Is mac and cheese a Thanksgiving must?

Macaroni and cheese at Thanksgiving — yes or no?

For some families, it’s as expected as mashed potatoes or stuffing, a pot of gold beside the turkey. For others, it’s an outlier — a welcome guest but not a required one.

And on the internet, the question of whether mac and cheese is a Thanksgiving must can start an argument with the same intensity as a dinner table debate with your uncle — you know the one.

In a pair of informal polls on my social media feeds, the verdict was clear: even when it’s not part of a family’s longstanding holiday tradition, macaroni and cheese rarely gets turned away. Why would it?

There’s nostalgia in that casserole for adults, whether they grew up with it as a weeknight staple or Grandma’s holiday centerpiece. It’s a refuge for picky children (of all ages) confronted with a table full of unfamiliar dishes, challenging textures and baffling flavor combinations.

And for competitive cooks who view holiday tables as a field of culinary contest, it can be a quiet battleground of pride and personality. Which cheeses were used? What noodle? Is there egg? What about breadcrumbs?

Sometimes it’s even a hinge that joins households. My social media research uncovered more than one story of a Thanksgiving marriage between a Northern cook and a Southern family, sealed by a pan of macaroni and cheese.

It might not appear in a Norman Rockwell painting, but it looks beautiful on the table all the same.

The dish is hardly niche. Many tables are a crazy quilt of traditions and heritage, a place where families celebrate their backgrounds. But while Italian ziti, Mexican tamales or Polish pierogi might seem out of place at some Thanksgiving celebrations, macaroni and cheese works with everything.

It’s also more historical than people think. No, it wasn’t at the first Thanksgiving alongside venison, lobster and squash — but it didn’t appear much later.

Thomas Jefferson encountered a version of the dish in France, but it was his cook, James Hemings, who put it on American tables. Its place on our collective menu was shaped not by a Founding Father but by an enslaved Black chef.

And let’s not forget that it’s an excellent main dish option in case your guest list includes any vegetarians. And this vegetarian entree isn’t sculpted out of bean curd. Score.

So if macaroni and cheese shows up at a Thanksgiving feast, even one that’s never had it before, it’s not a party crasher. It’s culinary manifest destiny. It’s a reflection of who we are, where we come from and how our tables continue to expand.

And that alone is reason enough for it to have a place of honor beside the turkey — whether it’s traditional or not. Dig in.