Thanksgiving. A time for us all to give thanks for what we have in our lives no matter how big or small. This year I was happy to spend the holiday at home with family, cooking at our house for the very first time. We got an organic bird and dry-brined it with just salt for a couple of days in the refrigerator and I made the decision to not stuff the turkey. My mother, who always does Thanksgiving at her house, usually buys a 20 pound (or bigger) turkey since there are so many of us and makes enough dressing to go into the cavity of the bird as well as a separate pan to cook on its own. She does this because some people in our family eat the "wet" dressing and others only eat the "dry." The only person eating Thanksgiving at our house this year that eats the wet dressing is my stepdad, so with a little debate between my mother and me, she relented to let me cook Thanksgiving how I wanted. I didn't stuff the bird but did compromise and stuff the bird for 30 minutes with a little dressing after the bird came out of the oven to get some of the flavor and juices from the turkey while it was resting. It seems like it takes forever to cook that huge bird because of the size but also because it's stuffed. The reason I didn't want to stuff the bird was because I didn't want to get up at the crack of dawn to put the bird in the oven or deal with the dressing that could be like salmonella soup. And....to answer the question about whether it stuffing or dressing, in my family we call it dressing versus stuffing, even though once it goes into the bird it's technically stuffing.
Inevitably, my family always makes too much food, and this year was no exception. We had broccoli casserole (a favorite of mine), mashed potatoes and giblet gravy, brussel sprouts gratin (a new favorite of mine), and my mother's recipe for cornbread dressing. I had made this recipe last year for the first time since I wasn't home for Thanksgiving. Just the two of us celebrated a traditional Thanksgiving in Oregon wine country. My mother uses pecans in her recipe, but I used hazelnuts (known as filberts in Oregon) in mine so you can make this with a nut of your choosing or not at all. Whatever you choose, just know it will be delicious. The recipe is best when the cornbread is slightly stale, so go ahead and make cornbread the night before so it has time to dry out and go a little stale. If you want, it can be made a couple of days in advance.
Hannah's Cornbread Dressing
1 cup Cornmeal
1 cup All Purpose Flour
1 tsp Baking Powder
1/2 tsp Baking Soda
1/2 tsp Salt
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups Buttermilk
4 Tbsp Butter
1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Once oven has come up to temperature put butter in a cast iron skillet or a 9x13 pan and melt.
2. While the butter is melting, whisk all dry ingredients together in a medium-sized bowl.
3. Whisk buttermilk and eggs together in a separate bowl. Once the eggs and buttermilk are combined add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients. Mix well but do not overmix.
4. Remove the skillet from the oven and add the hot butter to the wet mixture. Add the mixture back to the hot skillet and cook until the cornbread is springy to the touch or insert a toothpick in the middle of the cornbread and comes out clean.
1 pound Breakfast Sausage
2 Tbsp Butter
4-6 Slices of Day Old Bread
1 diced Onion
5-6 Stalks of Chopped Celery
1 pound Mushrooms
2 Apples diced
2 Tbsp. chopped Sage
1/4 cup Italian Parsley
1/2 cup Pecans
3 Tbsp. Poultry Seasoning or enough to make the dressing fragrant
1 cup Chicken or Homemade Turkey Stock
1. Preheat oven to 350. While the oven is preheating, heat a saute pan and cook sausage, breaking it up into bits. Cook sausage until browned and crispy then drain onto a papertowel lined plate.
2. While sausage is cooking remove the cornbread from the skillet and crumble into a large bowl. Pulse the bread slices in a food processor until fine and add them to the bowl of cornbread crumbs.
3. Melt 1 tablespoon of butter in the pan and cook onions and celery until soft, about five minutes or so. Add this to the bowl with the cornbread and breadcrumbs.
4. Melt another tablespoon of butter in the pan and add mushrooms and saute until the liquid has gone from the mushrooms. Add the mushrooms to the cornbread mixture.
5. Chop apples, sage, and parsley an add this to the cornbread mixture.
6. Measure pecans and the poultry seasoning and add them to the bowl.
7. Mix all the ingredients together and put the cornbread mixture into a 9x13 casserole dish. Pour chicken stock over the dressing and cover it with foil.
8. Cook covered for 30 minutes. Remove foil and cook uncovered for an additional 30 minutes or until the dressing is lightly browned on top.
9. Enjoy this warm with turkey and gravy!
