Sausage Apple Cranberry Cornbread Dressing

Intro: Sausage Apple Cranberry Cornbread Dressing

A little bit of everything in an easy dressing you can prepare ahead of time. Easily made vegetarian through omission.

STEP 1: Toast Cornbread

Crumble up pre-made cornbread onto a baking sheet, and toast in a 250F oven for about an hour. If you've got stale bread rip it up and toast it too- dressing is a fine time to use it up.

While the cornbread is in the oven we'll prepare the rest of the ingredients.

STEP 2: Prepare Base

Ingredients:
~2T butter or olive oil
onions, chopped
garlic, chopped
celery and/or fennel stalks, chopped
peppers, chopped (Hot, bell, chipotle, etc; I used all of these.)
leeks, chopped (optional)

Combine ingredients and saute until onions are soft.

Add chopped apples and a bag of cranberries, stir, and remove from heat.

Note that I'm NOT giving you quantities here- it's entirely a question of personal taste. Just about anything will work.

STEP 3: Prepare Sausage

I like to use at least two types of sausage in my dressing. The specific type doesn't really matter so much as the variety of flavors introduced. Obviously, skip this step if you're making vegetarian dressing.

Try to get one of the "spicy/hot breakfast sausages"; these usually come in a tube, and can be made of pork or turkey. Extrude the mush into a hot pan, and stir around until fully cooked.

The other variety should be a chorizo, linguica, or other Iberian sausage. These are often pre-cooked, and just need to be into bite-size pieces for addition to the dressing.

STEP 4: Combine Ingredients

Dump the onion mixture into a very large bowl, then mix in the sausage, fresh herbs*, and toasted cornbread. Stir gently to mix.

*Any combination of fresh parsley, rosemary, tarragon, sage, oregano, thyme, etc. I usually add ground allspice at this point too.

STEP 5: Add Stock

Add enough chicken or turkey stock* to completely soak the cornbread. You can do this iteratively- add a bit and stir, then check and add some more. You can even add more stock after putting the dressing into the pan and letting it sit overnight in the fridge- if the cornbread isn't soggy by morning, add more stock.

For a richer dressing use a mix of stock and half-and-half, and even beat an egg in if you're feeling particularly enthusiastic. I like my dressing a bit drier, as I then proceed to cover it in giblet gravy.

*I had homemade stock left over from a previous turkey, so it was an obvious choice. Making your own stock is easy if you've got a pressure cooker, and an even smarter idea if you've got decent freezer space. If you're making vegetarian dressing, use homemade veg stock or dissolved veggie boullion cubes.

STEP 6: Store Then Bake

Scoop the dressing into an appropriate pan, then cover and refrigerate or freeze until ready for use.

Bake at 350F until cooked through (especially relevant if you've used eggs in the mix) and just golden brown on top.

While you can certainly use this as a stuffing, I don't recommend stuffing turkeys. They cook more slowly, have a higher risk of contamination, and produce a soggy mess from the interior. It's best to cook turkey and dressing as separate items to optimize both.

STEP 7: Serve

Allow to cool slightly out of the oven, then serve warm.

Dressing keeps beautifully in the refrigerator or freezer, and is best drowned in wonderful giblet gravy.

Comments

[Alex7382]

Я о таком рецепте еще не слышал, очень интересно, попробую сделать

[nfsells4u]

i forgot to let this know that this turned out amazing!!! it was a big hit...might not be able to wait for thanksgiving to make it again.

[canida]

Awesome!

[nfsells4u]

I will let you know...my "amounts" filled a rectangular 9 x 11 pampered chef stoneware casserole dish perfectly.

[her]

looks wonderful but no list of ingredients or how much of what. Can u be more specific?

[nfsells4u]

I just threw this together... 1 onion 1 green and 1 red pepper, 4 stalks of celery, 1 1/2 pounds of sweet sausage, 4 cloves of garlic, fresh ground pepper, 1 apple 1 cup cranberries, handful of parsley, sage and 1 tbsp oregano, 1 egg beaten, 2 cans of chick broth, 3/4 cups milk. I had a plate of cornbread so I cubed that it was about an 8 x 8 amount and 1/2 bag of additional bread crumbs. Smells amazing can't wait to cook it later...good luck!!!

[canida]

Thanks! I made this for ~45 last year, so my measurements were pretty wonky. It would have been even worse than usual trying to convert them to a usable format. Your proportions sound pretty good- hope it tastes as good as it smells!

[canida]

Yeah, I don't go too much for hard-and-fast measuring in my recipes. The base ingredients are listed in Step 2, and the rest (mostly optional) as they appear in later steps. Try the "view all steps" option (left gray box on the list of steps at the top) to see it in a more useful format. Then you can just scroll through the whole thing. You can also set "view all steps" as a preference on your settings- that's what I do.