We’ve officially entered the month of November, meaning that everyone is trying to plan their Thanksgiving menus! Who’s bringing and cooking what, and what will the menu look like?
Thanksgiving is what I like to call the Butter Holiday or the Food-Focused Holiday. Don’t get me wrong, there’s still a lot of butter and food to be consumed on Christmas, but it just feels right to call Thanksgiving the Unofficial Official Butter Holiday!
To start off this four-part series, let’s take a look at some viral recipes for…appetizers!
What is your favorite Thanksgiving appetizer? What flavors define the holiday?
In no particular order, let’s take a look at the top seven viral Thanksgiving appetizer recipes that you can find on TikTok. Be sure to let us know your favorites down below!
1. Turkey Tray
Who Made This: @macy.blackwell
Viral Views Gotten: 161K
Ingredients You’ll Need: 1 pear, triangle-shaped crackers, two different kinds of cubed cheese, green grapes (or red if you really don’t like green ones), sliced summer sausage, Townhouse crackers, your favorite almonds, candy eyes
Starting off, here is a super simple appetizer that doesn’t involve any cooking at all. It takes a cheese and meat tray to a whole new level that will certainly impress your guests during this holiday season!
You first place your pear in the middle of your serving surface, and line up the triangle crackers behind it. Then, place one kind of cubed cheese behind those crackers, followed by the green grapes. Behind the green grapes comes in the summer sausage. Next, place your second type of cheese on the tray, followed by the crackers and almonds. Finally place your two candy eyes on top of the pear to finish off your completed turkey. Basically, what you’re doing here is arranging all of your ingredients behind the pear (your “turkey”) to look like turkey feathers.
2. Baked Brie
Who Made This: @yessidothecookingg
Viral Views Gotten: 3.4M views
Ingredients You’ll Need: 2 blocks of Brie cheese, chopped walnuts, fresh rosemary, honey, fig jam, extra virgin olive oil, flake salt, some sort of super crusty bread
The second appetizer on this list involves just a smidge of oven time. However, don’t worry if you’re an inexperienced cook who’s trying to impress your guests because this particular recipe couldn’t seem any easier than it already is!
Before you even start to gather your ingredients, just watch the TikTok video and try not to drool (I did that, and nope, it didn’t work…at all). Start out by mixing together your chopped walnuts, fresh rosemary and a healthy drizzle of honey. This will be used later on in the recipe, so just hold off on doing anything else with that for a hot second. Next up on your list of simple steps, take your two bricks of Brie cheese and score them (this means cutting criss cross lines across the top of each one, being careful only to merely cut the surface, not all the way through to the bottom of the Brie). After this, it’s time for the fun part (besides eating it, of course)… top each Brie with your favorite fig jam as well as the walnut mixture. Drizzle with EVOO, a tiny sprig of fresh rosemary, and place into the oven. Before digging in, drizzle with a tiny bit more honey. K, now’s drool time!
3. Crack Weenies
Who Made This: @vandal_the_evil_baker
Viral Views Gotten: 43K views
Ingredients You’ll Need: Your favorite packaged bacon strips (cut into thirds eventually), little smokies (essentially, mini hot dogs), your favorite maple syrup, brown sugar
The next appetizer up on our list of the best is something that, yes, has a wacky name to it, but the time and effort that it takes to make this is anything but wacky. This recipe is super simple, involved a little bit of cook time in the oven, and is super addictive, sweet, and fun to make overall!
These steps are all super simple, so there’s not gonna be a whole lot of directions going on here…here it goes, folks! First you’re going to want to take out all of your bacon from the package and cut it all into thirds pieces. Then, wrap your little smokies in a piece of bacon. Next, place a tooth pick into each weenie, drizzle a little bit of maple syrup onto each one, and place into the oven for a designated amount of time. Take them out and sprinkle on some brown sugar onto the whole entire tray. Put them back into the oven. Once the cooking time is done, take out again and finally it’s time to enjoy these tiny classics that everyone is sure to love and enjoy nonetheless!
4. Stuffed “Pumpkins”
Who Made This: @angelikasaesthetics
Viral Views Gotten: 14K Views
Ingredients You’ll Need: Chopped up rotisserie chicken, bacon, mushrooms of your choice/favorite, sour cream, store bought (or homemade, for that matter) dough rolled and shaped into balls, kitchen/baking twine (or any other thicker sort of strings), eggs, thin pretzel sticks
These cute little stuffed ‘pumpkins’ are a perfect way to incorporate a little bit of some Fall and Thanksgiving-themed decorations per say into your appetizers this year and all beyond!
No, before we begin, these aren’t actual stuffed pumpkins. They are little bits of pastry or bread dough essentially that has been shaped and tied with twins to give the appearance of being a cute and adorable stuffed little pumpkin. Okay, now onto the more fun part of it all… how to actually make them! Firstly and starting everything off over here, let’s make the mixture/stuffing that goes into these little pumpkins: chopped rotisserie chicken, chopped cooked bacon to your desired crispiness or floppiness, chopped mushrooms of your choice, and desired amount of sour cream as well. Next off, flatten your dough balls, fill them with the filling mixture, and mold to form another ball again. After each one is formed, use the kitchen/baking twine to make the lines on each dough ball and tie off the top (chop off any excess). After baking in the oven for a specific designated amount of time, take off the twine to show off the beautifully created lines, and add in a thin little pretzel stick to the top middle of each pumpkin to create the stem – enjoy it allllll up!
5. Bacon Cream Cheese Rolls
Who Made This: @simplymadeeats
Viral Views Gotten: 1.2M Views
Ingredients You’ll Need: Bacon, fresh or dried chives, 1 block of your choice of cream cheese, salt and pepper (to taste/preference, of course), 1 package of crescent rolls (all together in one sheet)
This is yet another appetizer that only uses a short amount of oven time, only a handful of super simple ingredients (some of which you may already have in your fridge/pantry), yet an appetiser that looks like you spent all day making! I mean, that’s the goal on the holidays, am I right?!
Before mixing anything together for this particular recipe over here, cook your bacon to desired crispiness or floppiness, chop up your chives super small (if not already dried a pre-chopped, that is), and make sure that your cream cheese block is taken out of the fridge ahead of time. This makes sure that it’s super soft and much easier to mix in general. Once all is cooked and chopped respectively, mix into the single block of cream cheese. Take out your crescent roll dough and slight roll it using a rolling pin to make sure all of the cuts and pieces are made all into one singular sheet. Next, spread the cream cheese mixture on top of the crescent roll dough. Roll up and cut slices. Place on a baking tray, bake in the oven for the designated bake/browning/melty time. Enjoy and Happy Thanksgiving, y’all!
6. Stuffed Dates
Who Made This: @williamssonoma
Viral Views Gotten: 546K Views
Ingredients You’ll Need: Medjool dates, your favorite brand of parm-reggiano cheese, walnuts (whole or chopped, whichever you prefer, really), extra virgin olive oil for drizzle at the end
This recipe was posted by Williams Sonoma themselves, so it just absolutely has to be a good one, am I right?! This simple and slightly sweet appetizer is perfect for any sort of hosting occasion!
You obviously first start out by pitting each of your dates, if you didn’t buy pre-pitted ones already. Then, arrange each date on a lined baking tray ready to be stuffed. Next up on your list of steps to do, stuff each date with the parm-reggiano cheese and whole or chopped walnuts (again, totally your preference on that particular part of it over here). Stick into the oven for a short amount of time to warm and get melty. Upon exiting the oven, drizzle with a little finishing EVOO and yum!!
7. Birdie Sandwiches
Who Made This: @melissajorealrecipes
Viral Views Gotten: 101K Views
Ingredients You’ll Need: Chopped red onions, shredded cheddar cheese (or any other sort of shredded cheese of your particular preferences), 1 small can of chopped black olives, mayo, crusty bread of your choice, butter, seasonsings of your choice to taste
First of all, while I have no idea whatsoever why these are called ‘Birdie Sandwiches’, I was super intrigued by their name alone, as well as their use of black olives (if you know what a ‘Birdie Sandwich’ is or how they got their names, please enlighten me down in the comments below). Second of all, let’s get into how to make one. Starting out, let’s chop up our red onions and mix it in with our shredded cheddar cheese of choice. Next up, let’s take our let’s take our chopped black olives and favorite brand of mayo and mix all four of those ingredients together. Finally, in terms of all of the prep work to be done here, take your butter and melt it, followed by toasting your favorite type of crunchy bread, as well as the seasonings of your choice and to taste. Once your bread is all prepped and toasted, top with the olive and cheese mixture and broil it in the oven until all nice and toasty warm…finally…enjoy and…tweet, tweet? IDK what these are…besides delish!
That’s a wrap on the top 7 viral TikTok Thanksgiving appetizer recipes! Next: onto Main Dishes!
What appetizers will you be making this year on Thanksgiving? What flavors sort of define the holiday as a whole? Let’s chat all about it down below! And as always…eat up, folks!