Boston Thanksgiving Dinner

Top Boston restaurant choices for your holiday meal

Boston Thanksgiving dinner provides the city's restaurants with a chance to show off their best holiday cooking.  Although Pilgrims held the first Thanksgiving dinner in Plymouth, Boston restaurants carry on the tradition of celebrating the fall harvest - and we're all thankful!

If you're visiting Boston on this Thanksgiving holiday, you'll receive a warm welcome from our restaurants when you join the many locals who plan a stress-free holiday feast by making reservations instead of making dinner.

Boston's creative chefs go all out.  Whether you opt for a traditional meal with all the trimmings or an innovative riff on turkey and stuffing, this will be a meal that you'll remember warmly!

If you're planning to visit the city in late November, read through our list of tantalizing restaurant offerings - and then pick up your phone.

Restaurant reservations for Boston Thanksgiving dinners are virtually mandatory to ensure that you'll get a table.

Prices listed below do not include taxes, tips, or beverages (and although I do my best to ensure they're accurate, please note that they may not be).  

Thanksgiving for 2009 falls on Thursday, November 26. 

Insider Tips

Reserve as early as possible - some of these restaurants are quite small!

Keep in mind that restaurants may need to make last-minute changes in their menus based on what's fresh and available in the markets - the true spirit of Thanksgiving!.

All of these restaurants are located in some of Boston's most interesting neighborhoods.  After dinner, work off a few calories by taking a stroll. If you plan ahead of time to do this, you can enjoy your dessert guilt-free.

Lavish buffet at Omni Parker House

The splendid Boston Thanksgiving buffet at Parker's Restaurant at the elegant Omni Parker House Hotel in Downtown Boston is almost too lavish to contemplate.

You can start with duck truffle pate, calamari and shrimp with orzo and arugula, roasted portobello bisque, and a number of other yummy choices.

Moving on, featured entrees include slow roasted turkey with herb stuffing, honey grain mustard glazed ham, herb-crusted sirloin, and pan-seared salmon. Vegetarians can select the butternut squash ravioli. Choose from traditional accompaniments - autumn veggies, glazed sweet potatoes, creamed onions, and garlic mashed potatoes.

For desserts, you find an array of pies and pastries, petite fours, apple cranberry crisp. Be sure to save room for truffles!

Details and Directions

Hours: Seatings at 12 noon and 2:30 pm
Cost: Adults $52; children 12 and under $19
Location: 60 School Street, Downtown Boston
Closest T station: Blue and Green Lines/Government Center; Red Line/Downtown Crossing
Reservations: 617-725-1600; website

Holiday feast at Seaport Hotel's Aura

Photo courtesy of Seaport Hotel

The freshest local and New England produce, organic turkey, and other specialties of the season will delight you when you gather around the table at Aura at the Seaport Hotel on the spectacular South Boston Waterfront. 

Start with ginger-laced buttercup squash bisque . . . baked oysters with pancetta and mornay sauce . . . ricotta gnocchi with mushrooms, pignoli, and aged Gouda . . . or one of the other special starters.

Then move on to your choice of organic turkey with cranberry sauce and all the fixings, lacquered salmon with purple kale and fingerlings (a feast for the eyes!), ribeye steak with roasted root veggies, or other main courses.

Can you possibly find room for the dessert buffet?  It doesn't matter . . . when you see the pecan pie, German chocolate cake, crème brûlée, and much more, you won't be able to resist! 

Children will be happy with the kids' options . . . sliced turkey and stuffing, chicken fingers and sweet potato fries, and every child's favorite, even on Thanksgiving, mac 'n' cheese with broccoli florettes.

By the time you've finished this memorable meal, you'll be giving thanks for Chef Rachel Klein's great Boston Thanksgiving cuisine.

Details and Directions for Seaport Hotel

Hours: Seating at 12 noon
Cost: Adults $60; children $22 (children under 6 are complimentary)
Location: One Seaport Lane, South Boston Waterfront
Closest T station: Silver Line/Seaport
Parking: Underground garage at the hotel (get the restaurant to validate your ticket)
Reservations: 617-385-4300; website

Traditional Boston Thanksgiving bliss -
But with a twist At 75 Chestnut

Thanksgiving dinner at this cozy slightly-off-the-beaten path neighborhood spot in Boston's Beacon Hill will remind you of the delicious down-home meal that your mom might have made - if your mother is an accomplished chef.

You'll start with pumpkin bisque.  Next comes the oven-roasted turkey - traditional enough until you taste the fabulous walnut stuffing, giblet gravy, and melt-in-your-mouth cranberry orange sauce. Garlic mashed potatoes, butternut squash puree, and string beans with julienned veggies round out the main course.

Finish with your choice of traditional-with-a-twist desserts - apple and cranberry cobbler with cinnamon gelato, pumpkin pie with whipped cream, and rum raisin pudding decked out with fresh berries and chocolate sauce.

Details and Directions

Hours: 12 noon -6 pm
Cost: $55 per person for 3-course dinner
Location: 75 Chestnut Street, Beacon Hill, Boston
Closest T station: Red Line/Charles Street
Reservations: 617-227-2175 - call after 5; website

An elegant dinner for 2 at the Taj

Taj Hotel Boston's Thanksgiving dinner comes with an added incentive . . . make reservations for their elegant 3-course holiday meal in The Café for $75 per person, and you can also receive a special holiday guestroom rate of $75 per person per night, based on double occupancy.

Taj Boston's yummy Thanksgiving menu, created by Executive Chef Franck Steigerwald, lets you choose an appetizer, entrée and dessert. 

For appetizers, choose from smoked salmon . . . foie gras terrine with citrus salad and apricot marmalade on brioche . . . pumpkin soup with a poached egg topped with parmesan and roasted pumpkin seeds.

For your entrée, you can select turkey with all the traditional accompaniments, halibut with asparagus and golden beets topped with porcini sauce, or grilled beef strip loin with rutabaga mousseline and wild mushroom Madeira sauce.

And for dessert, start dreaming now about pumpkin cheesecake with a touch of dark chocolate, apple tarts with cinnamon ice cream, or caramel loops with vanilla ice cream. 

This is the perfect way to jump-start your holiday shopping on Newbury Street on Friday . . . or just enjoy a relaxing, stress-free holiday weekend

Details and Directions

Hours: 12 noon - 9pm
Cost:  $75 per person
Location: 15 Arlington Street, Back Bay, Boston
Closest T station: Green Line/Arlington
Reservations: 617-536-5700; website

Traditional and not . . .
Boston Thanksgiving at The Beehive

Thanksgiving dinner at The Beehive offers traditional and non-traditional Thanksgiving choices, with plenty of delicious meat-free options for Vegetarians.

This South End neighborhood "cafe des artistes" in the former boiler room of the Cyclorama will offer an a la carte menu so that you can mix and match to please your palate.  In keeping with The Beehive's tradition of featuring local musicians, live music will be on-going for your enjoyment all day.

For starters, select from house-smoked salmon with zucchini fritters . . . shortrib and potato pierogies . . . pumpkin soup.  Or, head straight for the chilled seafood raw bar.

Main course options include roasted farm raised turkey with wild mushroom brioche stuffing, prime rib with parsnip mashed potatoes, grilled wild salmon, and a vegetarian Thanksgiving plate. Creatively prepared veggies accompany the entrees.

If you still have room for dessert, pumpkin chocolate chip cheesecake and apple crisp with vanilla ice cream await you.

As a nice touch, The Beehive also offers a children's menu with food that kids love. Choices include turkey dinner, mac and cheese, and chicken with rice. Wise children will eat lightly and save lots of room for the yummy desserts.

Details and Directions

Hours: 1pm - 10pm, with a closing time of 2:30am
Cost: A la carte. Appetizers (not including raw bar) $9-14; main course choices $23-29; desserts $8-9; children's items $8-12
Location: 541 Tremont Street, South End, Boston
Closest T station: Orange Line/Back Bay
Reservations: 617-423-0069; website

Mouth-watering menu
Boston Thanksgiving Dinner at Pigalle

For delicious Thanksgiving favorites with a French twist, you'll want to consider Pigalle in Boston's Bay Village. Chef Marc Orfaly's 3-course prix fixe menu provides a true feast with lots of wonderful choices for each course.

Start by selecting from a long list of appetizers almost too delicious to contemplate. For example, you could choose creamless cauliflower soup with steamed mussels and caramelized cauliflower.  Or a duet of Wellfleet clams casino and oysters Provençal. Or perhaps tuna Niçoise with traditional accompaniments.

Main course options include favorites such as turkey dinner with traditional trimmings, roasted prime rib with pot de boeuf a la mode and creamed onions, pumpkin tortellini with duck consomme and duck comfit, pepper-crusted tuna steak with forest mushrooms, and several more yummy choices. You can also add sides of pomme frites, creamed spinach, butternut custard, stuffing, and other favorites.

For dessert, you can choose a traditional favorite like pumpkin pie - or something more unusual like cinnamon ice cream with spiced caramel or chocolate layer cake.

A nice children's menu rounds out the offerings with a turkey dinner, mac and cheese, or shells with meat gravy.

Details and Directions

Hours:   Thanksgiving dinner for 2009 will be served from 3pm - 8pm
Cost: Three-course prix fixe menu, $70; sides $6 and some appetizers have a $6 supplement. Children's menu $16
Location: 75 Charles Street South, next to Radisson Hotel Boston and across from Charles Playhouse and Improv Asylum; Bay Village, Boston
Closest T station: Green Line/Boylston
Reservations: 617-423-4944; website