You don't have to roast a turkey, you know

Thanksgiving food is bad. It doesn't have to be this way.

Thanksgiving dinner.
(Image credit: Illustrated | iStock)

I love Thanksgiving. Seriously, it is among the highlights of my year. I love the adapted Biblical narrative of exile and redemption. I love the aesthetic associations with autumn and New England, my favorite season in my favorite region. I love the connection Thanksgiving represents between ourselves, Abraham Lincoln, and George Washington, both of whom embraced the holiday. This year in particular, I cherish the pretext for gathering in one place a far-flung family.

But there's one thing I don't like. To my taste, the conventional Thanksgiving menu is at best boring and sometimes downright bad. I understand the emotional associations many people have with foods their parents, grandparents, or great-grandparents cooked. But be honest: Do you really enjoy this stuff?

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Samuel Goldman

Samuel Goldman is a national correspondent at TheWeek.com. He is also an associate professor of political science at George Washington University, where he is executive director of the John L. Loeb, Jr. Institute for Religious Freedom and director of the Politics & Values Program. He received his Ph.D. from Harvard and was a postdoctoral fellow in Religion, Ethics, & Politics at Princeton University. His books include God's Country: Christian Zionism in America (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2018) and After Nationalism (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2021). In addition to academic research, Goldman's writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and many other publications.