22% Agree This Is The Worst Thanksgiving Side Dish

Let's play a little word association game: We say "Thanksgiving," you say "turkey," right? Oh, if only it were that simple, but one bird, no matter how large, does not a holiday meal make. Instead, Thanksgiving is about "turkey and all the trimmings" (and oh yeah, being thankful for stuff or something like that). When it comes to those "trimmings," though, many of them are dictated by long-standing tradition, which means that quite a few of these annually-recurring dishes are the kind of thing we greet with more dread than delight.

In order to wallow in the misery — ours and everyone else's — Mashed conducted a poll of 607 people to determine the nation's most-hated Thanksgiving side. The "least wanted" list consisted of all the usual suspects: candied yams, cranberry sauce, green bean casserole, mac and cheese, mashed potatoes, stuffing, and sweet potatoes. Rolls, however, did not make the list, since who could possibly hate those?

One interesting thing we noticed from the poll results was that the less you mess with a base foodstuff, the less people are likely to object to the results. The least-hated dish was plain old sweet potatoes — only 5% would say no to the low-GI, high-nutrient superfood that actually tastes pretty good on its own. Mashed potatoes were disliked by just over 8%, while stuffing was unpopular with slightly less than 10% of pollees. Over 14%, however, felt that mac and cheese does not belong on the Thanksgiving table, while nearly 20% would like to banish cranberry sauce back to the history books.

Separated by just a single percentage point, however, were the top 2 most-hated candidates. Finishing in a strong second place and loathed by approximately 21% was that candied yam casserole that proves you can take the "super" out of a superfood by smothering it in sugar and marshmallow goo. Topping our poll, though, and winning the non-coveted crown of most-hated Thanksgiving side, was the "Creature from the Church Basement," aka that dreaded green bean casserole featuring limp canned veggies drowned in condensed cream of yuck. That's one dish we'll never manage to be thankful for! (And no, Aldi, making it into a pizza doesn't make it even a tiny bit better. What were you thinking?)