Posted By Greg on November 19, 2008

We tackled Thanksgiving pie last week, a dish commonly reserved for frozen-food aisle rescue, this time we will tackle the box…the stuffing box, that is.

There is one Thanksgiving staple, served by almost every American family, which every cook has destroyed at some point. Whether you call it stuffing, dressing, or forcemeat, it is the thorn in every Thanksgiving cook’s side. Even we, the professionals, have under-cooked, burnt, over-seasoned, under-salted, and imploded (yes, imploded) Thanksgiving stuffing. As if the numerous possibilities of how to destroy it weren’t good enough, there are equal numbers of ways to prepare it.

There’s the New England version made with sourdough bread and oysters. The Southerners are famous for their cornbread and sausage dressing and the North Westerners love their wild mushrooms and egg bread. The Baker family loves the savory Mire Poix and Cranberry Turkey Stuffing. Done right, it is pillowy soft on the inside with a little bit of crunch on the outside. Perfect for leftover turkey and cranberry sandwiches.

The first time we made the Family stuffing, it was more like a soup. Panic, of course, set in. “We have ruined Thanksgiving. You can’t have Thanksgiving without stuffing!!” Some quick culinary-thinking later and we were straining all of the liquid out of the stuffing soup, sending Greg’s brother; Tom, to the corner store for Wonderbread and throwing it into a 500-degree oven in 5-minute shifts.

Next year, it was drier than the Mojave Desert. The year after that, a large air hole was captured in the center (or so we were told – we think that it was sabotage by Karl Rove and his merry band of pranksters), which caused it to implode when sent under the broiler for a crisping. That was fun to clean up.

You see, it’s not just you. We’ve made the mistakes. But fear not, little culinary-wonder-bees. Every year we prepare Thanksgiving feast for take-out and delivery for nearly 100 families. We’ve had some time to perfect this stroke-inducing Thanksgiving staple and it is soooooooooo easy.  We could have saved a lot of brain cells had we thought of this recipe sooner.

Cranberry and Mire Poix Stuffing
Serves 6

1 loaf French bread, torn or cut into cubes
2 tbsp melted butter (or even better, duck fat)
2 cups celery (chopped)
2 cups onion (chopped)
4 cloves garlic (minced)
2 tbsp butter
2 tsp fresh sage
2 tsp fresh rosemary
2 tsp fresh thyme
1 cup dried cranberries (optional)
2-½ cups chicken or turkey stock
sea or kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Place the French bread in a bowl and toss with the melted butter (or duck fat!!), then place in a single layer on baking sheets and dry it in a 250 degree oven for about an hour.

While the bread is drying, put the other 2 tbsp of butter in a sauté pan over medium heat and let it melt and get foamy. Add the celery, onion, garlic, thyme, rosemary, and sage and sauté for 3-4 minutes, until the onions and celery have softened. Remove all of the from the pan and place in a big bowl.

When the bread is dried, add it to the bowl along with the cranberries and the chicken stock. This would be a good time to mention that if you want to cook the stuffing inside your turkey, it would be a good idea to decrease the amount of chicken stock to about 1-½ cups, as the juices from the turkey will add plenty of extra moisture.

Season this well with salt and pepper and toss it all together. Check the flavor, your taste might like a little more sage or rosemary, and then either stuff the turkey, or place the stuffing in a baking pan.

If you’re going with the baking pan, finish the stuffing by baking at 350 for 25-30 minutes, until it’s crisped to your liking. If you’re stuffing the turkey, please, don’t try to be efficient and stuff it hours or days ahead of time – you’ll be throwing a party for microbes, and you really don’t want to set a place for those guys at your table.

Categories: American Cuisine, Holiday, Our Comfort Food, Side Dish
Tags: stuffing recipe, thanksgiving recipe, thanksgiving stuffing