Tag Archives: stuffing

Sweet and Savory Sausage Bread Stuffing

Quite some time ago, I shared my standard “go-to” recipe for basic poultry stuffing/dressing.  At the bottom of this posting, you will find the link to that recipe and an explanation for the difference (if you don’t already know) between stuffing and dressing.

In this Sweet and Savory Sausage Bread Stuffing recipe, I have jazzed up the stuffing by adding sausage meat to it.  Dried cranberries can also be added so long as they have first been plumped in some warm rum (or warm chicken stock) for 10-15 minutes.  Otherwise, the cranberries can be a bit hard and chewy in this stuffing.  The cranberries are an optional ingredient but they do lend a pop of color and texture to the finished product.  I sometimes, though not always, add them in. The sweetness in this stuffing comes from both the chopped apple and a bit of maple syrup which also adds to the moistness of the stuffing.

Sausage Stuffing Recipe
Sweet and Savory Sausage Bread Stuffing

What gives this stuffing its unique flavour is the kind of sausage used.  My local butcher shop (KJL Meats in Charlottetown) is known for its creativity in making sausages.  To get the best choice, it means an early visit on Saturday mornings when they have their best selection available.  I have a couple of favorites I gravitate to for bread stuffing/dressing and they are sundried tomato or honey garlic sausages. Other flavours may, of course, also be used, according to personal taste preferences.  I remove the sausage casing and break up the meat then lightly scramble fry it with the aromatics (onion and celery) for 3-4 minutes, or until the meat is no longer pink.

Here, in PEI, the seasoning of choice for many folks when it comes to poultry stuffing/dressing is the herb called summer savory and that’s what I use in my stuffing/dressing recipes. In my household, it would not be considered to be stuffing/dressing unless it is made with summer savory! Old traditions prevail!

Sausage Bread Stuffing
Sweet and Savory Sausage Bread Stuffing

This recipe should yield approximately 4-5 cups of stuffing/dressing, depending on how dry/wet the potatoes are when cooked and the texture of the bread crumbs used.  The recipe, however, is easily scalable so it can be doubled, tripled, halved, and so forth to meet the size of the chicken or turkey.

To make this recipe gluten free, simply substitute gluten-free bread crumbs in the same amount called for in this recipe and ensure that all other ingredients called for are also gluten free, including the sausage and liquid chicken bouillon.  Some butchers, like KJL Meats, do make gluten-free sausages. I save all the crusts from gluten-free bread and then use my food processor to crumb them coarsely for use in stuffing and then freeze the crumbs in airtight freezer bags for use as needed.

Sausage Bread Stuffing
Sweet and Savory Sausage Bread Stuffing

[Printable recipe follows at end of posting]

Sweet and Savory Sausage Bread Stuffing

Ingredients:

2-3 tbsp butter
2 tbsp finely chopped onion
2 tbsp finely chopped celery
4 oz honey garlic or sundried tomato sausage, casing removed
2 cups warm mashed potatoes (apx. 1 1/8 lb, uncooked)
1½ tsp summer savory
2 tsp liquid chicken bouillon
¼ cup dried cranberries, plumped in 2 tbsp warm rum or warm chicken stock (optional)
2 tbsp finely chopped apple
1 cup soft, coarse bread crumbs  (apx. – see note below)
¼ cup melted butter
1 tbsp water
1 tbsp pure maple syrup
1 tbsp fresh parsley
1 tbsp chopped fresh chives
Salt and pepper, to taste

Method:
 
Melt butter in small frypan over medium heat.  Add the onion and celery. Briskly stir the vegetables for 2-3 minutes. Break apart the sausage meat and add to the onion and celery. Scramble fry the sausage meat until no longer pink, about 3-4 minutes.

Place the warm mashed potatoes in a large bowl. Sprinkle with summer savory. Add the onion, celery, sausage, and chicken bouillon.  Mix.  Add the dried cranberries and chopped apple.

Mix in the bread crumbs along with the melted butter, water, maple syrup, parsley, and chives.  Stir to combine.  Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Loosely fill the body cavity of turkey or chicken with the stuffing. Roast turkey/chicken according to package directions for stuffed poultry and use a food thermometer to ensure that both the poultry and the stuffing have reached the safe minimum temperature.

Alternatively, make the stuffing into dressing by lightly pressing the mixture into one or two greased tinfoil-lined loaf pan(s). Cover with tin foil and bake in 350°F oven for apx. 15-20 minutes then remove tin foil and bake for 10-15 minutes longer, or until lightly browned on top. Let cool in pan(s) for at least 15 minutes then lift the tinfoil out of the loaf pan(s) and slice the dressing.

NOTE:  Depending on how wet the variety of potatoes may be when cooked, additional bread crumbs may be needed to achieve the desired texture of the stuffing.
 
Yield: Approximately 4-5 cups

Sweet and Savory Sausage Bread Stuffing

This moist sweet and savory sausage bread stuffing is made with sausage meat, bread crumbs, summer savory, apple, cranberries and maple syrup. The perfect side dish to roast chicken or turkey dinners.
Course Side Dish
Cuisine American
My Island Bistro Kitchen My Island Bistro Kitchen

Ingredients

  • 2-3 tbsp butter
  • 2 tbsp finely chopped onion
  • 2 tbsp finely chopped celery
  • 4 oz honey garlic or sundried tomato sausage casing removed
  • 2 cups warm mashed potatoes apx. 1 1/8 lb, uncooked
  • tsp summer savory
  • 2 tsp liquid chicken bouillon
  • ¼ cup dried cranberries plumped in 2 tbsp rum or warm chicken stock (optional)
  • 2 tbsp finely chopped apple
  • 1 cup soft coarse bread crumbs (apx. – see note below)
  • ¼ cup melted butter
  • 1 tbsp water
  • 1 tbsp pure maple syrup
  • 1 tbsp fresh parsley
  • 1 tbsp chopped fresh chives
  • Salt and pepper to taste

Instructions

  1. Melt butter in small frypan over medium heat. Add the onion and celery. Briskly stir the vegetables for 2-3 minutes. Break apart the sausage meat and add to the onion and celery. Scramble fry the sausage meat until no longer pink, about 3-4 minutes.
  2. Place the warm mashed potatoes in a large bowl. Sprinkle with summer savory. Add the onion, celery, sausage, and chicken bouillon. Mix. Add the dried cranberries and chopped apple.
  3. Mix in the bread crumbs along with the melted butter, water, maple syrup, parsley, and chives. Stir to combine. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
  4. Loosely fill the body cavity of turkey or chicken with the stuffing. Roast turkey/chicken according to package directions for stuffed poultry and use a food thermometer to ensure that both the poultry and the stuffing have reached the safe minimum temperature.
  5. Alternatively, make the stuffing into dressing by lightly pressing the mixture into one or two greased tinfoil-lined loaf pan(s). Cover with tin foil and bake in 350°F oven for apx. 15-20 minutes then remove tin foil and bake for 10-15 minutes longer, or until lightly browned on top. Let cool in pan(s) for at least 15 minutes then lift the tinfoil out of the loaf pan(s) and slice the dressing.

Recipe Notes

Yield: Approximately 4-5 cups

NOTE 1: Depending on how wet the variety of potatoes may be when cooked, additional bread crumbs may be needed to achieve the desired texture of the stuffing.

NOTE 2: To make this recipe gluten free, simply substitute gluten-free bread crumbs in the same amount called for in this recipe and ensure that all other ingredients called for are also gluten free, including the sausage and liquid chicken bouillon.

 

[Copyright My Island Bistro Kitchen]

 

For my basic poultry stuffing recipe, click here.

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Sausage Bread Stuffing
Sausage Bread Stuffing

Five PEI Foodies Talk About Their Christmas Food Traditions

Herb-Basted Roast Turkey
Herb-Basted Roast Turkey

Food plays a vital role in Christmas celebrations here in Prince Edward Island. I recently chatted with five Islanders who, in one way or another, have strong food connections. Read on to find out what foods these foodies most associate with Christmas and what foods, if they didn’t have them, it just would not be Christmas for them.

(With the exception of Premier Wade MacLauchlan’s Seafood Pie,   all photos in this posting are from the food blogger’s own stock collection and are not of contributors’ specific recipes mentioned in this article.)

Wade MacLauchlan, Premier of Prince Edward Island

Food factors heavily into Premier Wade MacLauchlan’s Christmas festivities.  The premier, a great cook himself, launches into seafood pie production in mid-December.  He produces some 20 seafood pies filled with mussels, lobster, bar clams, scallops, and some fin fish like salmon, trout, or haddock.

Premier Wade MacLaughlan's Seafood Pie
Premier Wade MacLauchlan’s Seafood Pie

Premier MacLauchlan uses grated potatoes that have been cooked in seafood stock to make a heavy starchy paste which eliminates the need for flour as a thickener for the pie filling.  The ingredients are combined and placed inside a double-crusted pastry and baked.

Premier Wade MacLauchlan's Seafood Pie
Premier Wade MacLauchlan’s Seafood Pie

When asked what he does with all the pies, he tells me he gives them away as gifts. And, for those who aren’t seafood lovers, he makes tourtière and says he usually makes between 6 and 10 of those each December.

Food also plays a part in a Solstice Sunrise Party that the premier has been hosting at his home for almost two decades.  Held annually on the day of the winter solstice, the premier says he simply couldn’t stop it now even if he wanted to because the regulars would just show up anyway! Rising early to make 3-4 dozen muffins and to brew a couple of urns of coffee, the premier opens his doors at 7:30am and people start arriving to watch the sunrise together around 8:00am. It’s not uncommon for 75-80 people to attend. With a commanding view to the east and to the south out over Stanhope Bay, it’s a time for family, friends, and neighbours to visit and re-connect. Everyone brings food to contribute to the potluck event which is set up buffet style.

Christmas Day is spent with immediate family and, on Boxing Day, the larger extended MacLauchlan family gather at the premier’s home for a potluck brunch.

The premier has kindly shared his recipe for his Seafood Pie which is printed here with Wade MacLauchlan’s permission.  The premier says, although the recipe yield is for 20 pies, the recipe is easily scalable.

Premier Wade MacLaughlan's Seafood Pie Recipe
Premier Wade MacLaughlan’s Seafood Pie Recipe

 

Premier Wade MacLauchlan's Seafood Pie
Premier Wade MacLauchlan’s Seafood Pie

Peter Bevan-Baker, Leader of the Green Party of Prince Edward Island

Communal family cooking has always played a significant part in Peter Bevan-Baker’s life starting when he was a lad growing up in Fortrose, just north of Inverness, in the Highlands of Scotland. The family would all prepare the Christmas dinner together, chopping vegetables and singing Christmas carols.

Member of the Legislature and Leader of the Green Party of PEI, Peter’s first and foremost memory of a food enjoyed at Christmas time is his late father’s vol-au-vent made with leftover turkey from Christmas dinner and served with Sauce Robert, a brown mustard sauce. Sometimes, the vol-au-vents would be served as nibbles but other times as the main for a meal when they would be served with “tatties and neeps”, the Scottish names for potatoes and turnips, respectively.

Plum Pudding
Plum Pudding

When asked what Christmas dinner dessert consisted of, Peter says it was always Christmas Pudding which he did not like at all!  However, he says the arrival of the pudding at the dinner table was quite an elaborate ceremony. Everyone stood up and literally lifted the table off the floor to meet the pudding – it was a true salute to the Christmas pudding! Of course, some alcohol would be heated, poured over the pudding, and the pudding set aflame. Peter claims watching the pudding burn was the best part since he had no liking for the pudding! His father made a brandy butter to serve with the pudding. Peter says another great memory he has of Christmas as a young boy in the Scottish Highlands was visiting a rich family who lived in the area and who served Coca Cola at Christmas which was very special since it was not something he had at home.

Peter’s father was a great cook and modeled to his children that it was okay for men to be in the kitchen cooking. Today, Peter and his wife have four adult children (two of whom are chefs) and cooking remains very much a family event. Vol-au-vents will make an appearance over the holidays in keeping with his long-standing family tradition. While the family usually has a turkey dinner for Christmas, Peter says it will usually be with a contemporary twist of some sort that may include some dishes from other cultures.

Bill Martin, Mayor of Summerside and Owner of the Water Street Bakery

Mayor of the City of Summerside, Bill Martin has very fond memories of waking up on Christmas morning to the scent of meat pies baking.  His mother, a Scottish war bride, had an absolute Christmas morning tradition and that involved homemade meat pies.  The family enjoyed the meat pies, complete with homemade mustard pickles, after opening presents on Christmas morning.  Mayor Martin continues that tradition today. He and his family enjoy Christmas breakfast of bacon, eggs, homefries, and toast along with the meat pie and mustard pickles.  To this tradition, they have also added the Acadian dish, Rapure, a grated potato casserole.

Acadian Rapure
Acadian Rapure

Mayor Martin and his wife have run the Water Street Bakery for the past 29 years. They make meat pies year-round now and, in December alone, they will make more than 2000 meat pies which are made with pork, chicken, turkey, potato, onion, and spices, all covered in a biscuit dough crust.  These pies are in such demand during the Christmas period that the bakery has rented additional freezer space. In fact, on the first Saturday in December, they made 200 meat pies and sold 100 of them the same day. As a bakery owner, the other two most popular items that Martin says never go out of style are the chocolate-covered peanut butter balls and the cherry balls, both of which are available at the bakery only at Christmas which makes them more special treats.

Chocolate Peanut Butter Balls
Chocolate Peanut Butter Balls

Irwin MacKinnon, Executive Chef, Papa Joe’s Restaurant and PEI Chef of the Year 2017

Long-time executive chef at Charlottetown’s Papa Joe’s Restaurant and recently-named PEI Chef of the Year 2017, Chef Irwin MacKinnon says it would not be Christmas in his household without the “Jimmy Jams”.  These delightful cookies have been made by ancestors on his mother’s side for years. Today, his mom is the principle baker of these Christmas treats that his children look forward to each Christmas.  As MacKinnon describes them, Jimmy-Jams are two round shortbread cookies, about 1½“ – 2” in diameter, sandwiched together with plain white icing.  Each sandwiched cookie is iced again on top and then decorated with rainbow-colored sprinkles.

Everyone has his or her own version of the stuffing for the turkey and Chef MacKinnon discovered how important that tradition is when he and his wife married 25 years ago.  On his side of the family, they make what he calls “Grammie’s Stuffing” which is bread-based and the ingredients are bound together by mashed potato and lots of butter and seasoned with onion, summer savory, and salt and pepper.  A bit of brown sugar is added just to give a sweet tone.  On his wife’s side of the family, they make the stuffing (dressing) completely opposite and Chef Irwin classes it as a potato stuffing made with mashed potatoes, onion cooked in butter, and seasoned with summer savory.  This is baked in the oven and there is no bread in this version.  If you are an Islander, you’ll get and appreciate the significance of family recipes for the turkey stuffing/dressing!

Roast Turkey
Roast Turkey

So, whose stuffing recipe will be on the Christmas table in the MacKinnon household this year? You guessed it – Irwin will be making his grammie’s stuffing recipe to go along with the fresh turkey from Larkin Brothers in New Glasgow. To this, he’ll include a wide variety of veggies that include potatoes, turnip, carrots, squash, and brussel sprouts.

For dessert, Chef Irwin’s mother-in-law’s plum pudding will grace the table complemented by Irwin’s rich brown sugar sauce made from a rue of butter and flour with caramelized brown sugar added.  Chef Irwin says a slice of pudding topped with ice cream and a good drizzle of a glossy brown sugar sauce is the ultimate Christmas dinner dessert.

Since he cooks everyday for a living, I asked Chef Irwin if he lets someone else cook the Christmas dinner but he says it’s him that spearheads the dinner at home and one of his greatest joys is to cook for his own family.  Other members of the family pitch in and bring contributions to the dinner as the family melds their different traditions from their blended families.

Glenda Burt, Chef, and former owner of The Home Place Restaurant in Kensington, PEI

For Chef Glenda Burt, the highlight of the Christmas dinner is the plum pudding and warm sauce.  She says that, even though you might be “stuffed to the gills” from the main meal, there is always room for plum pudding!  Glenda makes a rich toffee sauce to serve with her plum pudding, a sauce made with brown sugar, whipping cream, butter, and vanilla.

Plum Pudding
Plum Pudding

Glenda grew up in the family that originally owned Mary’s Bakery in Kensington so baking and candy making are certainly second nature to her. She has very fond memories of the chocolate, brown sugar, and divinity fudges that her mother made at Christmas and how they would appear in a plastic Christmas motif tri-sectioned dish on Christmas Eve. Homemade raisin bread toasted on Christmas morning is an annual tradition in the Burt household. Glenda doesn’t prepare a big Christmas Day breakfast because she says the whole day is spent eating; however, the raisin bread must be present to start the day off.

Other foods that will make their appearance over the holidays will be gingersnaps, dark fruitcake, meat pies (that Glenda says are pure comfort food) and, in deference to our Maritime culture, some kind of seafood which could be lobster in the shell or seafood chowder.

Chef Glenda is hosting her family Christmas on Boxing Day this year and she will be doing the cooking of the traditional Christmas dinner that will include roast turkey, stuffing, and veggies. Glenda will be serving her famous turnip casserole as well. This yummy dish is made with mashed turnip, a white sauce with Parmesan cheese, and topped with buttered bread crumbs.  Of course, all the traditional fixins’ like homemade rolls, pickles, and beets will be on the table to complement the turkey dinner.

 

My thanks to Premier Wade MacLauchlan, Leader of the PEI Green Party Peter Bevan-Baker, Mayor Bill Martin, Chef Irwin MacKinnon, and Chef Glenda Burt for sharing their Christmas food traditions with me.

Bread Stuffing/Dressing Recipe for Roast Turkey/Chicken

There is nothing like the scent of a turkey roasting in the oven!  I love a roast turkey dinner with all the trimmings and I especially love the bread stuffing or, you may know it as  “dressing”. The theory is that, if it goes inside the turkey cavity, it’s called “stuffing” but, if it is cooked separately (as in a casserole or loaf pan), then it’s called “dressing”.   Regardless what it’s called, it just would not be a roast turkey dinner without this wonderful savory side dish. Continue reading Bread Stuffing/Dressing Recipe for Roast Turkey/Chicken