A turkey is a tough bird. In life, turkeys are mean and beady-eyed and prone to pecking humans. In death, turkey often comes out of the oven dry and bland.
That’s no excuse, of course, for eating ribeyes at Thanksgiving. Or strip steaks. Or ham, which is really more of a Christmas meat. Heaven forbid you heat up tofurkey, which The Vegetarian Times informs me tastes like “what I imagine turkey-flavored ChapStick or a turkey-scented candle might taste like.”
It’s a challenge to make a delicious bird (a challenge that can be conquered with brining). Moreover, it’s tradition. (RELATED: MR. RIGHT: How To Politely Nuke The Liberals At Your Thanksgiving Dinner)
The traditional Thanksgiving meal is turkey, it tastes great if your learn to cook it right but even if you can’t be bothered the meal is turkey
You can serve another meat alongside but Americans eat turkey on Thanksgiving
Than you for your attention to this matter
— Auron MacIntyre (@AuronMacintyre) November 19, 2025
William Bradford, leader of the Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts, wrote of a “great store of wild Turkies [sic]” at the first Thanksgiving. Bradford was writing after the fact, but regardless, turkey was at least associated with Thanksgiving by the mid-1600s.
The turkey really hit its stride in the 1800s. The bird was plentiful and native, big enough to feed an entire family, and pretty much useless as a farm animal except for its meat. Turkey played a starring role in Sarah Josepha Hale’s 1827 novel, Northwood.
“The roasted turkey took precedence on this occasion, being placed at the head of the table; and well did it become its lordly station, sending forth the rich odor of its savory stuffing, and finely covered with the froth of the basting.”
Accompanying the turkey, in Hale’s story: Beef sirloin, pork and mutton, a goose and pair of ducklings, a chicken pie, pickles, preserves, butter, wheat bread, a huge plum pudding, and “custards and pies of every name and description ever known in Yankee land; yet the pumpkin pie occupied the most distinguished niche.”
Also, cakes, fruits, and wine.
The chicken pie, along with the pumpkin, are “an indispensable part of a good and true Yankee Thanksgiving,” according to Hale.
You know what’s not an indispensable part of a good and true Yankee Thanksgiving?
“One-pot vegetable biryani,” which The New York Times (NYT) suggests as a replacement turkey for vegetarian-minded readers. (RELATED: Trump Says He Saved Turkeys From Being Deported To Notorious Foreign Prison In Hilarious Moment)
The late Charlie Kirk laid down some ground rules for a Thanksgiving feast.
The great Charlie Kirk: It’s un-American to not have turkey at Thanksgiving. pic.twitter.com/3rBerWUkWm
— Human Events (@HumanEvents) November 26, 2025
“I’m a turkey purist … Now, Christmas is a completely different ballgame. There are no rules with Christmas, ham is usually center, but steak is acceptable … Thanksgiving, it is un-American not to have either turkey, some sort of dressing, cranberries, but here’s the thing about the cranberry thing. If you want to be an ultra-traditionalist, it must be straight out of the can, taken vertically, with no adjustments.”
Canned, congealed cranberry sauce sounds fairly repulsive to me, but that’s the thing about tradition. It supersedes individual preferences.
As G.K. Chesterton wrote in Orthodoxy, “Tradition means giving a vote to most obscure of all classes, our ancestors … Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about.”
Now, that said, canned cranberry sauce was a mid-20th century addition to the table, and while iconic, not the most traditional. But the point remains. This Thanksgiving, roast a turkey.
Follow Natalie Sandoval on X: @NatSandovalDC
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