Instead of serving up a delicious turkey for Thanksgiving dinner, Charlie Brown whips up some toast and candy for a last-minute meal in the holiday classic, “A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving.” The family-friendly movie, based on Charles M. Schultz’s comic strip “Peanuts,” airs every November around the Thanksgiving holiday.

This year, the cartoon movie will air on ABC Wednesday, Nov. 23 at 8 p.m. EST. The flick will then be available to watch for free on the ABC mobile app and ABC.com Thursday, Thanksgiving Day.

“A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving” has been a classic since first premiering on TV in November 1973. At the time the movie aired on the CBS network, but it switched to ABC in 2001.

In the movie, directed by Phil Roman and Bill Melendez, Charlie Brown is finalizing plans to go to his grandmother’s house for Thanksgiving dinner when his friend Peppermint Patty calls and invites herself over to Charlie’s house for a holiday meal. Before Charlie can interject, Patty also says she’s bringing their friends Marcie and Franklin with her.

Suddenly, a very nervous Charlie finds himself stuck with having to host a Thanksgiving dinner for his friends. “I can’t cook a Thanksgiving dinner,” Charlie tells his best friend Linus. “All I can make is cold cereal and maybe toast.”

Linus offers to help and instructs Snoopy and Woodstock to set up a table in the backyard and cater the dinner. Instead of attempting to make a traditional Thanksgiving meal, Charlie sets out preparing buttered toast, pretzel sticks, popcorn and jelly beans for his friends.

Although Charlie put a lot of effort into the last-minute meal, Patty is less than pleased and grills Charlie about why he didn’t make turkey, pumpkin pie, mashed potatoes and cranberry sauce. Patty eventually apologizes for her remarks after Charlie gets upset and leaves the table. “A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving” ends with Charlie’s grandmother saving the day and inviting everyone over to her house to eat.

In a June 2014 interview with the blog Noblemania, Todd Barbee dished on voicing Charlie Brown telling the outlet that “A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving” was among his favorite “Peanuts” movies. “The Thanksgiving show is really one of the three big classics that everyone remembers, along with ‘Christmas’ and the ‘Great Pumpkin.’ I’m happy to have played Charlie Brown in such an iconic classic,” he said.

“A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving” airs Wednesday, Nov. 23 at 8 p.m. EST on ABC.

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