Best Thanksgiving dishes

Stuffing▲ Rising

Bread that sat under the turkey and absorbed all its drippings, then got seasoned with sage, celery, and onion until it became the dish people fight over the corners of the pan for. It's the only side that changes personality in every region—cornbread in the South, oysters in New England, sausage everywhere else—and that adaptability is exactly why it never leaves the table. Turkey gets the applause, but stuffing gets the second and third helpings.

added by IJR

Mashed potatoes and gravy▲ Rising

The great equalizer of the Thanksgiving plate, the dish that turns dry turkey into something worth eating and makes lumpy attempts still disappear by dessert. There's no signature moment because it IS the moment—every fork detour runs through the potato bowl before hitting anything else. It's ranked here not because it's flashy but because it's structurally load-bearing: pull it off the table and the whole meal collapses.

added by IJR

Turkey▲ Rising

The bird everyone build the entire holiday around, yet the one dish most likely to get quietly upstaged by its own sides on the actual plate. Its signature moment is the carving—the ceremonial cut that starts dinner—but let's be honest, it's dry more often than not and survives purely on gravy and nostalgia. It sits at the top of the ranking not for flavor but for symbolism: no turkey, no Thanksgiving, full stop.

added by IJR

Mac and cheese▲ Rising

The uninvited guest that crashed the traditional Thanksgiving lineup decades ago and never left, especially once it started showing up next to turkey in Black households and then everywhere else. Its signature move is doing what stuffing and potatoes can't—giving kids and cheese-obsessed adults something to actually get excited about besides pie. It's climbing this ranking every year because it's the rare side dish with zero detractors at the table.

added by IJRin 4 rankings

Cranberry sauce▲ Rising

Either a can-shaped jellied cylinder with ridge marks still visible, or a homemade version with whole berries and orange zest—and the fight between those two camps is basically its whole identity. Its signature moment is the slice, wobbling as it slides out of the can intact, a texture nobody asked for but everybody secretly loves. It ranks here because it's the only dish on the table that's actually tart, cutting through all that richness like it's doing the meal a favor.

added by IJRin 2 rankings

Sweet potato casserole

The dish that dared to put marshmallows on a vegetable and, somehow, won—turning what should be a side into a dessert-adjacent argument starter every single year. Its defining moment is the toasted marshmallow top cracking open under a spoon, revealing the sweet orange mash beneath, proof that sugar and starch make a surprisingly great marriage. It belongs on this list precisely because it's the most divisive dish here, and division means people care.

added by IJRin 2 rankings

Dinner rolls

added by IJR

Pumpkin pie▲ Rising

added by IJRin 2 rankings

Green bean casserole▼ Falling

Born in a 1955 Campbell's Soup test kitchen as a way to sell more canned cream of mushroom soup, and somehow it became sacred family tradition within a generation. Its signature moment is the crispy fried onion topping getting scraped off first, sometimes before the casserole even makes it to the table intact. It earns its spot for pure staying power—seventy years of skeptics saying

added by IJRin 2 rankings

Ham▼ Falling

added by IJRin 2 rankings