A look at how Thanksgiving has changed from the 1950s to now. This Vintage Thanksgiving menu is a fun look at the past and may even give you some new recipe ideas.
It’s so interesting to look at food people ate in the past, especially for holidays. The Thanksgivings of the past are one of those interesting places to look.
I love reading vintage magazines. I buy them and find articles people have shared online from the magazines. I decided to look for some vintage articles showing Thanksgiving menu ideas from the 1950s and found some great ones.
I wanted to share one with you as well. Many of the items are very familiar and still served today but some are a bit more unusual.
I also tried to find as many recipes to share as well. Some of the recipes are likely a bit more modern than what they ate in the 1950s but they are similar.
Some I couldn’t find, like steamed acorn squash rings. All of the recipes I found were roasted not steamed. I’m also not sure what the green olives were stuffed with.
I think it would be fun to have a 1950s-style Thanksgiving at some point. I feel like that menu would need some kind of jello salad though, even if the menus I’ve found surprisingly didn’t suggest any. Can you really have a mid-century dinner without something encased in jello?
Vintage Thanksgiving Menu
- Tomato-Clam Juice Cocktail
- Roast Turkey
- Celery Hearts
- Stuffed Green Olives
- Carrot Sticks
- Sausage-Chestnut Stuffing
- Giblet Gravy
- Mashed Potatoes
- Butter Green Peas
- Steamed Acorn-Squash Rings
- Creamed Onions
- Whole Cranberry Sauce
- Hot Rolls
- Pecan Pie
We often think of the 1950s as not being a very healthy era, after all, they often put salads in jello. However, this Thanksgiving menu featured a lot of vegetables as was actually pretty common in the 1950s. Sure there is still a lot of fat but overall it’s pretty balanced.
Who knows how many people followed this kind of menu but it’s very interesting to see what kind of meal was suggested. If you were alive in the 1950s I’d love to hear what you remember eating for Thanksgiving, share in the comments below.
Planning Your Vintage Thanksgiving
If you want to plan a 1950s-style Thanksgiving you want to be organized. I’m sure in the 1950s they would have just used a notebook to plan but we have a lot more options these days.
I have a printable Thanksgiving planner available that is great for planning a modern or vintage Thanksgiving meal. It will help you stay on track, make grocery lists, keep track of recipes, and more.
You can also use this free Thanksgiving week planner. It has fewer bells and whistles than my full Thanksgiving planner but if you don’t need as much help it can still help you get planned.
The key is to plan ahead of time and get what you can done ahead of time. It makes your Thanksgiving so much more relaxed if you have a plan and have already prepped before Thursday.
Christine Mulholland says
I am vintage. As a child in the 1950’s my Mother would go all out for Thanksgiving. Tables would be extended from the dining room through the living room. The best linens, china and cutlery were used.
Her menu would include the mandatory tomato juice topped with a slice of lemon on delicate juice glasses.
The relishes would include celery, olives and radish roses and the jiggly in a can sliced cranberry sauce.
The main course would be a large turkey that was roasted and basted all night. The dinner was always held around 1:00PM. Stuffing was made with bread, herbs, onions, celery and broth. Of course we had gravy to top the mashed potatoes. For some reason she always served peas and carrots plus a casserole of baked candied yams (NO marshmallows) . She liked baked acorn squash wedges as well.
For dessert there was pumpkin pie with whipped cream and apple pie.
My granddaughter was delighted with the tomato cocktail idea before dinner and we have adopted it into our festivities today.
Christine Mulholland says
I almost forgot about her Parker house rolls which were always referred to as “the lovely rolls”. We say that whenever rolls are served around here.
giulia lombardo says
I don’t eat meat but this menu sound really delicious!!!
Mary says
V-8 juice, fruit cocktail appetizer, cream cheese stuffed celery ,pumpkin & coconut custard pies for dessert. My mom also purchased her fruitcake from the bakery so she could start soaking it with liquor for Christmas.
Helen Hahn says
Stuffed olives are typically called that with pimento in them. You can stuff with blue cheese. I seem to recall that many years ago.
Lynn Kaufman says
Your 50s Thanksgiving menu is basically what I’m making in 2021! Skip the tomato juice,add Waldorf Salad, please no jello Salad, mincemeat pie instead of pecan. The Waldorf salad is vintage. Some things just don’t need to change: