Born and raised in southeastern Massachusetts, now living closer to Boston. My husband was born and raised just west of Boston.
Thanksgiving now is, for the most part, just us and our 4 kids, and for the past few years my brother has joined us. One year my nephew came, but he's now married (at the time, he was single and his immediate family live in Florida) and spends it with his wife's family.
Anyway, our holiday is mostly traditional. Every year we have roasted turkey, gravy mashed potatoes, stuffing (made with Bell's seasoning), canned cranberry sauce (just like the Pilgrims ate - complete with the lines all around).
My own additions, which have become traditional, are sauteed pearl onions with brown sugar and dijon mustard, butternut squash with onions and pecans, corn pudding, crescent rolls.
Boston Market makes a cranberry sauce that is to die for. It has walnuts in it, and I love it, but it can be a hassle to go there just for that (the day or two before tend to be extra busy). But it is soooo good - I like it heated up and put over vanilla ice cream.
Dessert is usually my peanut butter pie. I would prefer something more traditional, like pumpkin, but no one else in the family likes it so I don't usually bother. And my kids all say it's not a holiday without the peanut butter pie. Although, this year my husband's birthday falls on Thanksgiving, so we may be having birthday cake. There's a bakery nearby that makes cakes in the shape of a roasted turkey, with little cubes of cake that look like stuffing. Really cool - maybe I'll get him one of those this year.
Oh, and I have to make cranberry orange bread every year. My mother's recipe. And if I have time, I'll also make chocolate chip pumpkin bread. So that will be breakfast for a few days.
When Thanksgiving was a big extended family thing, I used to love to go all out and make a bunch of different pies - there was a mince cranberry pie with eggnog whipped cream, a pina collada pie, custard pie - but it's too much work all at once, especially when I'm doing the whole dinner - when the pies were all I had to make, it was easy!
One year I tried a pumpkin soup recipe - I have special holiday dishes and there were soup bowls, so I wanted to use them. I found the recipe - it was really easy, and there was a cranberry sauce-like stuff made separately that you topped it with. I thought it was really good, but it wasn't that populare with everyone else so I haven't bothered again.
Oh, and to drink, everyone has a Mickey Mouse - cranberry juice and ginger ale.
