Ever since the end of the Halloween hype, there are two things on everyone’s mind, number one is that it’s now officially acceptable to listen to Christmas music, and the second being Thanksgiving food.
AH yes, Thanksgiving. A time for gathering with family and friends while stuffing our faces with turkey, mashed potatoes, and pumpkin pie. A day where diets don’t exist.
But, have you ever thought about a way to celebrate it more than once, because it is just THAT good? Which brings me to Friendsgiving.
If you’re unfamiliar with this term, Friendsgiving is just what it sounds like, having a second Thanksgiving dinner with friends. Personally, I’m a HUGE fan of Friendsgiving. Who wouldn’t want to be able to eat Thanksgiving food more than once?
I have personally had a couple of different experiences with having a Friendsgiving, both good and not so successful. So, I’ve thought out all of the essentials that worked for my Friendsgiving so that yours doesn’t go down the drain.
Now lets have the best Friendsgiving that you possibly can
The Food
Let’s be real, the first thing anyone thinks of when it comes to Thanksgiving is the food. When I first attempted cooking Friendsgiving dinner, tragedy struck. Even with no knowledge of ever cooking a turkey before, we decided to just Google how it was done. I mean, you can’t have Friendsgiving without a turkey, right? Everything was going well when we were following the directions, very closely. But, we ended up losing track of time and well, the turkey ended up looking a little something like this…
So, my advice when it comes to turkey is, pay attention! If you follow the recipe here, you’ll hopefully have a turkey that looks a little more like this.
Now, turkey is definitely not the only food that makes a Thanksgiving dinner. It’s the complete array of different delicacies like mashed potatoes, corn, green-bean casserole, cranberry sauce.
For my Friendsgiving, I asked each of my friends to bring a dish that’s unique to their family traditions. This way we all got to have a little bit of home to share with one another. The dish i decided to make was my mom’s sweet potato casserole.
This is a Thanksgiving classic to my family and my mom makes it every year. She starts off by cooking and mashing sweet potatoes. She mixes in butter and cinnamon and tops it with crushed pecans (can swap with the nut of your choice) and marshmallows. Bake until the marshmallows are golden brown and you’re done!
Along with the food, fun drinks are always a cool way to spice up your Friendsgiving. My favorite drink during this season is apple cider.
What’s better than apple cider you ask? Homemade apple cider. Now, making this from scratch does require some time and patience, but the end product and the quality time you get to share with friends is worth it.
Check out the recipe I followed here.
Last but not least is dessert! A proper Friendsgiving wouldn’t be complete without it. You need the classics- pumpkin pie, pecan pie, etc. But at my last Friendsgiving I wanted pumpkin pie, but had to spice it up. So, I had the idea of making mini pumpkin pies instead.
These fun little bite sized pies were a huge hit and made cleanup super easy. They were also super simple to make. You can check out the recipe I used here.
The food may be one of the most important part of your Friendsgiving, but it wouldn’t be the BEST Friendsgiving without a couple other things, which brings me to…
Set-Up
Set-Up? But setting up is easy? Yeah, there are the basic ways of setting up, but to me, design is key. C’mon you don’t really think you’d be having a Friendsgiving without having a grand layout for an a totally Instagrammable moment, did you?
Decorating your table with flowers and hanging decorations on the walls around the table add a little sparkle to the dining experience. Opt for fall colors to up the holiday feels.
With the food all set and the table oozing with Thanksgiving feel, you are well on your way to throwing the BEST Friendsgiving yet.
But wait there’s more!
At my family thanksgivings we always have traditions or games that we participate in throughout the night. So, the final step to a Friendsgiving is, traditions.
Traditions
In my family, during dinner we go around to each person and say what we’re thankful for. I recently stumbled upon the idea of a thankful jar.
Before dinner, we would write down what we are thankful for and put it in a jar. During dinner, the jar would be passed around and everyone would choose a thankful note and read it. Everyone would then try and guess who wrote what!
Throwing a Friendsgiving is definitely a fun way to be able to celebrate the holiday twice. Tons of food, and quality time with your friends, nothing beats that? Hopefully following this guide will help you when planning your own Friendsgiving. And please, try not to burn the turkey!