23 Biscuits, Rolls, and Popovers for Your Thanksgiving Bread Basket
You don’t, strictly speaking, need Thanksgiving bread. And if you’re trying to simplify this year’s holiday meal, we won’t stand in your way. But a big Thanksgiving bread basket piled high with sweetly aromatic cornbread and rolls that release a puff of steam as you pull them apart can help your festive spread feel like a truly epic feast. (Freshly baked bread is a wonderful thing to contribute to the dinner if you’re attending as a guest.) Below you’ll find a few of our favorite Thanksgiving bread ideas, including crusty loaves, pillowy buns, and the flakiest biscuits around. You may want to make extra so you’ll be stocked up for leftover turkey and ham sandwiches the rest of the week.
Photo by Joseph De Leo, Prop Styling by Anne Eastman, Food Styling by Rebecca Jurkevich1/23Parker House Rolls
Photo by Joseph De Leo, Food styling by Rebecca Jurkevich2/23Skillet Cornbread
Fragrant cornbread can be the base of your Thanksgiving stuffing, but it’s also nice to have on the holiday table for nibbling by the slice or the square.
Photo by Chelsea Kyle, Prop Styling by Jerri Joy, Food Styling by Anna Hampton3/23Pull-Apart Bread With Pumpkin and Spinach
Photo by Joseph De Leo, Food Styling by Judy Haubert5/23Flaky, Buttery Biscuits
If your Thanksgiving bread basket doesn’t feel complete without flaky biscuits, start with this recipe from baking icon Cheryl Day. Folding and stacking the dough gives it towering height and lots of buttery layers.
Photo by Joseph De Leo, Food Styling by Rebecca Jurkevich6/23Cheddar and Herb Gougères
You can freeze the choux dough for these cheese puffs after piping, then bake from frozen on Thanksgiving day.
7/23Extra-Fluffy Sourdough Dinner Rolls
The tangzhong technique, popular for milk bread, meets tangy sourdough in these superlative rolls. If you’re not hosting the meal this year, this is the ideal baking project to contribute to the feast.
Photo by Chelsea Kyle, Prop Styling by Beatrice Chastka, Food Styling by Anna Stockwell8/23Porcini Popovers
Grind up some dried porcini mushrooms to add deep, woodsy flavor to these golden-brown popovers. For the mushroom-averse, try our classic popovers.
Photo by Chelsea Kyle, Prop Styling by Alex Brannian, Food Styling by Diana Yen9/23Orange Sweet Rolls
The sweet citrusy flavor of these buns pairs wonderfully with the tart notes of cranberry sauce or cranberry relish.
Photo by Chelsea Kyle, Prop Styling by Beatrice Chastka, Food Styling by Anna Stockwell11/23Sesame Breadsticks
Part crisp, part chewy, and wonderfully seedy, these breadsticks are a nice addition to your pre-dinner Thanksgiving appetizer spread.
Photo by Romulo Yanes13/23Rosemary Olive Oil Bread
Olive oil gives this bread a plush texture—and any leftovers will be excellent for turkey sandwiches.
Photo by Chelsea Kyle, Food Styling by Joe Sevier and Anna Stockwell14/23Cathead Biscuits
These biscuits are fluffy, rather than flaky, and excellent with a smear of honey butter. If you cannot find buttermilk powder and don’t have time to pick some up online, you can use store-bought buttermilk and skip the water.
Photo by Brittany Conerly15/23Honeychile Brown Butter Cornbread
Brown butter adds rich, nutty flavor to this Thanksgiving cornbread recipe. The key move: be absolutely sure to preheat your skillet before you add the batter.
Photo by Michael Graydon & Nikole Herriott17/23Buttery Pull-Apart Dinner Rolls
A mountain of these soft dinner rolls just might disappear before the stuffing or the mashed sweet potatoes.
Photo by Alan Weiner19/23The Saturday White Bread
A simple crusty Dutch oven loaf lets all the other flavors of your Thanksgiving feast shine. If you only want to bake one boule, save the rest of the dough for later in the week.
Photograph by Emma Fishman, Food styling by Susie Theodorou, Prop styling by Sophie Leng20/23Stuffing Biscuits
All the herby flavors of the Thanksgiving classics come together in this fun biscuit recipe from Bon Appétit. These also make an excellent day-after-Thanksgiving breakfast. (Just add leftover turkey gravy.)
Photo by Caren Alpert21/23Rosemary Garlic Potato Bread
A sturdy stand mixer helps make light work of this fluffy, garlicky loaf, but you can absolutely work the dough by hand.
