5 Surprising Reasons We Eat Thanksgiving Dinner So Early (2024)

FAQs

5 Surprising Reasons We Eat Thanksgiving Dinner So Early? ›

There are many reasons, but primarily: Historically, dinner became before supper; it makes for a more relaxed day; it's simply tradition; it's more convenient for traveling guests; and, of course, to watch football.

My informal polling in conversations and on social media have yielded a range of opinions, from noon to 9 p.m. The prime reasons fell largely into two camps: Giving the cook(s) enough time to prepare the meal and deciding whether, when and what you want to eat later.

But, when exactly should you eat Thanksgiving dinner? It's a small, but important detail that has Americans divided on the best time to dig in. A 2018 survey from Statista shows 42 percent of Americans agree food should be served somewhere between 1-3 p.m.

To celebrate the arrival, the 800 Spanish settlers shared a festive meal with the native Timucuan people. The first Thanksgiving meal in Plymouth probably had little in common with today's traditional holiday spread. Although turkeys were indigenous, there's no record of a big, roasted bird at the feast.

So while our Thanksgiving dinner table has a big ol' turkey plated in the center, the first Thanksgiving table was likely filled with ducks, geese, eels, lobster, and venison. Maybe there was a turkey, but it was either missing or too dry for anyone to literally write home about it.

We celebrate Thanksgiving in October, earlier than the US simply because harvest comes earlier in Canada then it does in the US. Thanksgiving has been a legal holiday since 1879 in Canada. It floated for many years as to the specific date.

Thanksgiving-type celebrations were common at the turn of the 19th century with many opting to put a turkey on the table instead of slaughtering a useful animal like a hen or cow that was producing other needed products, according to Britannica. Turkeys at the time, and still today, were raised to be meat birds.

If any night is the most critical, it's the night before, when many Americans will bake pies and prepare reheatable dishes, like casseroles and soups, so that Thursday morning doesn't dissolve into chaos.

The answer is simple: leftovers can be kept in the refrigerator for three to four days. This means you have until the Monday after Thanksgiving to eat all those delicious leftovers or place them in the freezer to enjoy later. If you store leftovers in the freezer, they will be of best quality within 2-6 months.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service recommends throwing out refrigerated leftovers after three to four days. If foods are kept in the freezer, they can usually still be consumed for three to four months. There is some flexibility in these rules, however.

What president refused to declare Thanksgiving a holiday? ›

Thomas Jefferson was famously the only Founding Father and early president who refused to declare days of thanksgiving and fasting in the United States.

Colonists and the Wampanoag tribe shared an autumn harvest feast in 1621 in Plymouth, Massachusetts that is widely acknowledged as one of the first Thanksgiving celebrations. But some historians argue that Florida, not Massachusetts, may have been the true site of the first Thanksgiving in North America.

It is also worth noting what was not present at the first Thanksgiving feast. There were no cloudlike heaps of mashed potatoes, since white potatoes had not yet crossed over from South America. There was no gravy either, since the colonists didn't yet have mills to produce flour.

Massasoit sent some of his own men to hunt deer for the feast and for three days, the English and native men, women, and children ate together. The meal consisted of deer, corn, shellfish, and roasted meat, different from today's traditional Thanksgiving feast. They played ball games, sang, and danced.

While live cows and hens were useful as long as they were producing milk and eggs, respectively, turkeys were generally raised only for their meat and thus could be readily killed. Third, a single turkey was usually big enough to feed a family.

Thanksgiving was initially meant to be a fast, not a feast. The devout settlers at Plymouth Rock mostly recognized "giving of thanks" in the form of prayer and abstaining from food.

Many people flock to restaurants on Thanksgiving Eve — either because they're reuniting with friends from their hometowns, or they just don't have any interest in cooking before Turkey Day because their fridges are already packed with prepped dishes.

Your health won't be affected by one meal, and neither will your biomarkers! Start your Thanksgiving morning with a good breakfast, make sure to drink water during the day, enjoy your time with family and friends, and resume your healthy habits the next day.

Historically, the Tuesday and Wednesday before Thanksgiving and the Sunday afterward are the busiest travel days, according to TSA.