I'm quite famous in my extended family (of 11) for my stuffing. Somehow over the years I have become in charge of the stuffing and nothing quite compares to mine. I posted a photo of it last week and Sarah M asked for the recipe. I don't really have a recipe, but I'll walk you through how I make it.
You'll need a bunch of chopped celery. We used my mom's Pampered Chef slap/chop thing. You'll also need a big handful of chopped walnuts. Yes, walnuts. We slap chopped them, too.
I only use Pepperidge Farm cubed stuffing. Not cornbread, just regular old Country Style stuffing.
First, I melted a stick of butter and added the celery and nuts to the melted butter, cooking until the celery was a little clear. Then I added the liquid indicated on the package (just follow the package directions as far as how much liquid to add for whatever amount you're making). I used chicken broth. To the chicken broth/celery/nut/butter mixture, I added some onion powder (because we can't have actual onions) and some poulty seasoning.
That's my mom's poultry seasoning. It's probably 20 years old. My dad doesn't eat poultry, so it doesn't get used often. Just once a year when I dig it out and dump a bunch into my stuffing mix. I keep trying to dump enough so it gets emptied and she'll buy new, but she moved across the state this year and the old poultry seasoning still made the journey.
Boil the liquid mixture for a good five minutes. After it's good and hot and the flavors are well blended, pour it over the stuffing mix/croutons. Mix it very well. Then put that into a greased crock pot on low. I usually make the stuffing a few hours before we eat and then use the crock pot to keep it moist and warm until we eat. (Now that I'm typing this, I think I actually just put it in a casserole this year and put it in the warming drawer in my mom's new oven. Either works. You don't want to bake it, and you want it to stay moist. You need warmth and a lid.) Serve with turkey and mashed potatoes and gravy over all it.
That's it. Nothing huge, just my special ingredient of walnuts. We can't eat stuffing without them now. Not sure how I started the tradition, but we all love that bit of crunch in our stuffing. Yummers.
