35 Best Friendsgiving Food Ideas

Our best Friendsgiving food ideas! Find easy recipes for a festive fall gathering—crowd-pleasing appetizers, fun drinks, desserts, and more.

If you’re celebrating Friendsgiving this year, you’re in the right place! Below, I’ve rounded up my best Friendsgiving food ideas—bite-size appetizers, batch cocktails, classic side dishes, and easy desserts. Whether you’re hosting or just bringing a dish to pass, you’ll find Friendsgiving recipes to try. Back in the day, Jack and I celebrated Friendsgiving on Thanksgiving, because we lived far from our families and didn’t always travel for the holiday. Now, it’s more common to do both—a Friendsgiving earlier in November and a traditional Thanksgiving feast with family later on. I’m all for this, because it turns Friendsgiving into an opportunity to…

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Cauliflower Mashed Potatoes

These cauliflower mashed potatoes are just as smooth and creamy as classic ones! Ready in 20 minutes, they're a delicious, easy low carb side dish.

Don’t tell Jack, but we probably won’t have classic mashed potatoes at Thanksgiving this year. I’m planning to make these cauliflower mashed potatoes instead! That’s because we’re celebrating with his parents, who eat a low carb diet. I wanted to create a rich, creamy alternative to mashed potatoes that everyone at the table would enjoy, and after testing and tweaking this recipe, I think it’s going to be perfect. These cauliflower mashed potatoes are smooth, creamy, and flavorful, made with Parmesan cheese, butter, garlic, and sour cream. I won’t tell you that they taste exactly like potatoes (they do have a…

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Cranberry Sauce

This easy cranberry sauce recipe is tart, lightly sweet, and scented with orange. Ready in 15 minutes, it's a classic, delicious holiday side dish!

Meet my best cranberry sauce recipe! Easy to make with 5 ingredients in under 15 minutes, it’s delectably tart, not too sweet, and studded with whole cranberries. I’m not a turkey eater, and I still spoon this sauce all over my Thanksgiving plate—it’s just that good. This homemade cranberry sauce is an updated version of a recipe I shared a few years ago. I’ve added more orange juice and zest for bright, fruity depth of flavor and shortened the cook time, which is 1) convenient and 2) means that more cranberries stay intact. If you ask me, their bursty texture…

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How to Cook Turnips

Learn how to cook turnips! Roasted with salt and pepper, this underrated veggie becomes sweet, tender, and nutty. It's a delicious, healthy side dish!

Turnips are one of the vegetables I buy most often in the fall. I can never resist them at the farmers market—bright white, pink, or tinged with purple, with lush green tops attached. They often look more humble in the grocery store, but they’re still worth reaching for. Turnips have a lightly sweet, peppery flavor with delicious nutty, mustardy undertones. Why not add them to your root vegetable rotation? I’m sharing a guide to how to cook turnips below, complete with my favorite roasted turnips recipe. It’s easy to make with 4 ingredients, and it cooks in right around 30 minutes. If…

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35 Best Soup Recipes

If there's one thing I love about cold weather, it's soup! Read on to find over 30 easy soup recipes I'll be making all fall and winter long.

Soup season is here! There’s a lot to love about fall—beautiful weather, changing leaves, cozy baked goods, and hot drinks—but the soup recipes are hands down my favorite part. I adore soup. I love making it, I love eating it, and I love packing up the leftovers so that I can enjoy it again the next day. When I’m stressed, I turn to soup because I find it meditative to cook. When I’m snowed in, I turn to it because I keep a stash stored away in my freezer. And when I’m in need of a healthy reset, I turn…

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Tomato Soup

The BEST tomato soup recipe! It's rich, flavorful, and easy to make with basic ingredients. Just add a grilled cheese for a delicious, comforting meal!

This tomato soup recipe is a cold weather staple in our house. It couldn’t be simpler to make, and the ingredients are largely pantry basics that I always keep on hand. But more importantly, this tomato soup is creamy, comforting, and full of rich flavor. The tomatoes make it tangy, balsamic vinegar adds sweetness, and red pepper flakes give it a warming kick of heat. You could serve it on its own, topped with a swirl of olive oil, black pepper, and fresh basil leaves…or you could pair it with a grilled cheese sandwich. If you’re craving cozy comfort food…

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How to Cook Spaghetti Squash

Spaghetti squash is such a fun, underrated vegetable! Here is my favorite way to cook it, along with a few tips and recipes.

I get so many questions about how to cook spaghetti squash, so I thought I’d share my go-to method for roasting it, a few tips, and a couple of my favorite spaghetti squash recipes. How to Cook Spaghetti Squash First thing’s first: place the squash on a cutting board and use a sharp knife to cut it in half lengthwise. After you slice the squash in half, use a spoon to scoop out the seeds. Next, drizzle the insides lightly with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. I find that adding too much oil and too much salt…

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Homemade Corn Tortillas

Learn how to make corn tortillas with this easy 3-ingredient recipe! Soft and flavorful, these homemade tortillas are so much better than store-bought.

You can’t fully appreciate corn tortillas until you’ve tried homemade ones. They’re entirely different from the shelf-stable, store-bought kind. Instead of being dry and prone to cracking, they’re soft, bendable, and full of toasty corn flavor. I shared these corn and flour tortillas a few years ago, and ever since then, I’ve gotten tons of requests for a 100% corn tortilla recipe. I’m so excited to finally get this one to you—it’s totally gluten-free and calls for just 3 ingredients. I love making it to use in Mexican dishes like enchiladas and tacos and to pair with refried beans. I…

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Creamed Corn

Learn how to make creamed corn! This easy recipe combines fresh or frozen corn kernels with a cheesy, creamy sauce. It's such a comforting side dish!

Don’t buy creamed corn in a can—this recipe is easy to make from scratch! It calls for 8 basic ingredients, comes together in a single skillet, and tastes SO much better than any canned cream corn I’ve tried. Creamy, cheesy, and packed with crisp, juicy sweet corn, it’s a delicious, comforting side dish. You can make this recipe with fresh or frozen corn, but through September, while corn is still in season, I’ll be making it on repeat with fresh. I love the intense sweetness and satisfying crunch of the peak-season kernels in this dish. That said, if you want…

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25 Best Labor Day Recipes

Celebrate the end of summer with our best Labor Day recipes! They include fun appetizers, picnic salads, grilling recipes, no-bake desserts, and more.

Looking for Labor Day food ideas? You’re in the right place! Below, I’ve rounded up our best Labor Day recipes for an epic end-of-summer cookout. You’ll find easy mains that you can toss on the grill, fun appetizers, seasonal side dishes, and—of course—summer desserts to round out the meal. I don’t know exactly what I’m making for our BBQ yet…but I do know that corn, tomatoes, and peaches will be on the menu. If you ask me, summer food is the best food. Celebrate it this weekend with these Labor Day recipes! Labor Day Appetizer Ideas Corn Salsa Crisp, juicy sweet…

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Air Fryer Green Beans

Learn how to cook fresh green beans in the air fryer! A delicious weeknight side dish, they're lightly crisp, tender, and ready in 10 minutes.

Have you ever tried cooking green beans in the air fryer? They come out lightly crisp, tender, and beautifully caramelized. And best of all, they’re ready in 10 minutes. Just like my air fryer zucchini and air fryer corn on the cob, these air fryer green beans are a perfect healthy side dish for busy weeknights. Fresh green beans are one of my favorite vegetables to cook at this time of year, so in the last few weeks, I’ve had this air fryer green beans recipe on repeat. I’m sharing a few of my go-to serving suggestions below, but to be…

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A food blog with fresh, zesty recipes.
Photograph of Jeanine Donofrio and Jack Mathews in their kitchen

Hello, we're Jeanine and Jack.

We love to eat, travel, cook, and eat some more! We create & photograph vegetarian recipes from our home in Chicago, while our shiba pups eat the kale stems that fall on the kitchen floor.