Bone broth and cream, about three and a half cups of broth, carry shredded leftover turkey and vegetables into something that tastes like pot pie without any pastry. Coconut cream works instead of dairy, sweet potatoes work instead of white, and if there is no fresh sage use savory, marjoram or rosemary.

Get the full tutorial at Ancestral Nutrition.

14. Turkey Cheese Ball

A cheese ball dressed up as a turkey, which buys you an hour of peace while dinner finishes, because guests will stand around picking at it instead of asking when we are eating. Crackers or pretzels make the feathers and tail, and the whole thing can be shaped a day ahead and kept covered in the refrigerator, which is exactly what you want from an appetizer on a day like this.

Get the full tutorial at Allrecipes.

15. Warm Quinoa Brussel Sprouts Salad

The clever step here is that the shaved brussels sprouts get tossed into the hot cooked quinoa and left covered for 10 to 15 minutes, which softens them without cooking them to death. Winter squash roasts at 400 degrees for 30 to 40 minutes, then everything comes together with chickpeas, walnuts, dried cranberries and a honey Dijon dressing. Shave the sprouts as thin as you can and cut the tough core out first. Serves eight.

Get the full tutorial at Sweet and Savory by Shinee.

16. Melting Sweet Potatoes

Five ingredients, and the name is accurate. Sweet potatoes get peeled and cut into inch-thick slices, drizzled with melted butter and salt, then spread on a roasting pan so no two pieces touch, roasted 20 minutes at 425, flipped with tongs and given another 20. The maple pecan sauce is maple syrup boiled with chopped pecans for exactly one minute. Crisp outside, light and fluffy inside. Serves four.

Get the full tutorial at Dessert For Two.

17. Crispy Potato Roast

Ten to twelve russets sliced as thin as you can manage, kept in their stacks and stood up vertically in a round baking dish, with thin shallot slices wedged in every three or four slices. Melted butter and olive oil go over the top, then thyme, red pepper flakes and cubed pancetta, and it bakes at 375 degrees. It looks like something from a restaurant and is basically just patience with a knife.

Get the full tutorial at Joyously Domestic.

18. Thanksgiving Bacon Roasted Turkey

A twelve pound turkey under a blanket of about twelve strips of bacon, with a compound butter of smoked paprika, garlic, rosemary, sage, thyme and lemon juice worked under the skin. The oven starts at 500 degrees, which is what sets the skin, and the whole thing runs around four hours. If you are brining, that happens roughly 18 hours ahead, so read the recipe the day before rather than the morning of.

Get the full tutorial at Cooking on the Weekends.

19. Butternut Squash Vegducken

A zucchini inside an eggplant inside a butternut squash, tied with kitchen twine, and yes it is a project. The stuffing uses the scooped-out insides with toasted pecans, shiitake mushrooms, shallot, breadcrumbs, parmesan and eggs. Total time is three hours and forty-five minutes for six servings, so this is your one showpiece dish and everything else on the menu should be something you have made before.

Get the full tutorial at Epicurious.

20. Herb And Goat Cheese Stuffed Peppers

Eighteen mini sweet peppers, halved with the stems left on because they look better that way, filled with goat cheese mixed with crushed garlic, rosemary, basil, thyme, red pepper flakes, salt and pepper. Fifteen minutes total, 11 to 13 of them in a 400 degree oven. The useful part for a holiday: you can stuff them the night before and bake them right before guests arrive.

Get the full tutorial at The Taylor House.

21. Thanksgiving Turkey Roulade

A boned, butterflied three pound turkey breast pounded to an even three quarters of an inch, spread with a half inch layer of chestnut and sausage cornbread stuffing, rolled and roasted at 350 degrees for about an hour and a half. Leave a three quarter inch border and resist overstuffing it, because an overfilled roulade will not roll closed. The pan gravy uses stock, white wine, cider vinegar and potato starch. Serves six.

Get the full tutorial at No Spoon Necessary.

22. Dry Brine Roast Turkey

Here’s my best Thanksgiving advice, and I cooked my whole life to earn it: when you try a new recipe, make sure everything else on the menu is something you have already made. Two or three new dishes at once and the timing is impossible. A dry brine is the one new thing worth risking on a roast turkey, because most of the work happens the day before. Jessica Gavin rubs salt and sugar under the skin, then lets the bird sit uncovered in the fridge for 12 to 24 hours, which she explains as osmosis: the salt and sugar pull the juices out and send them back in carrying the seasoning. Roasting starts breast-side down at 425 degrees so the legs get a head start, and then comes the hardest 45 minutes of your year, letting it rest before you carve.

Get the full tutorial at Jessica Gavin.

23. Corn Casserole For The Holidays

Five ingredients, one bowl, no mixer. A box of Jiffy corn muffin mix, a can of creamed corn, two drained cans of whole kernel corn, a cup of sour cream and half a cup of melted butter get folded together gently until just combined, then baked at 350 degrees for 45 minutes, topped with grated cheese and given ten more. Do not beat it smooth. Overmixing is what makes corn casserole tough. Serves eight.

Get the full tutorial at Two Sisters.

24. No-Fail Thanksgiving Turkey

If you have never roasted a turkey, start here. The bird defrosts in the refrigerator two to four days ahead, comes out an hour before roasting so it is not fridge-cold going into the oven, and gets an herb butter of rosemary, thyme, garlic, salt and pepper worked under the skin. Onion, lemon and fresh herbs go in the cavity. The video shows the carving too, which is the part most first-timers dread.

Get the full tutorial at DIY Joy.

25. Slow Cooker Thanksgiving Casserole

The entire Thanksgiving plate in one crock, layered in order: potatoes with milk and butter, seasoned cubed chicken, cream of mushroom, stuffing, more butter, green beans, cream of chicken, mozzarella and French fried onions on top. There is no browning and no searing, you build the layers and close the lid. It feeds a group and is genuinely filling, and it is a good answer for a smaller Thanksgiving where a whole turkey makes no sense.

Get the full tutorial at DIY Joy.

26. Slow Cooker Spiral Ham

A six pound spiral ham cooked on low for about five hours, glazed with brown sugar, honey, Dijon, apple cider, ground cloves and black pepper. Use a basting brush to work the glaze down into the spiral cuts rather than just over the top, and baste it every hour with the juices in the bottom, which is what keeps it from drying out. It frees your oven completely and it carves itself.

Get the full tutorial at DIY Joy.

27. How To Cook A Whole Turkey In A Crockpot

A whole turkey in the crockpot with salt, pepper and butter, set on low for seven to nine hours, and that really is the method. There is no wrong way to season it, so use steak seasoning or stuff it with sage and onion if you would rather. The skin will not brown on its own, so put the bird under the broiler at the end if crisp skin matters to you. Wash it and plop it in.

Get the full tutorial at DIY Joy.

28. Best Southern Cornbread Chicken and Dressing

The broth is the reason this one tastes different. It is built from scratch with four leg quarters, onion, celery, carrot, bay leaves, peppercorns and bouillon, and that broth then goes into the dressing along with crumbled buttermilk cornbread, cream of chicken, cream of onion, eggs, celery and onion. Southern dressing, not stuffing, and there is a difference worth arguing about. Serve it with gravy or cranberry sauce.

Get the full tutorial at DIY Joy.

29. Easy Chicken Cornbread Dressing

The simpler cornbread dressing of the two, and the one to make if you are cooking a lot of other things. Onion, bell pepper and celery get sautéed for about seven minutes with garlic in the last minute, then crumbled cornbread, shredded chicken, cream of chicken, cream of celery and six to seven cups of broth go in with sage, poultry seasoning and pepper. Taste it before it goes into the 350 degree oven, because the seasoning is all to taste.

Get the full tutorial at DIY Joy.

30. Slow Cooker Cornbread Dressing

Nine ingredients mixed in one bowl, poured into a greased slow cooker, dotted with butter and cooked on low for four to six hours. You can mix the whole thing the night before, which is the real reason this recipe exists. Crumbled cornbread, a bag of herb stuffing, cream of chicken, broth, sweet onion, celery, eggs, rubbed sage and pepper. It frees up the oven space that the turkey is going to need anyway.

Get the full tutorial at DIY Joy.

31. Crockpot Italian Sausage Stuffing

Sweet Italian sausage browned first, then the drippings and half a stick of butter carry onion, garlic, sage, rosemary and thyme, and a cup of chicken stock deglazes all of it into the crockpot. Lightly toasted sourdough goes in with two beaten eggs whisked into the remaining stock. Low for three to four hours. A word of warning from the post itself: one crockpot’s worth is not enough for a Thanksgiving crowd.

Get the full tutorial at DIY Joy.