I kid you not when I say that this is the best dressing recipe out there. Anyone who tastes it agrees, and you’ll look like a total rockstar when you serve it to your guests this Thanksgiving. Its unique without being weird, and all the flavors are classically Thanksgiving but not at all expected. Serious, just try it and you’ll get what I mean. I make this exact recipe, this exact way, every year.
Savory Cornbread & Sausage Dressing (stuffing)
Ingredients:
For the cornbread
- 2 boxes Jiffy Cornbread Mix
- 2 large eggs
- 2/3 cup milk
Everything else
- 1 cup apple cider
- turkey gizzards from 1 turkey (optional but encouraged)
- 5 links Italian sausage
- 2 stalks celery, small diced
- 1 yellow onion, small diced
- 1 yellow bell pepper, small diced
- 1 red bell pepper, small diced
- 2 tbsp fresh parsley, finely chopped
- 5 leaves fresh sage, finely chopped
- 1 sprig fresh rosemary leaves removed, finely chopped
- 2 sprigs fresh oregano leaves removed, finely chopped
- 2 sprigs fresh thyme leaves removed
- 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 pinch ground nutmeg
- 1/2 cup breadcrumbs Italian seasoned
- 1-1 1/2 cups unsalted chicken stock
- salt
- pepper
- olive oil
Directions:
1 day in advance
- Make the cornbread in a large baking dish according to the instructions. Cover with a towel and let sit overnight.
The day of
- Preheat the oven to 400 °F.
- In a small pot add the apple cider, gizzards, and a pinch each of salt and black pepper. Bring to a simmer and allow the cider to reduce until the gizzards are cooked through (about 15 minutes). Set aside.
- Sear the sausage on both sides in a large pan until mostly cooked through (but not all the way). Remove from a pan and place in a large bowl. Set aside.
- In the same pan, cook the diced celery, onion and peppers (add a little olive oil if needed). Season with salt and pepper.
- Once the vegetables have softened, remove from the heat, add the herbs and toss together. Add the cinnamon and nutmeg and toss together again.
- Break the cornbread up into cubes. In a large bowl, toss the vegetables with the cornbread – don't worry about breaking the cornbread up too much, just get it all mixed in evenly.
- Cut out the sinew part of the gizzards and discard. Dice the rest of the gizzards finely and add to the cornbread. Slice the Italian sausage into 1/4-1/2 pieces and add that (and any juices from the sausage) to the cornbread as well. Toss together.
- Add the breadcrumbs and reduced apple cider and toss together. Add as much unsalted chicken stock as is needed to moisten the cornbread crumbs, but don’t add so much that liquid begins to pool in the bottom of the bowl. Season again with a few pinches of salt and black pepper, and toss together.
- Pour the mixture into the same pan used for the cornbread. Bake, uncovered, in the 400 °F degree oven for 10 minutes. Drop the temperature down to 350 °F and bake for another 40-50 minutes until the top is evenly browned with a few darker edges.
- Remove from the oven and cover with tin foil until ready to serve. Can wait at room temperature up to 1 hour.
Equipment used or similar:
More Thanksgiving Recipes:
• Scratch-Made Asparagus Casserole (my version of green bean casserole)
• Country-Style Herbed Mashed Potatoes
• Dijon Country Gravy Made with Turkey Drippings
• Homemade Cranberry Sauce Worth Serving
• Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Maple and Bacon Vinaigrette
• How to Roast the Perfect Turkey
• Pumpkin Cheesecake
• How to Make an Entire Thanksgiving Meal In One Oven
Can this be made ahead and baked on day to be served
Absolutely, and I suggest that. Just hold off on adding the stock until right before cooking.
Where is the baking dish from?
It’s out of stock, but the one I use most these days is this one.
This was such a huge hit when I first made it two years ago, and now it gets requested for multiple holidays. And even for regular weeknight meals :). Thanks Chris!!!
Chris, I made this today (Thanksgiving) and I wanted to tell you that I’m thankful for you sharing it! :)
It was a last minute addition for us since this year my little family of 4 isn’t traveling to be with family and I wasn’t sure how much I was up for as far as # of sides. But last minute I decided that I couldn’t skip the dressing. :)
I didn’t have many of the ingredients, but I made it work… No link sausage, but I had some thawed ground pork so I cooked it with sage and fennel. No Jiffy so I just made the cornbread from scratch. I used the gizzard and heart plus I cooked down the back (cut out when spatchcocking) with some stock, veggies and herbs. I used that liquid as my chicken broth for the recipe, plus I “picked the back” of all it’s little meat pieces just like my mom taught me and added all of those. :) I also added pecan pieces to the dressing before baking because that’s what we always had growing up. DELICIOUS!
Happy Thanksgiving!
PS We are DIY remodeling baths in our home one by one and you and Julia reporting on the Master Bath really helped us to plan…thanks for that, too!
Sounds like you one-upped my recipe, for sure! Love all the changes and subs – sounds amazing. Happy Thanksgiving and thanks for following along! Best of luck with the bathroom projects. :)
For sure not trying to “one up” you in any way…just trying to pay forward some ideas, especially the addition of pecans :)
Do you think this recipe would work baked in the turkey?
I definitely wouldn’t suggest stuffing your turkey with anything other than loose aromatics and cook this separately. Stuffing the cavity makes the breast take longer to cook and by the time your stuffing is safe to eat the meat is usually overcooked.