Ranksgiving: Top 10
Mike Leitao ~ 11/25/2024
As November comes towards an end, the weather gets colder and the seasonal depression gets stronger. Many people are gearing up for a short week before a short December and then the new year. One thing I’ve always noticed about Thanksgiving Week is that the effort level of basically everything other than cooking goes down significantly. People are less efficient at work and, frankly, just crank out worse quality with the shortened week as both road and store traffic get way heavier. Other than people spending what feels like days in their kitchen to prepare their Thanksgiving feasts, people basically take the week off. So I thought to myself “well damn, I still got my full time job to deal with this week, so what if I half assed something else”. And thus, this brilliant idea was brought into the world through my marvelous brain. I present to you, the lowest effort ranking of thanksgiving foods you will find this year, or probably any year. And for those of you who aren’t feeling the low level vibes you should be thankful as I’m sure my glorious lord Sam will produce another banger and like always, my From the Couch will be the greatest piece of reading ever written.
Honorable Mention: Ham
I fucking love ham. I think it’s the best basic lunch meat out there, and a nice ham and cheese hoagie from Wawa hits different. I know some people do ham on Thanksgiving instead of turkey and I’m here to tell you, I fully think that’s the right group of people. However, in honor of being fair I will be recognizing Turkey as the official meat of Thanksgiving and leaving ham on the sidelines for Christmas, Easter, and basically everything else.
10: Cranberry Sauce
Ew. Disgusting. This shit is gross. Seeing the cans in the grocery store makes me gag. Watching someone whip this bad boy out with the can opener makes me wish they weren’t at the same place as me. Sitting there and waiting as the disgusting substance slowly plops out of the can onto a plate, still in the shape of the can with zero movement to suggest it will be returning to a normal shape. People who actively enjoy this should be thrown into a pit and left to rot. Watching someone just plop a huge spoonful onto their plate is truthfully how I decide which members of my family I would consider saving in a zombie apocalypse. Easily comes in last place for me.
9: Pumpkin Pie
This one may be controversial, but at the end of the day I’m right so who cares. As someone who doesn’t really love pie and who doesn’t like pumpkin, combining the two does surprisingly not do it for me. Now the reason I still rank it over the abomination that is cranberry sauce? Firstly, it at least looks like food so that already gets it in the win column. Secondly, if push comes to shove I can put a piece of pumpkin pie on my plate and eat the whole damn thing without wanting to kill myself (any more than usual). You ask me to make that same commitment to cranberry sauce, and I just simply can’t.
8: Stuffing
Stuffing is a strange one to me. It’s a thanksgiving tradition and isn’t really bad. But it’s just kind of there, existing but not thriving. Stuffing is never gonna be the main event, it’s also like the 3rd match on a show that comes after two really good performances so most people use it as their bathroom or snack break. Is it necessarily bad? No, not at all. But if you skip it from your plate are you really missing out on anything? Once again, no, not at all.
7: Apple Pie
Imagine taking a pumpkin pie, which contains pumpkin, which I don’t like and pie which I’m indifferent to at best. Now replace the pumpkins with apples, a food I actually do like. Assuming you did that simple math correctly it should be pretty obvious why this ranks where it does. It is my preferred dessert option at Thanksgiving, but believe me when I say I’m never looking forward to it, but I am glad it’s there as the ending treat to the feast that proceeded.
6: Green Bean Casserole
This is a tale of two potentials that led to a mid ranking. Green bean casserole is either the bomb, or I wish I had a bomb to blow it up. When it is done well, it’s incredible. The creaminess from the cream of mushroom plus the crunch of the crispy onions give it a great texture variance and the flavor is normally very good. On the flip side, when you get one that is just too mushy from the cream of mushroom so much so that it dampened the crispy onions and the flavor of mushroom is so overpowering, it makes you wish you didn’t grab it in the first place. The fact that you not only have those two extremes, but that they look practically identical so you won’t know if it’s gonna be delicious or awful until it’s on your plate and into your mouth makes for a guessing game I would rather just not play. For that, it gets a slightly below mid rating.
5: Turkey & Gravy
Oh shit, the big ticket item ranked right in the middle. The comments are going crazy I’m sure. I’ve never met anyone who’s favorite meat is turkey, I don’t think they exist and I think that’s for the best. Similar to green bean casserole, you can have good turkey or bad turkey. A good turkey is great for when you have decently flavorful and juicy pieces of turkey and you add the gravy to make it delicious. But when the turkey is dry and has no flavor, you gotta drown that thing in gravy to even get one slice of it down. Another thing with turkey is that good vs bad is not a simple 50/50 like the green bean casserole, I think you are much more likely to get bad turkey than good turkey. So why does it rank higher you ask? Keep reading and you’ll know… Obviously. Firstly, because it is less common to get good turkey compared to bad, when you finally get a delicious piece it elevates every part of the meal. The other simple truth is it’s the main dish, it’s what the whole meal revolves around. If the green bean casserole is good or shit, cool it really doesn’t change the dynamic of the dinner. But good vs bad turkey and can be the difference between a wonderful dinner and your cousins bare knuckling brawling over politics.
4: Rolls
I know I know, this pick is lame. I really like bread and rolls are bread. They are easy to make and a really good side piece to the dinner that is rarely ever bad. It’s crazy to me that just by being a solid and reliable side dish at Thanksgiving you are able to sneak your way to #4. If that isn’t proof that Thanksgiving dinner honestly is trash, I don’t know what will.
3: Mac & Cheese
A true staple of Thanksgiving. You always have one family member, whether it’s the host or one of the guests, you know someone will be bringing their homemade Mac and cheese. Although not all Mac and cheese is great, it just feels like at Thanksgiving people step their game and up so up with some damn good food. The Mac and cheese is almost always, without fail, one of the best food items of the meal and is most likely the food we eat the most of. That seems like more than enough to slip into the top 3.
2: Mashed Potatoes
This may shock some, but potatoes are truthfully one of my favorite food items ever. All the versatility is awesome, but we are just here to talk about mashed potatoes. But that’s ok, because they are normally the best food that is out there. Let’s start with the creation process because that’s easy. Just boil potatoes then run them through a ricer and add butter and milk and bam you got good homemade mashed potatoes. Then you go on and add the gravy, which for some reason Thanksgiving gravy just hits differently, they must be putting crack in it or something. Creamy and tasty mashed potatoes plus nice and thick gravy with outstanding flavor combine to create one of the things I look forward to the most, and other than Mac and cheese is the only competition for food I eat the most of at Thanksgiving. But as great as all these foods are, there is simply one part of Thanksgiving that beats all the food combined.
1: Political Conversations with The Family
Ah yes, the thing people either crave or dread about Thanksgiving. But if you are like me, you know you crave the day Thanksgiving rolls around and the first mention of the word tariff gets used. Seeing families tear each other to shreds over basic politics that no one at the table actually understands truly embodies the spirit of Thanksgiving. No matter how many things or people you have to be thankful for, there will always be someone or something out there who makes your blood boil and can take a day that is meant to be thankful to instead add hate. It brings a huge smile to my face and is the easy #1 option.
So there you have it, the 100% conclusive and totally not up for debate ranking of all the foods that are eaten during the Thanksgiving festivities. You might be thinking “Oh wow, I personally would’ve ranked Turkey higher seeing as it’s a main staple dish of Thanksgiving so it deserves respect.” Cool dude. I don’t care. You feel so passionately about it go start your own dope website where you produce articles on a recurring basis then. Or be lazy and just tell me I’m stupid and I should kill myself, both options will have similar success rates.
