Thanksgiving at our house
Thanksgiving at our house this year was simple and yet hard won. I was just coming out of the deepest depths of pregnancy nausea and felt like I could cook a little. We were determined to provide the touchstones of tradition in the midst of feeling both completely at home and lonesome for our loved ones.
We started with Pumpkin-Apple-Streusel Muffins and the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. My mama has made these muffins every Thanksgiving for pretty much my entire life (maybe she started when I was two?). It was a joy to figure out a way to make them with a little less sugar and just as much love.
Then came a turkey breast in the Instant Pot (which, by the way, is a GAME CHANGER for sensitive noses), bubbling cranberry sauce, sautéing greens beans, steaming homemade macaroni and cheese, and my first time ever making Granny’s cornbread dressing.
Granny’s dressing has no real recipe, just ingredients and feeling. I talked with my mom a lot on the phone before and during the make.
Both those conversations and the memory of Granny’s love caught up in the taste of that dish blessed me to the core.
Thanksgiving has its horrific issues. We denounce the lies of Manifest Destiny and mourn the sins of our forbearers agains the First Peoples of this land. Thanksgiving will always bear the pall of its abusers.
In our house, we try to find some way forward through gratitude. And memory.
Granny’s Cornbread Dressing: a method
Ingredients:
1 pone of cornbread made ahead and allowed to dry out a bit; I made ours weeks before and kept it in the freezer until the day before Thanksgiving
3 cups plus more of turkey broth/drippings mixed with water
2 eggs, beaten
1 onion, diced
2 celery stalks, diced small
Sage, eyeball it
Thyme, eyeball it
Salt and pepper
butter for the pan
cast iron skillet or an edged baking pan
Method:
Set the oven to 375 degrees.
Think of the dressing almost like a bread pudding. Break up the cornbread into crumbs and combine with all ingredients in a large bowl. Let the cornbread crumbs soak up the broth for a few minutes.
Meanwhile, heat your butter in the cast iron skillet in the oven.
When you’re happy with the batter, pour it into the hot skillet and smooth the top. If you use an edged baking sheet, the dressing will be flatter, but will have crispier edges!
Bake in the oven until set.