I like making bread stuffing. It's so easy that I don't know why anyone resorts to boxed stuffing -- but boxed stuffing is pretty damn good, I admit. I also like eating bread stuffing and I am tolerant of its many quirks; I like it even if it is gluey, or burned, or greasy.
Most cooks assert that their stuffing is THE BEST EVAR!!!!1!!, and I believe all of them because bread stuffing is just good in general. Mine, however, really is the best. I've been making it every Thanksgiving for six years, refining all the way -- I went through a prosciutto-and-chestnuts phase, and that was pretty successful; I made a brief detour through cornbread-and-green-chilies country, and that was okay. For the last couple of years I've been fiddling with the toasted-nuts-and-dried-mushrooms nick, and have come ever closer to stuffing nirvana.
This year, I got it. I nailed that sucker, with one of those scary air-compressor nail guns even. You can make it too, and you should, and not only on Thanksgiving. Why don't I do this more often?
You need:
1 loaf whole-wheat sandwich bread, crusts removed and cut into 1/2"-1" cubes (use plain whole wheat, multigrain is too heavy for this)
Half a stick + 1 tbsp butter
Half of a gigantic onion or a whole small one, chopped
3 stalks celery
2 tsps fresh sage, chopped
1 tsp fresh rosemary, chopped
1 generous palmful dried shiitake mushrooms (I have big hands) (porcinis would also be good)
Half a wineglass Sauvignon Blanc or other fruity white wine
3/4 c toasted pecans, roughly chopped
Half a tin smoked oysters, finely chopped
Stock -- chicken, turkey or vegetable, and if this is coming out of a can or a cube do try to spruce it up a bit. Simmer it with thyme and bay or something.
Half a cup chopped parsley
You do:
Preheat oven to 350.
Put the mushrooms in a bowl with boiling water to cover and let them sit until reconstituted, about 20 minutes. The soaking liquid is good for broth-sprucing. Coarsely chop mushrooms.
Spread bread cubes on a baking sheet and bake them in the oven until they are dried out and beginning to get toasty.
Melt butter in a large, deep skillet over medium heat. Sweat celery and onion in butter until translucent. Add sage, rosemary, mushrooms and oysters and saute, stirring, for a couple more minutes. Pour in wine and cook, stirring, until liquid has evaporated.
Add toast to pan and stir all around. Once bread has absorbed all the butter (and you can add more...) and everything is nicely mixed, start ladling in the broth half a cup at a time. Stir thoroughly after each addition. Only you know how wet you want this. I like it about half wet and shredded and half remaining in coherent cubes. Stir gently or it'll get too dense.
Stir in pecans and parsley. Salt and pepper.
Spread in casserole and bake until browned on top.
Done! Four adults and two small children demolished this; it doubles and triples easily.
You could also stuff a turkey with this, I suppose, but I kind of hate stuffing that has actually been inside poultry. It's always too wet and I worry about salmonella. If you like, you can take the pan drippings from the turkey and use them to baste the stuffing while it is baking.
Next year I think I might try to introduce a dried-fruit angle, like Craisins or something. When it comes to stuffing of the gods, the good is the enemy of the perfect.
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