Thanksgiving 2017: This Is Texas' Favorite Side Dish?!?!

AUSTIN, TX — Chicken spaghetti?!?! Them's fightin' words.
The folks at General Mills claim to have compiled a list of the most popular side dishes to complement the turkey on Thanksgiving Day, saying they scoured through search data from such prestigious culinary sites as BettyCrocker.com and Pillsbury. Their findings were then published in The Daily Meal.
Some added context, here: The Daily Meal is no slouch in the culinary information game. It's a website covering food and drink topics via articles, special reports and videos that bills itself as being "unprecedented in scope and depth," while producing "...more culinary content than any other resource."
So how, then, did spaghetti chicken emerge as the purported best Thanksgiving side dish in Texas? Surely these results are skewed by those rebellious Millennials, no? How then to explain the absence of the aforementioned and beloved green bean casserole? Is pumpkin pie no longer revered? Or what of that Texas twist pecan pie? Have we forsaken pecan pie in favor of chicken spaghetti? Are crescent rolls or mashed potatoes no longer in vogue or de rigeur?
What gives? And another thing: What the heck is chicken spaghetti?
Apparently it's a thing (a casserole), as Google yielded about 7,260,000 results in 0.52 seconds. We must've missed the memo. And, in spite of ourselves, it does sound delightful. The Pioneer Woman lists the ingredients of said dish, now apparently the favorite in the state.

• 2 cups Cooked Chicken.
• 3 cups Dry Spaghetti, Broken Into Two Inch Pieces.
• 2 cans Cream Of Mushroom Soup.
• 2 cups Grated Sharp Cheddar Cheese.
• 1/4 cup Finely Diced Green Pepper.
• 1/4 cup Finely Diced Onion.
• 1 jar (4 Ounce) Diced Pimentos, Drained.
• 2 cups Reserved Chicken Broth From Pot.

Sounds delicious, doesn't it? But still.

In most states, Thanksgiving searches for favorite side dishes yield the more traditional offerings: pumpkin pie, green bean casserole, crescent rolls and sweet potato casserole. But some states seem to increasingly think outside the culinary box, according to this list.

Two words: Sausage balls. That's Alabama's fave, according to the survey. Nebraska and Rhode Island, apparently, go nuts with monkey bread. Michigan goes for chili, another Texas staple on non-Thanksgiving-day days. Arizona and Wisconsin go for the incongruous shrimp as their favorite side.

We don't really know what to make of this list, but here's the state-by-state breakdown:

Alabama: Sausage balls

Alaska: Cinnamon rolls
Arizona: Shrimp
Arkansas: Chicken and dumplings
California: Macaroni and cheese
Colorado: Cranberry sauce
Connecticut: Butternut squash soup
Delaware: Sweet potato casserole
Florida: Pumpkin cheesecake
Georgia: Sweet potato casserole
Hawaii: Crescent rolls
Idaho: Biscuits
Illinois: Mashed Potatoes
Indiana: Peanut butter cookies
Iowa: Monkey bread
Kansas: Pinwheels
Kentucky: Chicken and dumplings
Louisiana: Cornbread dressing
Maine: Chicken pot pie
Maryland: Crab cake
Massachusetts: Cheesecake
Michigan: Chili
Minnesota: Green bean casserole
Mississippi: Chicken spaghetti
Missouri: Breakfast casserole
Montana: Oven-roasted vegetables
Nebraska: Monkey bread
Nevada: Peanut butter cookies
New Hampshire: Blueberry pie
New Jersey: Crab cake
New Mexico: Pecan pie
New York: Cheesecake
North Carolina: Sweet potato pie
North Dakota: Apple crisp
Ohio: Buffalo chicken dip
Oklahoma: Pecan pie
Oregon: Bread stuffing
Pennsylvania: Buffalo chicken dip
Rhode Island: Monkey bread
South Carolina: Sweet potato pie
South Dakota: Pumpkin pie
Tennessee: Sausage balls
Texas: Chicken spaghetti
Utah: Crescent rolls
Vermont: Butternut squash soup
Virginia: Macaroni and cheese
Washington: Sugar cookies
West Virginia: Buffalo chicken dip
Wisconsin: Shrimp
Wyoming: Pork chop

For these dishes and more, see 101 best Thanksgiving recipes from The Daily Meal. If you, like me, are taken aback by the emergence of this chicken spaghetti atop the roost but vaguely intrigued, check out this video primer:

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