The Opinions - I’m a Food Editor. I Hate Thanksgiving Dinner.

Episode Date: November 25, 2024

Margaux Laskey, an associate editor at New York Times Cooking, has a surprising confession: She doesn’t like Thanksgiving dinner. After days of effort, she finds the final product bland and boring. “I love gratitude and thankfulness, but I’m grateful I don’t have to eat turkey if I don’t want to,” she says. In this episode, she shares ways to celebrate Thanksgiving — no cooking required.Thoughts? Email us at [e-mail]. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

This is The Opinions, a show that brings you a mix of voices from New York Times opinion. You've heard the news. Here's what to make of it. My name is Margo Lasky, and I'm an associate editor for New York Times cooking. It's fall, and we are thick in the season of preparing for Thanksgiving, which is the Super Bowl of New York Times cooking. It's very exciting. We're all very busy. But today I want to talk about the fact that I hate Thanksgiving. giving dinner.

Only person. I'm just the only one willing to talk about it. I kind of find that it's all sort of brown and soft and kind of one note. The thing about turkey is, even when you have a really good roast turkey, like the best you've ever made, people try it and I go, that's good for turkey. It's like three weeks or a month of work and planning. I don't love cooking it. And then honestly, you know, you sit down and the meal is over.

in about 10 minutes. My colleagues are working very hard to create dishes for the Thanksgiving table that are not boring and bland and that are exciting and create some liveliness on the plate. We literally start talking about Thanksgiving in April or May. You know, we start making our plans and we do a retrospective like right after Thanksgiving. So it's like we spend so much of our professional lives thinking about Thanksgiving and thinking about Thanksgiving dinner. It's kind of the last thing I want to do is to think about making good.

is to think about making my own. I look forward to Thanksgiving Day. I'm not anti- Thanksgiving. I like the idea of thankfulness and gratitude and all of those things, but I'm grateful that I don't have to eat turkey if I don't want to. We found a new way to celebrate Thanksgiving in our family that feels much more celebratory to me and much more calming. We go to the same restaurant every year.

It's not the best restaurant in the world? It's never going to be reviewed by Pete Wells, but the food is solid and we can pick what we want from the menu. I get filet mignon or salmon. My husband gets the classic Thanksgiving dinner. My kids get chicken tenders or pasta with butter and everybody leaves happy. And then we get to come home and nobody has any dishes to do and we watch white Christmas. I think if I could reinvent Thanksgiving, I would just, make it more acceptable to sort of make whatever you want, you know, and not feel beholden to tradition. Sometimes people don't even think about whether or not they like it

because it's just tradition, it's just what you do. But there are plenty of people in this country who cook different things. My favorite dish is the Brussels sprouts. Piaia or jambalaya. Collard greens and mac and cheese and... So much chocolate. Sort of like world coner copia of dishes.

My mom and I make tacos. There would be bourbon. Just sort of the permission to make Thanksgiving whatever you want it to be. What would my advice be for people who hate Thanksgiving dinner as much as I do? Maybe bring a different dish this year to Thanksgiving to change it up a little bit. Or delegate, if you're normally the one in charge and you feel overwhelmed, delegate something, suggest a potluck, don't be scared of store-bought things. Order the pies.

Don't feel like you have to make a lot. all the pies. Give yourself permission to do something that's really going to make you feel thankful and not resentful. I'm sorry, it's the food editor who doesn't like Thanksgiving dinner. If you like this show, follow it on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you get your podcasts. This show is produced by Derek Arthur, Sophia Alvarez Boyd, Vichaka, Phoebe Lett, Christina Samuoski, and Jillian Weinberger. It's edited by Kari Pitkin, Alison Bruzek and Annie Rose Strasser. Engineering, mixing, and original music by Isaac Jones, Sonia Herrero,

Pat McCusker, Carol Saburo, and Afim Shapiro. Additional music by Amin Sahota. The fact check team is Kate Sinclair, Mary Marge Locker, and Michelle Harris. Audience Strategy by Shannon Busta, Christina Samuiluski, and Adrian Rivera. The executive producer of Times Opinion Audio is Annie Rose Dresser.