Tasty Tuesdays: halfway to 50!

Happy Tuesday blogland and welcome to the 25th edition of Tasty Tuesdays! I feel as though I should have some sort of celebration to commemorate this momentous occasion, but perhaps that might be a bit superfluous.

I must admit that through the years of eating dozens of Thanksgiving/Christmas dinners, I have never been a huge stuffing/dressing fan (stuffing=in the bird, dressing=cooked apart from the bird). It's not that I was opposed to eating bread drenched in butter, but in all honesty, it just never was all that appealing to me. It tended to be too dry or too soggy. I think the problem was in the recipe because I have tasted stuffing success with this recipe and I'm here to share it with you if you happen to doubt the merits of stuffing.

Now, don't write off today's recipe just because you think stuffing can only be served alongside your Thanksgiving turkey. You would be sadly remiss to do this. Even if you're not planning on serving a turkey at your Christmas dinner, this dish could easily compliment a myriad of other main dishes and was a hit at our throwdown (scroll down for the skinny on that epic event). The recipe is based off of a Good Housekeeping recipe, but I made some significant modifications, per usual.

Savory Bread Dressing with Pears and Cranberries

Ingredients:
1 large loaf of sourdough bread, cut into cubes (day old)
2 T olive oil
3 stalks of celery, diced
1 large onion, chopped
1 T minced garlic
2 pears, chopped
1 C dried cranberries (I used Craisins)
3 C lower sodium chicken broth
1 T sage
1 T rosemary
1 T tarragon
2 T parsley (the recipe actually calls for 1/2 C packed fresh parsley, but we didn't have any so I used a significantly reduced amount of the dried herb)
salt and pepper to taste

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

2. Spread the bread cubes out on a sheet pan sprayed with cooking spray and bake 15-20 minutes or until golden, set aside to cool. Reset oven control to 350 degrees.



3. In a deep dish skillet, heat oil on medium-high until hot. Add celery, onion, and garlic. Cook about 7 minutes or until vegetables are golden and tender.

4. Add pears and cranberries and cook 4 minutes or until softened, stirring frequently.



5. Add broth and heat to boiling; reduce heat to medium-low and simmer 5 minutes.

6. In large bowl, combine bread and broth mixture. Stir in parsley, sage, rosemary, salt and pepper.

7. In shallow 3-quart glass or ceramic baking dish, spread mixture in an even layer. Cover with foil and bake 25 minutes. Uncover and bake 15 minutes longer or until top of stuffing is golden brown.


This recipe is super simple and really turned out quite tasty. The flavors worked well together and I loved the sourdough bread in the recipe. I highly recommend you add this to your Christmas dinner menu!