FLOWOOD, Miss. (AP) — They’re both round, orange and probably bad for your health, but which is the better Thanksgiving dessert: pumpkin or sweet potato pie? For most people, the answer likely depends on where they’re from.
The two Thanksgiving favorites have more in common than not. They're similar in color, taste and texture, and derived from European carrot pie. Those similarities make them all the easier to compare.
“Pumpkin,” said Lori Robinson, a customer at Sugar Magnolia Takery in Flowood, Mississippi. “My mom cooks it every Thanksgiving, Christmas, every time. It's way better than sweet potato.”
Unlike some bakeries in the area, Sugar Magonlia Takery makes both pumpkin and sweet potato pies.
Owner Elizabeth Arnold said the main difference between the pies in her bakery comes down to spice. Sweet potato is sweeter, made with white and brown sugar. Pumpkin pie is less sweet and spicier.
“Sweet potato pie. All day,” said Xavier Pittman, another customer.
At Arnold's bakery, sweet potato tends to outsell pumpkin.
That's not surprising in a southern bakery, explained Adrian Miller, a culinary author known as the “Soul Food Scholar.”
Sweet potato pie, he said, is particularly popular in the South, where sweet potatoes have deep roots in the region’s culture, economy and painful past.
“If there were to be a Mount Rushmore of soul food desserts, sweet potato pie would definitely be there,” Miller said.
Pumpkin pie, while ubiquitous, is more often associated with the northern part of the country.
The stereotypes boil down to this: Pumpkin pie is favored by white northerners while sweet potato pie is a favorite among Black southerners. But for culinary historian and author Michael W. Twitty, the issue is more nuanced.
With both desserts ingrained in American history, tradition and culture, the debate over which is better, Twitty argues, is really about identity.
“We can have fun with good-natured ribbing between regions and cultures,” Twitty said. “At the same time, don’t let it get too serious to the point where it’s like hard, fast markers of who you are, who I am, who we are.”
Raised in Washington, D.C., Twitty didn't grow up in the Deep South. But the South, he said, has grown up in him. His family's southern roots stretch back to the 17th century.
“Everybody would always bring like two homemade sweet potato pies,” Twitty said of his childhood Thanksgivings.
The intertwining of sweet potatoes and southern Black culture began with slavery. Sweet potatoes were a staple for many enslaved people in the Americas, Twitty said. It was an accessible, familiar food, similar to the yams and cassava that make up a cornerstone of African cuisine.
Enslaved people are credited with perfecting the sweet potato pie recipe, though Europeans are thought to be the first to attempt such a delicacy.
Some believe slavery is the reason sweet potato pie didn't take off in the North. An abolitionist movement advocated boycotting goods produced by enslaved people but, Twitty said, the answer is likely simpler: access.
Sweet potatoes and pumpkins were both available in the South. In the North, however, early Americans didn't have much access to the orange sweet potatoes we think of today, Miller said. Instead, northern sweet potatoes had white flesh and a more mealy texture.
With limited access to sweet potatoes in the North, pumpkin likely reigned supreme. The tradition of pumpkin pie goes back centuries to the colonial period, Miller said. A recipe for pumpkin pie was included in the nation's first cookbook, written in 1796 by Amelia Simmons.
While there may be some truth to the culinary divide, Twitty said the stereotypes don't hold up in many communities. Miller, who also has southern ancestry, said he grew up eating pumpkin and sweet potato pie on Thanksgiving.
“There will also be somebody, every single day, every single year who will break the rules,” Twitty said.
Pies, fresh out of the oven, cool on a baking rack on Friday, Nov. 21, 2025, in Flowood, Miss. (AP Photo/Sophie Bates)
A mixer combines the ingredients for sweet potato pie on Friday, Nov. 21, 2025, in Flowood, Mississippi. (AP Photo/Sophie Bates)
Elizabeth Arnold, the owner of Sugar Magnolia Bakery, slices into a sweet potato pie on Friday, Nov. 21, 2025, in Flowood, Miss. (AP Photo/Sophie Bates)
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump was set to address the nation Wednesday night and offer an update on the war in Iran, his first prime-time speech since launching strikes alongside Israel more than a month ago.
The speech will offer Trump a wide audience to articulate clear objectives for the war that could attempt to reconcile weeks of changing goals and often contradictory messages about whether he’s winding down or ready to escalate military operations — even as Iran kept up its attacks on Israel and Persian Gulf neighbors and airstrikes pounded Tehran.
It comes amid rising oil prices, volatile financial markets and polling showing many Americans feel the U.S. military has gone too far in Iran — even as more American troops move into the region for a possible ground offensive. Trump opted not to deliver such an address closer to when the U.S. and Israel first launched attacks, and questions now remain about whether it is now too late for what he says to break through.
A White House official, who was not authorized to speak publicly ahead of the address and spoke on condition of anonymity, said the president will talk about U.S. progress on achieving his goals in Iran and will reiterate his estimated timeline for concluding operations within two to three weeks.
The president, in comments during a Easter lunch on Wednesday afternoon, said of Iran: “We could just take their oil. But you know, I’m not sure that the people in our country have the patience to do that, which is unfortunate.”
“Yeah, they want to see it end. If we stayed there, I prefer just to take the oil,” Trump said. “We could do it so easily. I would prefer that. But people in the country sort of say: ‘Just win. You’re winning so big. Just win. Come home.’ And I’m OK with that, too, because we have a lot of oil between Venezuela and our oil.”
The media was not permitted to watch the president’s remarks at the lunch, but the White House uploaded video of the speech online before taking it down. The White House did not return requests for comment from The Associated Press on the video and why it was taken down.
In a social media post earlier Wednesday, Trump maintained a belligerent tone, demanding that Iran stop blocking the Strait of Hormuz — the waterway vital to global oil supplies — or the U.S. would bomb the Islamic Republic “back to the Stone Ages.” The president has also said the U.S. “will not have anything to do with” ensuring the security of ships passing through Hormuz, an apparent backtrack from a previous threat to attack Iran’s power grid if it didn’t open the strait by April 6.
In the same Easter lunch, the president reiterated some of his complaints about NATO allies for their reluctance to get involved in securing the Strait of Hormuz while suggesting that China, Japan and South Korea could also step up to reopen the waterway.
“Let South Korea, you know, we only have 45,000 soldiers in harm’s way over there, right next to a nuclear force -- let South Korea do it,” Trump said of efforts to reopen the strait. “Let Japan do it. They get 90% of their oil from the strait. Let China do it.”
In another morning social media post, Trump wrote that “Iran’s New Regime President” wanted a ceasefire. It wasn’t clear to whom the U.S. president was referring since Iran still has the same president. Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, Esmail Baghaei, called Trump’s claim “false and baseless,” according to a report on Iranian state television.
Speaking earlier to Al Jazeera, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi signaled Tehran’s willingness to keep fighting. “You cannot speak to the people of Iran in the language of threats and deadlines,” he said. “We do not set any deadline for defending ourselves.”
Hours before Trump’s address, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian posted a lengthy letter in English on his X account appealing to U.S. citizens and stressing that his country had pursued negotiations before the U.S. withdrew from that path. “Exactly which of the American people’s interests are truly being served by this war?” he wrote.
Since the war began on Feb. 28, Trump has offered shifting objectives and repeatedly has said it could be over soon while also threatening to widen the conflict. Thousands of additional U.S. troops are currently heading to the Middle East, and speculation abounds about why.
Trump has also threatened to attack Iran’s Kharg Island oil export hub. And the U.S. could decide to send in military forces to secure Iran’s uranium stockpile — a complex and risky operation, fraught with radiation and chemical dangers, experts and former government officials say.
Adding to the confusion is what role Israel — which has been bombing Iran alongside the U.S. — might play in any of these scenarios.
Trump has been under growing pressure to end the war that has been pushing up the cost of gasoline, food and other goods. The price of Brent crude, the international standard, is up more than 40% since the start of the war.
The U.S. has presented Iran with a 15-point plan aimed at bringing about a ceasefire, including a demand for the strait to be reopened and for its nuclear program to be rolled back.
Iran insists its nuclear program is peaceful. And in a report last week by Iranian state TV's English-language broadcaster, an anonymous official was quoted as saying Iran had its own demands to end the fighting, including retaining sovereignty over the strait.
In the interview with Al Jazeera, Araghchi acknowledged receiving direct messages from U.S. Mideast envoy Steve Witkoff. He insisted, however, that there were no direct negotiations and said Iran has no faith that talks with the U.S. could yield any results, saying “the trust level is at zero.”
He warned against any U.S. attempt to launch a ground offensive, saying “we are waiting for them.”
In a deal ostensibly to give diplomacy a chance, U.S. officials have given “clear assurances” that Araghchi and Iran's Parliamentary Speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf won't be targeted, according to three officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they're not authorized to speak publicly about the matter.
Gambrell reported from Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Rising reported from Bangkok. Associated Press writers Giovanna Dell’Orto in Miami, Farnoush Amiri in New York and Samy Magdy in Cairo contributed to this report.
A rainbow forms over the White House on Wednesday, April 1, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
A young girl is comforted by her father and Israeli soldiers as they take cover in a bomb shelter during air raid sirens warning of incoming Iranian missile strikes in Bnei Brak, Israel, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Oded Balilty)
People inspect the site of an Israeli strike amid debris and damaged vehicles in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
A man feeds stray cats in Tehran, Iran, Tuesday, March 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
The Indian flagged LPG carrier Jag Vasant transporting liquefied petroleum gas, is seen at the Mumbai Port in Mumbai, India, after it arrived clearing the Strait of Hormuz, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool)
Firefighters and rescue workers work at the site of Israeli airstrikes, in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
A firefighter extinguishes a car at the site of Israeli airstrikes, in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Israel's rescue teams and residents take shelter as sirens sounds next to a site struck by an Iranian missile in Bnei Brak, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Oded Balilty)
A police vehicle is seen through a shattered windshield at the site of an Israeli strike in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
Two men ride scooters past charred debris at the site of an Israeli strike in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
