Yes, I may be biased but I believe my mom’s stuffing recipe is the best simple turkey stuffing recipe ever. The thing I look forward to most on Thanksgiving and Christmas is my mom’s stuffing. It is my favorite part of our holiday meals. She only makes it twice a year, and last year she only made it once. Last year, 9 days before Thanksgiving my dad passed away after a short illness. His celebration of life service was 6 days before Thanksgiving. In an effort to make holiday prep easier on all of us, my sister got a Thanksgiving meal from Publix. It was good and filled the need we had at the time, but, we all missed Mimi’s stuffing!
As Christmas approached we decided to make Christmas dinner as we always had, from scratch with everyone contributing. The passing of my dad also meant that this would probably be the last holiday we celebrated in the house that had been our family home since we moved to Florida in 1980. It also meant it could be the last turkey my mom cooked since the plan was to move her into senior living. I knew that my younger sister would never cook a whole turkey, she won’t cook meat with bones in it, so I better learn how to make Mimi’s stuffing. I went to her home 2 days before Christmas to learn her secrets.
Mimi’s recipe is based on the Bread Stuffing recipe found in her 1960s era Better Homes & Garden Cookbook. This recipe does not appear in the 1989 version that I own. Of course, over the years Mimi has tweaked this recipe to make it her own. In my opinion one of the most important ingredients is the Bell’s Seasoning. It can be difficult to find in some areas but thankfully it is available on Amazon!
- 16 cups bread pieces see recipe for how to make these
- 1/2 tsp Bell's Seasoning
- 2 TBS Onion Powder
- 2 TBS garlic Powder
- Salt & Pepper to taste
- 4 Chicken Bouillon Cubs
- 32 oz boiling water
- 1 1/3 cups melted butter or margerine
- We use stale bread pieces. Mom collects her heels and other bread pieces before they get moldy and tosses them in bags in the freezer. The day before she makes the stuffing, she takes the bags out and lets them thaw.
- Using this bread, shred it between your fingers over a large bowl. This is time consuming. we put on a Christmas movie and shredded away. You want small pieces of bread, not chunks and not breadcrumbs.
- As you are shredding and getting a good layer of bread then sprinkle on some of the onion powder, garlic powder and Bell's Seasoning.
- Continue the layers this way until the bread is done.
- Prepare the Bouillon according to package directions 4 cubes in 32 oz boiling water.
- Melt the butter or margarine.
- Using your hands, mix the wet ingredients with the dry ingredients.
- Season with salt and pepper, to taste.
- After removing the gizzards etc from the turkey, stuff the cavity with the stuffing and cook your bird.
- Place stuffing in a large covered microwave-safe bowl and cook 2-3 minutes, stirring once, until heated through.
Some people call it stuffing if it is in the bird and dressing if it is out of the bird. In the south it is always called stuffing. We are in Florida which isn’t the south…even though we are. We just call it stuffing. What do you call it?
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