One of my favorite Thanksgiving dishes is Cornbread dressing; I love the smell of cornbread dressing baking in the oven. Now that I have a family of my own, I find myself wanting to give my children the same holiday memories that I had growing up. Thanksgiving was always a time that represented family gatherings, great food, and excellent memories.

“One of my favorite Thanksgiving dishes is Cornbread dressing”

My recipe calls for giblets. Giblets are the liver, neck, and gizzard portions of the turkey that are usually discarded.

Chicken giblets can also is available in the meat section of your local grocery store. But, if you don’t have access to giblets, you can also use regular ground meat, but you will need to adjust the recipe a bit if using ground meat. But don’t worry, I’ll walk you through it.

Once you have your 1 lb of giblets, rinse ( I always like to rinse off my meat before I use it), and season well. Then cut an onion in half and a stalk of celery in half. Place giblets, onion, and celery into a stock pot along with 2 cups of water and let boil. Let boil until the giblets are tender. Once tender, place giblets in a food processor to roughly grind. You want the consistency of ground meat.

If using ground meat, brown seasoned ground meat in a skillet being sure to de-clump the beef, once browned, use a wooden spoon to de-clump the meat. Use ground meat and 1 1/2 can of beef stock.

Toast about ten slices of bread in the oven to dry out, and chop finely to create breadcrumbs. Ten slices of bread will produce about 3 cups of breadcrumbs.

Meanwhile, start baking your cornbread. I love the “Jiffy” Corn Muffin Mix, Jiffy Corn Muffin Mix 8.5oz (Pack of 4) my personal favorite, but you can also make your favorite cornbread. We will need 3 cups of cooked crumbled cornbread (try saying that three times fast, LOL!)

While your cornbread is baking and the giblets are boiling, we will need 6 slices of bacon; be sure that the bacon that you use for this recipe is the full-fat bacon. Choose the package with the extra fat, LOL. In a large skillet, fry bacon until crisp. Remove bacon only from skillet and roughly chop. Chop the other half of the onion, three stalks of celery, and breadcrumbs and place in skillet with bacon grease to sautee. Kukpo Easy Grip Mixing Bowl – X-LARGE 6.5 QT Easy Grip Handle- And Non Skid BottomThese bowls are my personal favorite. I love these dishes because the bottoms don’t roll around or slide off of the counter. But anyway, I digress! In a large bowl, combine crumbled cornbread, bread crumbs, bacon, sauteed onions and celery, stock, and giblets (or ground meat). The dressing should be moist. Season to taste using black pepper, salt, red pepper, and sage. Once seasoned, scramble two eggs and mix well into the dressing. Place dressing in a Dutch oven Enameled Cast Iron Dutch Oven – Red Color with Lid, 3.2-quart – by Utopia Kitchen or a foil dressing pan (I typically have tons of these for Thanksgiving) and cover with foil. Bake at 350 for 1 hour, remove foil and continue baking for an additional 20 minutes. The dressing will have a delicious crust on top when cooked.

Did I mention that I am from Louisiana? Rice dressing is made along these same lines. Stay tuned for more Thanksgiving Dinner Recipes.

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