Hunter Lee
Let’s get shakin’!!!!
So, is it dressing or stuffing? The argument I’ve had (and seen others have) for most of my years in the kitchen. I might ruffle some feathers in this one, but I’m going to give you the rundown. If you don’t agree that’s okay, you call what you make whatever you want. I’m here to teach and entertain, but mostly entertain; not to change your way of thinking.
In my family we made dressing. It was my mawmaw’s recipe, and though she’s gone on, I still make it the same way other than a little added seasoning. She made a huge pan and in the pan was a homemade tinfoil divider. Why? Well, Mom liked giblets; literally no one else did. So Mawmaw always made sure to do about 1/4 of the pan with, and the rest without.
She never put chicken or Turkey in the dressing. In her words, “That’s for when you make dressing as a meal and that’s for other times of the year. NOT Thanksgiving.”
So back to the difference in stuffing and dressing. For starters just as it’s called, stuffing is something stuffed on the inside of something, or cooked under or around something. I.e., turkey, duck, foul. Dressing is something made in a pan all to itself, or outside the main dish.
Some people in the south think that it’s stuffing if it’s made with crackers or bread, and dressing if it’s made with cornbread. This is false, both can be made with either or a mixture of the two. In the Deep South you even get into rice dressing, oyster dressing, seafood dressing. Are those dressings? Well yes and no.
Back to the beginning: the dressing, no matter if it’s cornbread, crackers, bread, oysters, seafood, rice, is not dressing if it’s cooked inside or under the meat. Then it would be stuffing. Similarly, if it’s cooked in a pan of its own, it’s dressing, not stuffing. It’s simple. What complicates it is tradition, and what one family has always called it compared to another. You call it what you always have. If it’s good, no one’s going to care.
Till next week I’m Chef Hunter Lee, wishing you all a Happy Thanksgiving.
Remember, “Treat your kitchen, treat yourself”
Benwood’s, uniquely Southern, surely the Best!!!