Thanksgiving is the day your kitchen gets properly tested. More people, more dishes and more things happening at once than any ordinary evening, which is why it exposes every compromise in a layout.
Oven capacity is the usual bottleneck
One oven and a full menu means cooking in shifts. Double ovens, or a wall oven paired with a range, change the whole day. It is the single upgrade holiday cooks mention most often afterwards.
Give guests somewhere to be
People gather in the kitchen whether you plan for it or not. An island with seating on the opposite side from the prep zone gives them a place to stand that is not between you and the refrigerator.
Think about the clearing up
A second dishwasher, or simply a deeper sink and more landing space beside it, turns the worst hour of the day into something manageable.
If your kitchen struggles every November, that is worth mentioning to a designer. It tells us more about how you live than a floor plan does.
