Thanksgiving Sides Quantity Calculator
| Guests | Potatoes | Stuffing | Cranberry | Rolls |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 | 4 lb | 2 boxes | 2 bags | 15 |
| 20 | 8 lb | 4 boxes | 3 bags | 30 |
| 30 | 12 lb | 5 boxes | 4 bags | 45 |
Turkey gets the argument, but sides sink the shopping list: guests take a scoop of everything, so a twelve-person table needs volume in six directions at once. The working baselines - catering consensus, not lab data - are 0.4 pounds of raw potatoes per person (a third of a pound if the table runs heavy on other starches, half a pound for leftovers), three quarters of a cup of prepared stuffing each, half a cup of green bean casserole, a quarter cup of cranberry sauce, a third of a cup of gravy and one and a half rolls per head.
Bottom line: for twelve guests buy five pounds of potatoes, two boxes of stuffing mix, two bags of fresh cranberry and eighteen rolls - and one 9x13 pan of green bean casserole feeds twelve with a serving left over for the host Friday lunch. The store-rounding is deliberate: potatoes land on the half pound, stuffing and cranberry land on whole boxes and bags, because you cannot buy nine people a tenth of a bag.
The honest part: every number here is a planning baseline, not a recipe - families run heavy on the dish they love and skip the one nobody touches, and teenagers invalidate all per-person mathematics after four in the afternoon. Buy the round number up, not down; unsold bags of cranberry keep for weeks, but a table that ran out of potatoes is the story that gets told for years.
How to use
- Enter the guest count - the tool turns each per-person baseline into store-ready totals.
- Round everything up to what the store actually sells: bags, boxes, dozen-count rolls and whole pans.
- Assign the dishes if guests offer to bring one - the potluck calculator handles the who, this one handles the how much.
Frequently asked questions
How many pounds of potatoes for mashed potatoes for 20 people?
Eight pounds raw, which mashes down to roughly ten pounds of finished potatoes once milk and butter go in - figure half a cup per person with gravy on top. The 0.4 pound per person baseline already includes peel loss; if the peel stays on for texture, drop to a third of a pound per person and use the pantry margin for the gravy roux. Russets mash fluffiest, Yukon Golds hold butter best, and a fifty-fifty split of the two is the quiet professional move.
Can I make the green bean casserole ahead?
Assemble it fully, hold the crispy onion top in a separate bag, and refrigerate the pan up to a day - then bake covered at 400 F for about twenty-five minutes, add the onions, and bake ten more. A fully topped casserole reheats into sogginess, which is the one failure the classic dish never forgives. The same split works for stuffing baked outside the bird: bake the pan the day before, reheat covered with a splash of stock so it steams instead of drying.
How much cranberry sauce is enough - and is one kind enough?
A quarter cup per person is the honest scoop, and about half the table takes none at all - but the half that takes it takes a real scoop, and the can-versus-fresh schism means you serve both: one whole-berry pot and one jellied, sliced, from the can with the ridges still on. Two bags of fresh cranberry make about four and a half cups of sauce, which covers eighteen scoops; sugar to taste, orange zest if the table skews fancy, and nobody has ever complained about leftover cranberry on a turkey sandwich.
Do the roll and gravy numbers change for a big table?
Rolls hold at one and a half per person up to any size - twenty-five people means thirty-eight rolls, and the extras become tomorrow's sandwiches anyway. Gravy is the one line that scales past its baseline: a third of a cup per person covers the plate, but the pot should hold half again more, because gravy runs out first, it is the only side people pour rather than scoop, and the person making it from drippings cannot stop halfway. Make a quart for ten people, two for twenty-five, and keep the pan drippings for a second batch.