Thanksgiving is a doozie of a day, right? Right. The food, the family, the parade, the football– it’s all taxing. So, why not take a beat for yourself after the meal and do a little 5-minute workout to relieve some stress?
Gather the whole family or sneak away on your own!
Turkey is great, but have you had a full plate of mashed potatoes with a side of rolls? Exactly, side dishes are where it’s at.
We recently asked our Agents what their favorite Thanksgiving side was/is and well, the results were not unanimous.
Mostly, people love mashed potatoes, stuffing, and sweet potatoes.
Wondering what you’ll do next week with all that leftover turkey and want to try something different than a traditional sandwich? Well, here you go!
Green (Leftover) Turkey Enchiladas:
Ingredients:
Directions:
1. Preheat the oven to 350°F and lightly grease a 9- by 13-inch baking pan with a little vegetable oil.
2. In a large skillet, cook the onions in the oil for 4-5 minutes on medium heat or until golden brown, add the chili powder, cumin and oregano and stir them in for about 30 seconds.
3. Add the canned chilies, shredded turkey, salt and pepper and cook everything together for about 4-5 minutes or until the turkey begins to caramelize a bit around the edges, remove the filling to a bowl to cool.
4. In the same skillet, add both cans of sauce and allow it to come to a boil, mix together the water and cornstarch and add it to the sauce. Cook for a couple minutes, remove from the heat and allow the sauce to cool a bit.
5. Take each tortilla and quickly warm it up either in a skillet or right over a gas burner, set them aside.
6. Add half of the sauce in the bottom of your pan and set aside.
7. Take each toasted tortilla, smear a spoonful of sauce on each one, top with some of the turkey mixture followed by a little cheese as well, wrap like a mini burrito and place it seam side down in the prepared baking dish.
8. Continue the same step until all of your tortillas are rolled, pour remaining sauce over the top, sprinkle remaining cheese and bake them for about 30 minutes or until the top is golden and bubbly.
Thanksgiving time is upon us and there’s nothing I am more thankful for than a ton of food. Okay, that’s an exaggeration. I’m obviously thankful for many other things, but being well-fed is definitely on the list. To make sure our menus around the office are ready to go, we asked Agents about their favorite Thanksgiving side dishes and even asked for a little help with the recipes. As usual, they over-delivered.
6 Special Thanksgiving Side Dish Recipes Straight From Agents:
1. Stuffing
“My favorite Thanksgiving dish is stuffing!!!! My mom prepares it with sausage and it’s so good. I was born the day after thanksgiving so, I say that I’ve been eating it for 37 years!!! It’s just comforting and such a nostalgic taste for thanksgiving. I never eat stuffing outside of thanksgiving, so it’s super special.”
Ingredients:
Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 350°F. Grease a 9 x 13-inch baking dish with butter. Place the stuffing cubes in a large mixing bowl. In a large sauté pan, melt the butter. Add the onions and celery and cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally, for about 8 minutes, or until the vegetables are soft. Add the garlic and cook 2 minutes more. Add the vegetables to the stuffing cubes. (Don’t wash the pan but scrape out every last bit of vegetables, otherwise, they will burn in the next step.) In the same pan, cook the sausage over medium heat for 8-10 minutes, until browned and cooked through, breaking up the sausage with a metal spatula while cooking (the largest pieces should be no greater than 1/4-inch). Add the browned sausage and fat to the bread cubes and vegetables. Add the chicken broth, egg, rosemary, sage, parsley, salt, and pepper to the bread cube mixture and mix until the bread is soft and moistened. Transfer the stuffing to the prepared baking dish and bake for 65-75 minutes, uncovered, until deeply golden and crisp on top.
2. Potato Casserole
“My absolute favorite side dish is potato casserole. I make it every year, and every year it is the one dish that there are no leftovers of! We’ve been eating this ever since I began hosting Thanksgiving, about 10 years ago. It’s such a warm, cozy dish that reminds me of family and the holidays. It’s perfect.”
Ingredients:
Instructions:
1. Pour the hash browns into a lightly greased 9×13 inch baking dish. In a large bowl, combine the cheese, sour cream and soup. 2. In a large skillet over medium heat, combine the onion with 1 stick butter and saute for 5 minutes. Add this to the soup mixture and spread this over the potatoes in the dish. 3. Next, arrange the crushed corn flakes over all in the dish. Melt the remaining stick of butter and pour this evenly over the corn flakes. 4. Bake at 425 degrees for 1 hour.
3. Sweet Carrots
“My favorite side dish is sweet carrots. I make it and I’ve made them for years. It just makes me feel like it’s holiday time.”
Ingredients:
1 pack of baby carrots
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup of sugar
Instructions:
“Cook together till carrots are tender. Eat and enjoy!”
4. Turkey and Homemade Noodles
“Turkey and homemade noodles is my favorite side dish. We have had noodles every year since I’ve been alive. My grandma hand made them. After she passed, my great aunt made them. And now it is my responsibility to make the homemade noodles. They are so delicious and a family tradition.”
Ingredients:
Instructions:
Knead, roll out and cut dough. Boil in juice (broth) from cooked turkey for 8 minutes. Add bits of cut up turkey. Yum!
5. Green Bean Casserole
“Green bean casserole. My mom has made it every year that I can remember and it would not be Thanksgiving without it! Even my kids have learned to love and look forward to that tradition.”
Instructions:
Stir the soup, milk, soy sauce, black pepper, beans and 2/3 cup onions in a 1 1/2-quart casserole. Bake at 350°F. for 25 minutes or until the bean mixture is hot and bubbling. Stir the bean mixture. Sprinkle with the remaining onions. Bake for 5 minutes or until the onions are golden brown.
6. Giblet Gravy
“My favorite Thanksgiving side dish is giblet gravy. I have been eating it for over 10 years. My mom prepares the dish every Thanksgiving and it gives the food an extra savory taste.”
Ingredients:
Instructions:
Cook the gravy by adding water, flour and bacon drippings until golden brown and a thickened creamy consistency. Boil the chicken gizzards until done then chop them up in small pieces and add them to the gravy.
I’m a little weird when it comes to Thanksgiving dessert– I don’t love pumpkin pie or pecan pie, but I could get on board with some pecan pie brownies. And your family probably could too.
Ingredients:
Directions:
Let brownies cool completely before slicing and serving.
Thanksgiving is a day that is hard to top– eat, eat, eat, nap, eat some more, watch football, maybe leave the house to look at Christmas lights. Also, it’s hard to be mad on a day when you’re able to sit around and reflect on all of the things and people you’re grateful for. That’s why we asked Agents to describe their perfect Thanksgiving day for us. Most of these sound pretty perfect!
8 Field Agents Described Their Perfect Thanksgiving:
1. “Our Thanksgiving looks the exact same every year. I prep everything I can the night before, sleep in (until about 8 a.m. or so), get up and start cooking! My family comes over around 12 and we eat turkey, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, potato casserole, corn, rolls, and pie! After lunch, we spread out all of the shopping ads across the floor and pass them around and start marking what we want to buy. We watch football while we eat another slice of pie and then load into the car to spend the rest of the evening shopping! It’s so perfect!”
2. “My perfect Thanksgiving day is when I get up early around 6 am to start preparing dishes that will be devoured later that afternoon. Music is playing in the background. My children are helping set the table and we start watching football at noon. We eat at 1 and enjoy the game and each other’s company and continue to eat until we get full. The menu consists of Mac n cheese, turkey, dressing, sweet potato casserole, potato salad, apple crispy, and sweet potato pie.”
3. “My perfect Thanksgiving Day is a day where all of my little family gathers together. We have a light breakfast followed by some football and our favorite movies like Rudy (also about football). We cook together and gather to eat once done. We have a full feast of turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, green beans, mac and cheese, stuffing, cranberry, rolls and cannot forget the desserts and all the pies. Pumpkin, apple, and pecan pie are a must. We end the night by watching Christmas movies and indulging on leftovers and desserts.”
4. “My perfect Thanksgiving starts with my family running a 5k turkey trot race. Next, I start prepping thanksgiving lunch while watching the Macy’s thanksgiving day parade. My husband preps the oil to deep fry the turkey while I prep potatoes, chicken and noodles, corn, gravy, rolls, deviled eggs, cranberry salad, and baked beans. We enjoy our lunch with family and friends. We have a variety of desserts including pumpkin pie and roll. Then we relax, enjoy each other’s company and play games.”
5. “My perfect day is I go to my mom’s around 3:00. My mom fixes a huge Thanksgiving meal. She makes ham, turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes, dumplings, dressing, noodles, broccoli casserole, sweet potatoes, potato salad, macaroni salad, rolls, and corn pudding. The desserts are chocolate and pumpkin pies. My parents, siblings, their significant others, their children, my children and my husband. We don’t have any particular traditions. We just eat, talk and laugh. We go back and forth to the TV watching football and we look at Black Friday ads.”
6. “My perfect Thanksgiving Day would be watching the Macy’s Parade with my husband and daughter. After the parade, we would go to my grandma’s to eat Thanksgiving dinner with everyone (aunts, uncles, cousins). I would fill my plate with ham, macaroni and cheese, mashed potatoes, and corn. We would talk and play games for the rest of the afternoon!”
7. “10 a.m. is the Turkey trot in my town. So I’ll do the 5-mile jog. Then family comes over for some bird, stuffing, veggies and all the trimmings. Perhaps some wine and seasonal cocktails will be served too.”
8. “The perfect Thanksgiving is with family. Spending a week at my mother’s house with all of my brothers and sisters and their family is the best Thanksgiving day we have an early dinner just so that we can enjoy the leftovers later on that evening. We usually go to movies or we go to see college basketball games or football games. It’s the best.”
If you think preparing a Thanksgiving meal for your family or friends is a bit overwhelming or stressful, imagine doing it in 1955 and having a woman named Marie Gifford tell you need to prepared the bird “New York-style” or something like it. Don’t know what New York-style is? Same here, friends.
If you want to learn all about Thanksgiving in 1955 or modern-day Thanksgiving prep, check out this somewhat ridiculous, somewhat wonderful video below.
Feeling extra inspired to go back in time with your turkey? Here’s Gifford’s turkey recipe:
How to Defrost:
1. If you have time, let it defrost in your refrigerator food compartment. Allow 24 hours at least.
2. If you’re in a hurry, and don’t live in a drought-stricken state, let it sit under cool running water for 1 to 3 hours.
3. When the turkey leg is pliable, it is ready.
4. Don’t re-freeze after defrosted – thaw, and cook, and eat.
Roasting the turkey
1. Put the bird breast down in a V-shaped roaster rack so the juice and fat will run over the breast meat.
2. Brush the turkey all over with melted fat.
3. Halfway through the roasting turn the turkey breast up.
4. Now it’s ready to roast.
When Roasting your Turkey …
1. Take into consideration the overall weight of the turkey and the weight of the stuffing to determine the amount of pounds and thus the amount of time it needs to be cooked.
2. Use Marie Gifford’s Poultry Roasting Chart to determine the weight and cook time.
3. Keep the oven low at 325 degrees.
4. When ready, let rest, carve and enjoy!
For more vintage recipes from Marie Gifford visit
