Talking Southern – Dressing vs. Stuffing

     Thanksgiving may be your compiler’s favorite holiday, at least from a comestibles standpoint, because of the fabulous banquet always set forth for the gathered family to enjoy.  In his family, the single favorite Thanksgiving delight is dressing with giblet gravy, which, if prepared correctly, is good enough to heal the sick and near-about raise the dead.

     What is the difference, you may ask, between dressing and stuffing?   That’s easy.  Dressing is a mixture of crumbled breads – usually one recipe of cooked cornbread and one recipe of cooked biscuit – turkey juices and chicken broth (4-5 cups in total), about a cup of sliced and sauteed onions, a tablespoon or more of celery seed, three eggs, salt and pepper, some melted butter, and sage to taste.  Mix this all together and flatten with your hands in a baking pan, then cook at 400F for 30-45 minutes, till lightly browned. Cut into squares, cover with giblet gravy, and enjoy!  

     That’s dressing.  Stuffing, on the other hand, is the filler material that makes mattresses and upholstered furniture soft and comfortable to sleep or sit upon.  

     While that is truly one definition of stuffing, your compiler realizes that many people have as their Thanksgiving tradition to stuff their bread mixture into the body of the turkey and bake it there.  Although your compiler is willing to concede that doing so likely infuses the mixture with juices of the turkey while it is cooking and probably has an incredibly rich taste resulting therefrom, he, as a born and bred Georgian, simply cannot comprehend why anyone would want to eat something dug from a turkey’s butt with a spoon when he or she could scoop it out of a pan, as is done with dressing.

    Properly made dressing is flavorful and delicious by itself, but adding gravy makes one think he or she has died and gone to Heaven.  Following is how giblet gravy has always been made in your compiler’s family, and will be forevermore:

Instructions for the giblet gravy:

• Sprinkle 6 tablespoons of plain, all-purpose flour  in a hot black skillet and stir for about a minute till very slightly browned.  Turn heat down to medium-high.
• Add 6 tablespoons of oil – vegetable oil, bacon grease, drippings from cooked fowl – whatever combination suits you.
• Mix flour with the oil  in the pan to make a thickish roux.
• Add three cups of liquid –  juices from fowl, chicken broth, water, whatever combination suits you.
• Mix together in pan using a whisk or slotted spoon, stirring over medium heat till gravy thickens – maybe 5-7 minutes.  (Can sprinkle in a bit of sifted flour if thickening is not happening.)
• Add a couple of tablespoons of finely chopped turkey giblets and a sliced boiled egg, stirring in so the goodies are evenly dispersed in the gravy.
• Serve atop your dressing.  Also very good atop sliced fowl, rice, and mashed potatoes.

      No matter how you like your Thanksgiving feast prepared, and no matter the customs to which you cling, your compiler wishes each reader the safest and happiest of Thanksgivings, and the maximum experience in gustatory, gratitudinal, and familial delight.