I thought this week, I would concentrate on stuffing.
I know, I know stuffing is what goes inside the bird and dressing is cooked in a pan separately. I just like the word stuffing better. When I think of dressing, I think of a turkey all dressed up in it’s Sunday best {just a little insight in to my crazed mind}.
As I have mentioned before, I grew up in a very traditional Italian home and even though we celebrated Thanksgiving, the emphasis of the meal was not on the Turkey and stuffing. It was on the Lasagna. We did have a turkey, we just didn’t have stuffing. I’d never tasted stuffing until I met Handsome.
I remember our first thanksgiving as a married couple, I wanted to make my new handsome Thanksgiving dinner, even though we were invited over to my family and his family homes for Thanksgiving dinner. I got up really early {around 4:00am}, prepared a whole Thanksgiving dinner for just us two. Carefully put everything in containers in the fridge then we went to both families homes and ate dinner. At 11:00pm, on Thanksgiving Handsome lit a fire and we sat down to our first holiday meal together. I remember looking for recipes in Gourmet magazine for turkey and stuffing. This recipe is loosely based on those original recipes.
Ingredients
1 Loaf Potato Bread, cut in to cubes
1 Pound Sweet Italian Sausage, casings removed
1 Medium Onion, chopped
4 Celery Stalks, chopped
1/2 Cup Dried Cranberries
1 Teaspoon Dried Parsley
1/2 Teaspoon Black Pepper
1/2 Teaspoon Italian Seasoning
1/2 Teaspoon Garlic Powder
1/4 Teaspoon Dried Thyme
Chicken Stock
2 eggs
Butter
Salt to Taste
Directions
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
- Place bread cubes on a cookie sheet and bake for 10 minutes until golden brown. transfer bread to a large bowl.
- Turn oven down to 350 degrees.
- Cook sausage in a large frying pan, crumbling as it cooks.
- Add thyme, italian seasoning, and garlic powder
- Add cooked sausage to bread crumbs.
- Cook onions and celery in same pan as the sausage until vegetables are soft about 12 minutes.
- Add cooked vegetables to bread and sausage mixture.
- Mix in cranberries to the bread mixture.
- Beat eggs in a 2 cup measuring cup.
- Add enough stock to the eggs to make 2 cups.
- Pour stock and egg mixture to bread mixture, stir to coat completely.
- Place stuffing in a buttered baking dish.
- Place foil over baking dish.
- Bake for 30 minutes, take off foil turn oven up to 400 degrees and bake for an addition 15 minutes.
Enjoy!