Yes, it is important to count your blessings on Thanksgiving. You should definitely do that.
But, Thanksgiving is also about the food and the floats. The floats in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade that is! Here is the definitive guide to great food and float pairings for the 2023 Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade.
Don’t worry if you don’t know what to eat or drink when Santa ends the parade on Herald Square, I’ve got you covered!
I am sure I will have a less tongue and cheek post about Thanksgiving later this week.
Today is about silliness though!
A quick word about food and the Thanksgiving Day parade. Some of my actual feelings about what foods best pair with the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade date back to around 2009 when I was an unmarried, childless, baby librarian at the Chester County Library. My co-worker Susan told me that she and her children, who are now adults, make and eat Pillsbury cinnamon rolls only one time a year and it is when they are watching the parade on Thanksgiving morning. Ever since she told me this, I have been sure that Pillsbury cinnamon rolls must be consumed on Thanksgiving morning. I don’t have any photographic evidence to confirm this, but I am pretty sure, I came home to eat them last year after running in my turkey trot race. I did find photographic evidence to confirm that we had homemade cinnamon rolls on Thanksgiving in 2020 which makes sense because during Covid quarantining we went all-out with our cooking ideas.
So anyway, without further ado, here are some fun food and drink and float pairings. . . .
- When you see the Grogu Balloon (you know, Baby Yoda) go down the street, get yourself some blue macaroons just like Grogu would eat and did eat in that one episode of The Mandalorian.
- When R&B artist Brandy (from Moesha) serenades the crowd while riding on a yet-to-be determined float, toast Brandy and all her years of success with great vintage of of brandy on the rocks.
- Treat yourself to some a plate of pain perdu (fancy French toast) while listening to Jon Batiste, New Orleans native and former bandleader from the Late Show with Stephen Colbert. He is also one of the slated performers in the parade.
- In the 2023 parade, you can see country music artist Jessie James Decker cookbook author of Just Feed Me and toast her with Mermaid Juice. A concoction of rum, blue curacao, lemonade and ginger ale and drink it before the parade ends at noon. That will start your Thanksgiving on the right note.
- See Miss America Grace Stanke and toast her with a slice of American Cheese.
- This year’s parade will feature 29 different clown crews. That is way more clown crews in this year’s parade than high school or college marching bands. In fact, there are only 11 total marching bands in this year’s parade. Put a McDonald’s McFlurry in the freezer to have during those long clown stretches of the parade. The connection here is that Ronald Mcdonald is a clown. It seems that clown crews are to the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade what firetrucks are to most town parades.
- The Big Apple Circus is one of the seven featured performance groups during the parade. I think you should serve an French Apple Tart from Trader Joe’s while watching The Big Apple Circus. Ina Garten would agree. She said that she sometimes puts a TJ’s Apple Tart into one of her own pie plates, pops it into the oven and serves it with vanilla ice cream and a drizzle of caramel sauce and passes it off as homemade. If she can do it, you can do it too.
- The music group Chicago will be performing in this year’s parade. Log onto Goldbelly.com this very second and order yourself a Chicago Deep Dish style pizza or a Chicago Style hotdog to eat while Chicago is performing.
- Of course, it wouldn’t be a parade without the Pillsbury Dough Boy balloon. This is your chance to make my parade dreams come true. Get yourself a tube of Pillsbury Cinnamon Rolls this very second and warm them up before the parade so you can be ready to bite into one when you see the Pillsbury Dough Boy. Such a cutie!
- Make yourself a tropical mixed drink and drink to Santa when you see him at the end of the parade. If this seems weird, here my little story. A number of years ago, I used to put on a Youtube clip of the movie The Snowman by Raymond Briggs while Mr. Man took his nap in the living room. After The Snowman, immediately a lesser known movie would come on that was based on the book Father Christmas Takes a Holiday, also by Raymond Briggs. In this movie, the British Santa would vacation in a warm destination (Sprin) in the off season and maybe sometimes drink too much, if I remember correctly. Anyway, drink to Santa in the parade with a tropical drink. Also if you have the opportunity, maybe watch this movie. British Santa is different than the American version.
Happy Thanksgiving!
