Grandma's French Turkey Dressing - Easy Meat Stuffing Recipe (2024)

FAQs

Do you fully cook stuffing before putting it in the turkey? ›

Fully cook raw meat, poultry, or seafood ingredients before adding to stuffing. Combine the ingredients and place them in your bird immediately before cooking. Don't stuff whole poultry with cooked stuffing. In addition to the turkey, the stuffing's center needs to reach 165 F.

Eggs: Two lightly beaten eggs help hold the dressing together and add moisture. Water: You can add a few tablespoons of water, if you'd like, to achieve your desired consistency. Seasonings: This turkey dressing recipe is seasoned with salt, pepper, rubbed sage, and garlic powder.

"Stuffing is cooked in the cavity of the turkey, so the juices soak into the ingredients, making it more flavorful. Dressing gets cooked on its own and needs extra liquid to make it flavorful." So stuffing is cooked inside the bird. Dressing is cooked outside the bird, usually in a casserole dish.

Eggs add richness to the stuffing, and makes it cohere better. I'd use two eggs per pound of bread.

How do you safely cook stuffing? The stuffed meat, poultry, or stuffing in a casserole should be placed immediately after preparation in an oven set no lower than 325 °F. A food thermometer should be used to ensure that the stuffing reaches the safe minimum internal temperature of 165 °F.

Harmful bacteria can survive in stuffing that has not reached the safe minimum internal temperature of 165 °F possibly resulting in foodborne illness.

Cornstarch. This is our binder! Cornstarch makes a great egg substitute in vegan baked goods. Turns out it's great for making an eggless stuffing as well!

The BEST traditional Thanksgiving Stuffing recipe is easy to make dried bread cubes, sausage, diced vegetables, and chicken broth. It's a great side dish to make ahead of time and it definitely tastes best homemade! Pair this easy homemade stuffing with our popular turkey recipe, homemade rolls, and Thanksgiving pie.

Typically, baking the stuffing inside the bird helps keep the mixture moist. “I prefer stuffing (in the bird) to dressing (outside of the bird) because all those delicious drippings that come off the turkey gets absorbed right into the stuffing,” Bamford says.

But for the Thanksgiving side dish in the South, the term dressing was adopted in place of stuffing, which was viewed as a crude term, during the Victorian era. Although dressing and stuffing are interchangeable terms, the signature ingredient of this Thanksgiving side dish in the South is cornbread.

Do you put stuffing in a turkey dry or wet? ›

Stuffing needs moisture to prevent it from drying out, but knowing how much liquid to add can be tricky. You want your stuffing moist but not soggy and certainly not dry. The bread in the stuffing absorbs moisture, but if it's dry (as it should be, see above), it takes some time for the liquid to settle in.

Potatoes. Whether mashed or roasted, white or sweet, potatoes had no place at the first Thanksgiving.

Yes! You can absolutely make stuffing ahead of time. It's a great way to get a jumpstart on Thanksgiving cooking and it frees up much-needed oven space.

The bread is one of the most important ingredients in the stuffing. This is the base; it's what gives the stuffing structure, and it plays a big role in determining the texture. While you can use almost any bread — cornbread, bagels, or even frozen waffles — to make stuffing, it needs to be dried or “staled” first.

Plan to serve about 3/4 cup of stuffing per guest. That amounts to roughly 4 cups of prepared stuffing for 5 guests and 7-1/2 cups for 10 guests. However, if you have grand plans for using leftovers in Stuffin' Muffins or turkey potpie with a stuffing crust, feel free to make a little bit more.

Why Cooking Stuffing in Your Turkey Is Dangerous. The USDA advises that whole turkeys be cooked to an internal temperature of 165°F to kill any potentially harmful bacteria. That temperature includes any potential stuffing deep in the turkey's cavity. At temperatures below 165°F you risk exposure to salmonella or E.

You can cook the bird and the bread in the same pan with delicious results.

Also, you'll need a food thermometer for determining when stuffing is safely cooked to a minimum internal temperature of 165°F. Use this temperature as a guide, whether you serve stuffing separately in a casserole dish or stuffed into poultry or meat.