Tieghan Gerard's favorite Thanksgiving recipes

For this year's Thanksgiving menu, Summit County blogger and cookbook author Tieghan Gerard recommended a robust menu.

Cocktails: A spicy pomegranate ginger paloma that's "really simple, not overly sweet and has a really pretty red hue, which is kind of festive," or a vanilla chai old-fashioned for a "warmer and cozier" sipper.

• Potatoes: Whether it's roasted garlic mashed potatoes, a salty spin on sweet potatoes — like these crispy parmesan thyme sweet stacks or a sweet potato casserole with bacon pecans — spuds on the table are a "staple."
• Brussels sprouts: This year, Gerard is doing bacon-wrapped Brussels sprouts, but she also loves a "really pretty" shaved Brussels salad with an apple-cider dressing.
• Rolls: They're a must. She loves a Parker House roll with "a little bit" of honey, butter and sea salt on top.
• Mac and cheese: This comforting dish tends to make it on the menu most years. This year, however, her sister-in-law requested cauliflower mac and cheese — an idea she's into.
• Main dishes: An herb and butter roasted turkey with make-ahead white wine gravy, or — for vegetarians —  stuffed spaghetti squash four-cheese pesto lasagna or a four-cheese sage pesto Florentine lasagna.
• Dessert: Try a double chocolate mocha pudding pie, molten chocolate crackle pie (her favorite) or a chai espresso martini as an after-dinner cocktail.

What's next: On Feb. 22, Gerard will release her third cookbook, "Half Baked Every Day: recipes for balanced, flexible, feel-good meals."

• She tells Axios she hopes to have a book tour — though the pandemic is still keeping most scheduling details up in the air. But one thing is for certain: this new book reflects a more "polished" version of herself.
• "It's still so much of the recipes that you know and love … but just a little bit more of a grown-up version," she says.

The bottom line: "I don't want to ever lose what people come for and what they know and love," Gerard says.

Read her top advice on holiday hosting