Reason 219 why I will never be a perfect Mormon woman. I can't make Jello. I don't really even know what exactly I do wrong.... but it's never pretty and always has a funny film on it. Remember when they came out with that Sparkling Jello? I was so excited to try this out and imagined glasses filled with perfectly cut cubes of red Sparkling Jello with a perfect dallop of cool whip as a refreshing dessert after a dinner party... mine looked more like some sort of plasma. So, I gave up and I haven't attempted Jello for many years. I will just stick to pudding.
But there is something I have mastered - turkey and stuffing. Because my father and I worked for the same company, who always sent home turkeys at Thanksgiving and Christmas, I was stuck with more turkeys during the holiday season than I knew what to do with. Those first couple years were the worst. There was the time that I started the turkey so early in the morning (on the advice of someone with a stove that probably didn't work properly!) that we were ready to eat dinner at 10am. After the year I tried the cooking in the bag method, which I decided was really just steaming the turkey and not for me I found myself harassing old ladies in the grocery store asking them advice about what type of pan they used, etc.
Martha Stewart's Perfect Roast Turkey saved me and after a decade of practice I have my routine scheduled down to the minute! And of course with the threat of salmonella and campylobacter I run a pretty tight ship and require a special sous-chef (OK, he's really just a kitchen slave!) to help me avoid as much nastiness as possible and bleach the sink and countertops once I get that bird in the oven!
But the best part of my thanksgiving repertoire is my recipe for sausage sage stuffing. If you are still using a boxed stuffing (GAG!) once you try this you will never go back!
Traditional stuffing recipes usually begin with cornbread, rice or stale bread dressed up with onions, celery, herbs and spices or dried fruit. The one you prefer is usually determined by what part of the country you grew up.
Traditional Sausage and Sage Stuffing (serves 12)
10 cups white bread cubes, 1/3 to ½ inch thick
1 tbs butter
1 tbs olive oil
2 cups chopped onions
2 cups chopped celery
2 tbs chopped fresh sage
1 lb sausage (pork or chicken)
½ chopped fresh parsley
3 large eggs
1 tsp salt
½ tsp nutmeg
½ tsp ground black pepper
7 oz roasted chestnuts, chopped
1 cup toasted pecans, chopped
1 cup chicken broth
Preheat oven to 350°. Spread bread cubes on baking sheets. Bake until golden brown. Transfer to large bowl. Melt butter and oil in large skillet. Add onions and sauté until tender. Add sage and sauté 1 minute.
Add sausage and cook until brown cooked through, breaking up with back of fork. Cool slightly.
Stir sausage mixture, parsley, chestnuts and pecans into bread cubes.
Whisk eggs, salt, nutmeg, pepper in bowl. Mix into stuffing.
Loosely fill main cavity with ½ of stuffing. Add enough additional broth to remaining stuffing to moisten lightly (about ¼- ½ cup), place in generously buttered baking dish. Cover with buttered foil. Keep refrigerated until ready to bake.
Bake covered about 30 minutes, until heated through. Uncover and bake until top is just crisp about 15 minutes.
And what would Thanksgiving be without my usual rant -
LIES MY TEACHER TOLD ME
This year I am thankful for the woman I love to hate - Martha Stewart, without which I would never have been able to cook the perfect roast turkey! But even more, I'm thankful to my husband who made reservations at
Daniel's so I don't have to contaminate my kitchen with raw turkey! (The funny thing is that whenever we go out for Thanksgiving Dinner, I still end up cooking a full Thanksgiving spread later on that weekend! LOL!)
