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These best Christmas Side Dishes, including everything from vegetables to stuffing to potatoes and salads, will round out your holiday menu and bring your feast together.
Don’t let the Christmas Dinner sides play second fiddle this holiday season, these delicious, simple and festive recipes will most definitely be the star! Need Prime Rib sides? We’ve got you covered. Side dishes for Filet Mignon? We’ve got that too!
Whether you serve a traditional meal with a crispy-skinned roast turkey or a juicy holiday ham or a tender slow cooked pork roast, these Christmas side dishes will pair perfectly with your meal.
Christmas Side Dishes
Sometimes the best part of your holiday meal isn’t the main dish in the spotlight – it’s the sides! Christmas makes me think of more elegant, pretty side dishes, while the Thanksgiving sides are more about stick-to-your-ribs comfort food.
It’s fun to celebrate the holidays with some classier dishes, but still trying to keep it simple can be a challenge. The side dishes you’ll find in this collection are easy enough for the home cook, yet pretty enough to be the star of your Christmas dinner.
What Dishes are Served on Christmas?
We always have a simple meal on Christmas Eve with just our household which includes fish and German Potato Salad. It’s a 50 year old tradition that we haven’t broken yet!
Our meal on Christmas Day though, that’s the elegant, classy meal that you see in the movies where the star is a giant prime rib roast. It always includes Twice Baked Potatoes (because they’re fancier than regular baked potatoes!) and some delicious homemade cranberry sauce, both of which you’ll find below!
If you need help planning your meal or your entire Christmas season, be sure to check out our handy FREE PRINTABLE Christmas Planner.
How To Pair Christmas Dinner Side Dishes
Crucial to the success of your meal is pairing the right accompaniments. Whether you’re carving a whole turkey or an elegant prime rib roast, you need to choose the right sides to go with it. Here are a few basic tips for pairing the right side dishes with your Christmas dinner. It’s all about balance.
Round out the nutrition. Having a plate full of turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy might taste delicious, but it can also be pretty heavy. Lighter sides, like vegetables and salads, are a great place to bring in other nutritious elements that might not be part of the main dish recipe.
Balance the flavors. Turkey, ham, and beef can all have wonderful flavor but they are usually pretty mild. You want to balance that with a few bold flavors like tart cranberry, bright lemon, or even something spicy or sweet.
Textures and colors. When all the food on your plate is brown, or everything is a soft texture, the food can seem bland. When planning your Christmas side dishes, make sure to include a few different contrasting colors, and pair textures like crunchy and creamy.
What are the best dishes to eat with prime rib?
Prime Rib is a special occasion type of entree, so it deserves a special occasion type of side dish. Toss the can opener back in the drawer and keep these fancier prime rib side dishes at the ready.
Things like twice baked potatoes, bacon wrapped asparagus, and rice pilaf will really help the prime rib roast to shine. Don’t forget the horseradish sauce!
Potato Side Dishes
You can’t have a holiday meal without potatoes. Crispy or creamy, buttered or fried, potatoes are the perfect side because they go with pretty much everything.
Authentic German Potato Salad is a cold salad made with an oil & vinegar dressing that is traditionally served in the Swabian region of Southern Germany.
Easy Cheesy Scalloped Potatoes are the perfect side dish! Par-boiled instead of baked raw, these cheesy potatoes will always be cooked to creamy perfection.
Roasted Purple Potatoes are a delicious, simple to prepare and full of health benefits! Roasted in olive oil and seasonings and ready in about 30 minutes.
Copycat Cracker Barrel Hashbrown Casserole is an easy, cheesy recipe with frozen hashbrowns, cheese sauce and a crunchy corn flakes topping. Perfect for potlucks, brunch or as a simple side dish.
Oven Roasted Sweet Potatoes are coated in a cinnamon honey sauce and roasted until they are crispy and caramelized on the outside and tender on the inside.
Vegetables
You can’t have a meal without some hearty, healthy vegetables, right? Right! But there’s nothing that says they have to be bland or boiled, and these vegetable side dishes are anything but!
7 Layer Salad is a classic potluck dish great for feeding a crowd. These layers of deliciousness can be made ahead of time for these easiest side dish ever!
Garlic Green Beans are a simple, flavorful side dish that's fast and easy to make. Green beans cooked in garlic butter until tender with a squeeze of lemon.
Roasted Brussels Sprouts Salad is a perfect side dish for your fall get-togethers and especially Thanksgiving! Serve it hot or cold – it's sure to please!
Candied Yams are a classic side dish that's perfect for Thanksgiving. Tender yams, or sweet potatoes, glazed in a buttery brown sugar sauce.
Starchy Sides
I don’t know about you, but there has got to be bread at my holiday table. Now I realize that rice isn’t bread, but it falls into the starch family so we’re just gonna roll with it. While we’re at it, we’ll add some pasta, too.
Homemade Stuffing has dried bread cubes tossed with celery, onions, fresh herbs and broth, then baked until it's moist and fluffy, and crispy on the outside.
Instant Pot Mushroom Risotto is a rich and delicious recipe made with your pressure cooker for an easy vegetarian dinner or decadent side dish! Fresh thyme, Parmesan and white wine take the flavors in this dish to the next level!
These one hour dinner rolls are soft and fluffy, and really do take only about an hour from start to finish, including rising time. They are the perfect compliment to any meal.
These super easy and incredibly delicious Parmesan Rosemary Rolls look beautiful, and will be the hit of your celebrations, and no one will now just how easy they were to make!
An Indian-style flatbread, this Naan bread recipe is as simple as it is delicious.  Yogurt is the key ingredient to make this yummy bread soft and pillowy!
Garlic Cheese Biscuits are a copycat of Red Lobster Cheddar Bay Biscuits. They are cheesy, garlicky and salty yet still tender and flaky – you definitely won't want to share.
Parker House Rolls are a soft and buttery, melt-in-your-mouth dinner roll. They are brushed with butter before and after baking making them even more irresistible. Your family is going to love these amazing homemade rolls.Â
Sweet Side Dishes
Something sweet to go with all that savory food is a welcome treat. These sweet Christmas Side Dishes are the best!
Jello Salad is a vintage recipe that's part side dish & part dessert. This Green Jello Salad is deliciously creamy and perfect for sharing with friends!
Kristin Maxwell is the creator and main recipe developer, writer, and photographer of Yellow Bliss Road. A self-taught cook and self-appointed foodie, she specializes in easy, flavorful and approachable recipes for any home cook.
On the ad for the 35 Christmas sides the top keftnpicture is a dish topped with pomegranates. I can’t find that recipe anywhere but you show the picture. Could I please get the name of that dish and recipe.
Absolutely stunning! Thank you on a list!
I love your items you put up. I have made a few and have pined some also.
Thank you Veronica! Thanks for stopping by.
Lovely recipe, can’t wait to try it.
I was so late to discover this amazing list! Anyway, New Year is coming and I’m going to choose some nice dishes for the Countdown party xD
– Luna
Thank you!
On the ad for the 35 Christmas sides the top keftnpicture is a dish topped with pomegranates. I can’t find that recipe anywhere but you show the picture. Could I please get the name of that dish and recipe.
Hi Selina, All of the recipes are linked below the photos. I’m not sure which one you are referring to – is it this one: https://www.cookingclassy.com/pear-pomegranate-spinach-salad/
I’m looking for the same one Selina was asking about. I don’t see it in any of your links provided.
Unfortunately some of the links are broken so I had to remove them.
This all side-dishes looks fabulous!!Thanks for sharing!!! Merry Christmas!!!!
This looks delicious and I need to make this recipe soon! Thanks for sharing!
Love your blog. So glad I happened across it.
I’ve never heard anybody else call them “funeral potatoes”! That’s been our family “joke” for years! 🙂
These sides all look so good! Thanks for including my cranberry salad! 🙂