Squash

To complete the menu, serve seeded Italian breadsticks and a salad of radicchio and marinated artichoke hearts tossed with balsamic vinaigrette. Spumoni ice cream is a perfect ending.

A crunchy topping is the twist to this quintessential Thanksgiving pie.

Crusty French bread, a spinach and mushroom salad and buttered noodles round out the menu, and a rich bakery chocolate cake finishes it in style.

These savory pastry packages are a fitting presentation for Oscar night - plus they're perfect with the ham. This recipe makes few extras for second helpings.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Nice with steak, chicken or fish.

Use alphabets or little stars, orzo, or tiny circles. Or use a combination of them all. The child in your life will love this, and so will the child in you.

Do-ahead tips make this rendition of the Spanish classic perfect for entertaining.

Tina Thompson of Orlando, Florida, writes: "Food and nostalgia are closely related in my mind. When I miss my dad, I make an extra-buttery grilled-cheese sandwich just the way he would every Saturday for lunch. When I miss my college roommate Jenny, I splurge on a new ethnic food to remind me of adventures during our junior year abroad in London. Inspired by my great food experiences there, I attended a small cooking school stateside so that I could come up with some fantastic meals of my own."

Grapefruit zest stands in for lemon peel in the gremolata, an aromatic garnish.

Ken Haedrich, cookbook author, says, "Since moving to New England nearly twenty years ago, I've heated the house with wood-burning stoves. And because our big Thanksgiving gatherings put oven space at a premium, I've often pressed those stoves into backup duty. That's how steamed breads—which can be cooked on top of the stoves — came to be a regular part of our feast. This steamed pumpkin bread provides another way to bring good pumpkin flavor to the meal, too. I also serve my special crescent rolls on the big day. One year, my kids let it be known that they wanted croissants on Thanksgiving, but that seemed like a bit more work than I could handle. Instead, I came up with these sesame crescents—croissant-like rolls with savory onion filling. I guess they did the trick, because nobody says much about croissants anymore. Plus, I can make the crescent rolls two weeks ahead and freeze them. That way, they don't take up any of that precious oven space." Note that this bread needs to cook in an empty 28-ounce food can (such as the kind used to hold whole tomatoes).