1880s Bills of Fare

While Thanksgiving had been celebrated before the 1880s, this was the decade that saw a rise in the full menus (aka "Bills of Fare") published for the holiday. Earlier decades had recipes (or receipts as they were called) that were prepared during Thanksgiving, but menus themselves were rarely presented. However, even in the 1880s, full accountings of the menus with all the recipes provided were rare. Some of the menus from this decade come not from recipe books, but from magazines. These were accompanied by recipes for 1-3 of the dishes. Other times the menus stood alone as a recommendation, with the assumption that the cook would either have access to recipe books or know how to make the dish. Even when the menus came in cookbooks, the cookbooks often did not have recipes for all the dishes listed. In cases where there were no recipe given, recipes within 2-3 years of the original publication, especially if they show up in the same publication, are used to help give an idea of what the food was like. As typical of larger, formal meals from this era, Thanksgiving menus feature multiple course. Soup, seafood, multiple meats, sides, a selection of sweets, and fruit and cheese were very common. Leftovers were not only common, they were expected and relied upon for other recipes and meals afterwards. At this time, an official, nationa wide "Thanksgiving" had only been observed for less than twenty years. Thanksgiving also fell on the last Thursday of November, instead of the third Thursday in November like it is observed today.

Thanksgiving Menus