Why Stuffing… No, Dressing!… No, Stuffing! Rules

Don’t mess with the stuffing… or the dressing. Of all the foods on the Thanksgiving table, this unassuming side dish is the one that inspires the sharpest debate. Oysters? No Oysters? Cornbread? Fruit? Let the games begin

By Lisa Bertagnoli
CTW Features

History books tell us the Civil War ended in 1865. Yet vestiges of the battle, at least a culinary version of it, simmer every Thanksgiving in the Fort Worth, Texas, kitchen of Lynaia and Allen Lutes.

The battle is not over whether to bake or fry the turkey, or whether to serve canned cranberry sauce or a homemade chutney. It’s about dressing, or stuffing – whatever you call the bread-based side dish that’s either cooked inside the turkey (that would be stuffing) or baked in a separate casserole dish (dressing).

Lynaia, who’s from Colorado, calls it stuffing, and prefers a “Yankee” variety: white-bread-based and flavored with sage and bits of turkey. Allen, who hails from Texas, prefers a Southern version of dressing: cornbread-based, with oysters.

The two discovered this difference when they were dating. “He came to my house for traditional Thanksgiving according to our standards,” says Lynaia. “He was surprised at how different some of the foods were, especially the stuffing.”

Allen, 32, a chef, loves to taste new foods, including unfamiliar Thanksgiving staples. So he tasted Lynaia’s Yankee stuffing.

The verdict? “He thought it was disgusting,” Lynaia says.

Now married for seven years, the Luteses have reached a truce. Their Thanksgiving table, around which about 25 family members are seated, holds two pans of stuffing: one prepared Allen’s way, one made Lynaia’s way. They serve the stuffing in glass pans glazed with “North” and “South,” a gift from Lynaia’s parents.

The different family factions are polite, and taste the opposing side’s fare, “but my side still prefers the traditional Yankee stuffing, and his side still goes for the cornbread,” Lynaia says. As for her, “I’d rather have the one I grew up with.”

She’s nailed the reason stuffing wars rage so heatedly during holiday times, says Mary Clingman, director of Butterball Turkey’s hotline. Stuffing/dressing preferences are imprinted at an early age: “It’s what you grew up with,” says Clingman, 56, who lives in Naperville, Ill. “Tradition is a very powerful thing.”

In fact, according to a Butterball survey of 1,800 adults in May 2007, most northerners (83 percent) call the dish stuffing, no matter whether it’s cooked inside the bird or in a separate dish. In the South, respondents split 50-50 between saying stuffing or dressing. And an inexplicable 1 percent of respondents preferred the term “filling.”

Technically, there’s no classic recipe for stuffing. “It’s more like clam chowder,” says Adam Baird, the Culinary Institute of America-trained executive chef at Mimi’s Café, a restaurant chain based in Tustin, Calif. “There’s a core group of ingredients, and variations around the country.”

That “core group” includes crusty bread that’s been dried or staled, chicken broth, butter, celery and onion, and dried or fresh sage. Regional variations include oysters and andouille sausage in New Orleans, cornbread in the South, and sourdough bread in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Lack of a classic recipe, plus different family traditions, add up to culinary confusion over the holidays.

While the Butterball hotline exists mainly to help callers prepare the turkey, Clingman has fielded calls about stuffing debates.

One caller griped about raisins lurking about in an otherwise innocent-looking pan of stuffing. “The caller said, ‘that doesn’t look good at all,’” Clingman recalls. The presence of chestnuts in stuffing also prompts callers to dial for help.

“You give your opinion, and you keep your fingers crossed,” Clingman says. Her advice? Do what the Luteses do, and make two pans.

Clingman herself prepares two stuffings (after working most of the day handling hotline calls) for her guests. One is the very essence of tradition: cubes of staled white bread mixed with onion and celery sautéed in butter, and seasoned with chicken broth, dried sage and poultry seasoning. The other includes bits of liver, homage to her husband’s Norwegian heritage.

In her experience, two is tame: “I’ve been to Thanksgivings where there are four stuffings,” Clingman says.

Anna Otten’s family partakes of two types of stuffings, the result of a long-standing argument between her father and mother. But the debate’s not over ingredients; it’s about texture. Otten’s father likes dry stuffing; her mother prefers a moister version. “For years they would argue over which way,” says Otten, 26, who lives in Chicago.

Finally, they hit on the magic solution: make two pans. Mom’s is based on gluten-free, homemade bread (several family members, Otten among them, have gluten allergies) that’s been dried. It’s mixed with packaged, seasoned bread crumbs, plus sautéed celery, onions and homemade gravy, then cooked inside the bird. Dad’s recipe is similar, but it’s without the extra gravy, and it’s baked in a casserole dish.

“Someone says, ‘Pass the stuffing,’ and someone else says, ‘Which kind?’” Otten says. The stuffing is “almost like a conversation piece at the dinner table.”

She and her three siblings have chosen sides, in a manner of speaking: Otten’s sister prefers Mom’s stuffing. Otten likes Dad’s, and her two brothers “are guys ... they don’t care,” Otten reports. “As long as they have food in front of them, it doesn’t matter.”

Her brothers do, however, insist on fanning the flames of the simmering issue. “They’ll instigate,” Otten says, by telling one parent that guest are taking more of one stuffing over the other. But it’s all in good fun: “It’s just a long-running joke in the family,” Otten says.

Copyright © CTW Features