Last year, Thanksgiving hosts spent an average of $265 on food and drinks to serve 11 people. That cost is offset by 63% of guests bringing their favorite sides. While turkey is the traditional centerpiece, the latest survey from Campbell’s finds 63% of Americans prefer sides to the bird, if they’re prepared the way they like.
Thanksgiving favorites continue to endure; science shows how smart cooking techniques make every classic dish taste its best. Photo credit: Depositphotos.
Every family’s sides may vary a bit, and in fact, nearly a third of celebrants experiment with new dishes every year. But there are standards almost everyone sticks to, like stuffing, a dish that most people only eat once a year. In the more than 400 years we’ve celebrated Thanksgiving dinner, science has analyzed both the means of preparation and the effects these famous foods have on eaters.
Original spread
It might surprise you to learn that the original pilgrims and Wampanoag natives didn’t eat what we now consider a traditional Thanksgiving feast. In 1621, they likely ate wild turkey and other fowl, venison, cod, bass and corn. Some sources even suggest lobster was on the menu.
The classic Thanksgiving dishes we now eat emerged during the Civil War. Thanksgiving had largely been forgotten, but President Lincoln saw the dinner as a way to promote national unity. The editors of Godey’s Lady’s Book suggested to the nation a bunch of what we now think of as traditional foods, and Thanksgiving dinner was reborn.
Turkey time
The most obvious chemical reaction you’ll see at the dinner table is one you may have never thought of. The Maillard reaction is a chemical reaction between reducing sugars and amino acids. It is not a single reaction but a whole complex of reactions. It’s what causes the turkey to turn brown on the outside, but more importantly, it gives the bird its wonderfully complex flavors and smells. The Maillard reaction also happens when you toast marshmallows, bake cookies and bread, roast chestnuts and accidentally burn milk.
The original process of brining involves soaking your turkey in a salt-water solution, so the meat absorbs the salt and any other spices you might have added through osmosis. That way, when it bakes, some of the flavors are already infused in, and the turkey is filled with additional moisture that will keep everything juicy as it cooks. Science says brining decreases the amount of total moisture loss by 30-40%.
In recent years, the wet brine has been replaced in many kitchens with a dry brine, where you just sprinkle on the salt and spices, rub it in, then let the turkey sit in the fridge. Dry brining results in crispier skin and flavor that seems more traditionally turkey-like. Adding sugar to the brine is another recent change. People who have tried it say it rounds out the flavor more, cutting the saltiness without losing its effectiveness.
In olden days, basting was sworn by to keep the turkey juicy. But science has largely debunked that, finding instead that it has minimal helpfulness and may actually make the skin chewier and take longer to cook.
Rethinking tradition
One of the hardest parts of cooking a turkey comes from the fact that it has both juicier dark meat and drier white meat. This makes sense when you look at a turkey. They’re not flying around much, only in bursts, so the wings and breast are made of fast-twitch fibers. Meanwhile, their legs and thighs consist of slow-twitch fibers from constantly strutting around. Dark meat tends to have more fat, which requires longer cooking times.
Spatchcocking is a way of preparing your turkey by removing the backbone and spreading the bird out to lie flat in the pan. This is an excellent way to cook the bird evenly without drying out the white meat, but getting the dark meat fully cooked.
A quick way to cook the turkey and get a crisp skin is to deep fry it. Just be aware, water and hot oil don’t mix well. Only deep fry a fully thawed turkey, and dry it off before you drop it in the oil. Unless, of course, you’d like a visit from the fire department to your dinner table.
There is a chemical in turkey that gets a lot of attention this time of year. L-Tryptophan is famous for causing everyone, or at least the men in front of the TV, to fall into a post-meal stupor. But it’s just not true. Turkey has similar amounts of tryptophan as chicken and cheese. The real culprit for that afternoon nap is most likely overeating too many carbs. Your brain maxes out on serotonin and sinks pleasantly into slumber.
Perfect potatoes
Your turkey dinner would not feel complete without a certain starchy substance. Potatoes are an essential side dish for most folks’ Thanksgiving dinners. In the mid-1950s, science gave us instant potatoes. Most hosts today insist on making their mashed potatoes in a more traditional way, but science also helps with that.
Start with the right potato. High-starch Russets make for fluffy, light mashed potatoes. Or if you prefer a more buttery mash, grab medium-starch Yukon Golds. Either way, you’ll want to peel them by hand, with a knife and let them soak for a few minutes. Then chop each potato into even chunks. Start with icy water, sprinkled liberally with salt. Avoid overcooking the potatoes; drain them and put the pot back on the heat to evaporate excess water.
For the fluffiest mashed potatoes, science says use a ricer. A potato masher is a lot of work and may leave pieces unbroken, resulting in a mash that’s gluey and hard to chew. A potato ricer is like a garlic press, but for potatoes. It forces cooked potatoes through small holes. This breaks the starch granules into fine, uniform pieces, about as small as they can be, while retaining their cell structure.
The end result looks a lot like rice. You then add your butter, milk or cream and stir lightly. Too much whipping will also make them pasty and hard to chew. Some folks also swear by cooking the potatoes twice to make the mash even creamier.
Stuffing on the outside
Ever gotten sick at Thanksgiving? It’s not something most people want to think about, but for decades, we unknowingly created hazards for our dinner guests. Everyone should know to never let the turkey get to room temperature to avoid the risk of salmonella and other bacteria growing.
Raw turkey can and often does contain salmonella, which is eliminated in the cooking process. But when you put stuffing inside the turkey before cooking, it can absorb these bacteria and may not get hot enough to cook them off. Or you severely overcook your turkey.
But there is a better way. Prep and cook stuffing or dressing outside the bird. Make sure it’s fully cooked. That keeps it crispy and toasty, not soggy and potentially contaminated. If you need more turkey flavor, baste the stuffing with cooked turkey drippings. And if you really want the picture of stuffing pouring out of your bird, you can stage it inside once both are cooked and safe for your guests.
Thanksgiving mixology
There’s a lot of other science that comes into play when preparing other foods for Thanksgiving. Everyone has their favorites, and they may vary, depending on what each guest contributes.
One of the reasons the recipes in Godey’s Lady’s Book still remain popular is that they go well together. Roasted turkey shares common compounds with pumpkins, pecans, apples, chocolate, molasses, honey, parsley leaves, ham and roasted vegetables. Root vegetables and members of the onion family share many similar flavor compounds. And Campbell’s 2025 State of the Sides indicates the popularity of side dishes continues to rise year over year.
Doctors say people’s sense of smell is responsible for 80% of the flavors we taste. Between that and the spark of memory, also tied to aromas, means the combination of tastes and smells come together to create Thanksgiving flavors that complement each other well.
Krystle Smith is the recipe developer at Baking Beauty, a comfort food blog that focuses on recipes made without hard-to-find ingredients or expensive tools. She holds a professional cook certification and has been developing recipes for over 14 years. When she’s not in the kitchen, you can find her reading a good book or playing with her dog, Toffee.
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