With Thanksgiving coming up, I’ve been starting to plan how I’m going to celebrate here in New Zealand. This will be my second year spending the holidays here and I’m keen to bring a little bit of American culture down under. Read on if you’re curious about what it’s like celebrating Thanksgiving in New Zealand, or if you’re looking for some tips on where to find common meal ingredients here. Let’s go!
Does New Zealand celebrate Thanksgiving?
Nope! Thanksgiving is a holiday observed in the United States to celebrate the autumnal harvest.
The traditional Thanksgiving feast is supposedly modeled after a meal shared by the newly-settled Pilgrims and the Indigenous Americans living on the land. (We now know that it wasn’t such a friendly, heart-warming tale after all.)
Nowadays, Thanksgiving is a day centered around gathering with family, eating a ton of food, watching football, and going shopping in the wee hours of the morning.
Our New Zealand Thanksgiving menu
I tried to keep it as traditional as possible to show Ben’s family what it’s like. Something I didn’t realize before committing to cooking was how difficult it would be to find some of the ingredients here. I ended up having to improvise for certain dishes, with mixed results.
Turkey and stuffing
Turkey isn’t a very common meat in New Zealand, and as a result is quite expensive. We bought a small frozen turkey from the nearby Four Square for over $60 NZ. Despite it being the smallest Thanksgiving turkey I’ve ever had, it barely fit into our standard-sized Kiwi oven.
I couldn’t find any pre-made boxed stuffing, so I made it from scratch. Thankfully none of the ingredients were difficult to find: bread, onions, and celery are staples here.
Mashed potatoes and gravy
A New Zealand Thanksgiving wouldn’t be complete without mashed potatoes and gravy. These are two foods that Kiwis are used to, so they ended up being a hit with our guests. I did find gravy packets here, but it tastes much better from scratch anyway so I didn’t use them.
Cranberries
This was the saddest part of New Zealand Thanksgiving for me. American cranberry sauce, made from fresh or frozen cranberries, is basically non-existent here. The only type of cranberries I could find in our town were the dried variety. Desperate for an authentic Thanksgiving experience, I attempted to rehydrate the dried cranberries in hot water before using them in my recipe. They turned out just okay — the berries were small and still weirdly chewy.
Green bean casserole
Classic green bean casserole is made with green beans, French onion soup mix, and fried onions. I managed to find the soup mix and green beans, but fried onions were elusive. I ended up frying them myself, which turned out pretty tasty. Truthfully, the concept of this dish confused our guests a bit so I ended up with a lot of leftovers.
All the pies
My personal favorite thing to make. I baked an apple pie and a pumpkin pie, both completely from scratch. I find that the pre-made pie crusts you find in the supermarkets here are a bit weird — the puffed pastry shells end up being very puffy. Making the apple pie was simple enough – I chopped up some apples, added some sugar and spices, and baked it in a lattice crust.
The pumpkin pie presented more of a challenge. Canned pumpkin doesn’t exist in your average New Zealand supermarket, so I had to go through the trouble of making it from an actual pumpkin. I chopped it up, baked it, and then turned it into purée in the blender. Although it was quite labor intensive, it ended up being delicious! The Kiwis I served it to thought it was a bit strange, but claimed they liked it nonetheless.
New Zealand Thanksgiving 2020
This year, I’ll most likely cook a smaller than usual meal for Thanksgiving. Being in New Zealand, the holiday vibes just aren’t there for me. Having all of our classic winter holidays in the summer feels unnatural, even though I adore summertime. I still love Thanksgiving though, and would never pass up an opportunity to bake a few pies. Since turkey isn’t my personal favorite, we’ll probably forgo it this year and make a bunch of sides instead.
If you’d like to find out how I got to New Zealand, click here. In my next few posts here on the blog, I’m excited to start writing about traveling within New Zealand and being a flight attendant.
Happy Thanksgiving!
xoxo Niki
Flights | I start my search on Google Flights, then usually book directly with the airline so I’m protected in case anything goes wrong.
Accommodation | Booking.com is my go-to for booking accommodation. They have an awesome cancellation policy and a super easy-to-use website.
Activities | GetYourGuide is my all-time favorite site to book day tours and activities because their cancellation policy is unmatched. Viator is another great option, especially for multi-day trips and tours.
Luggage | Carry-on only or bust! I use my Fjallraven Kanken backpack on just about every trip I take. I also love Beis for carry-on suitcases, weekender bags, and makeup/toiletry cases.
Photography | I use my iPhone 12 Pro, a Canon G7x Mark ii, and a DJI Mini 2 drone for all of my photos and videos. I also edit my photos in Lightroom.
