DESPITE all of the warnings, do you STILL cook stuffing inside the bird?

[Miles Archer]

I have TWO family members who BOTH cook it in the bird, then take the bird oit and tent it with foil, LEAVING THE STUFFING INSIDE.

One of them did it for an HOUR once.

I won't touch it, I am just too damned obsessive-compulsive over food safety.

What about you?

[uppityperson]

1. No because the bird cooks faster unstuffed and also for vegetarians in the family who like stuffing

Put it in its own baking dish and it will also be fluffier.

[orleans]

2. agree. n/t

[Manifestor_of_Light]

3. No, I don't.

I mix up Pepperidge Farm stuffing mix, melted butter, sauteed onions, chicken broth, mushrooms, chopped hardboiled eggs, and seasonings and bake it in a 5 quart dutch oven.

[Miles Archer]

21. Pepperidge Farm...the ONLY stuffing.

Seriously. Unless you make everything from scratch, there is no other stuffing. And I wouldn't like scratch stuffing unless it TASTED LIKE Pepperidge Farm.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

25. Making bread and shredding it? WAY too much work!!!

Yep, Pepperidge Farm is the shit.

Stovetop is dog food.

[HeiressofBickworth]

4. No

StoveTop is cooked in a pan on the stove.

We switched to StoveTop years ago after a few years of home-made stuffing by one member of the family which resembled grey slime. Prevents having a culinary disaster at the table.

[easychoice]

5. Yes I stuff it.

To do that you have to be smart enough to cook a Turkey.
My mom was raised on a Poultry Farm.
I have seen people cook them without taking the giblets and neck out of the body cavities.YUK!
People don't thoroughly clean the body cavities either.
No wonder they get sick,they shouldn't even be allowed in the kitchen around food.These are the same people that get sick from filthy hands and filthy cutting boards.

[Rhythm]

11. Precisely. n/t

[In_The_Wind]

6. My bird is cooked without being stuffed.

[Major Nikon]

7. You can do it safely provided you bring the stuffing itself up to a safe temperature (165F)

However, if you do that the bird itself will almost certainly be overcooked.

http://www.fsis.usda.gov/wps/portal/fsis/topics/food-safety-education/get-answers/food-safety-fact-sheets/poultry-preparation/turkey-basics-stuffing/CT_Index

[Arkansas Granny]

8. We cook a portion of the stuffing in the bird, but when we take the bird out

of the oven to rest, we remove the stuffing, mix it with the rest of the dressing and bake it until done. That way, all the dressing tastes like it was in the bird, but it's fully cooked.

[Le Taz Hot]

9. I've never stuffed the turkey.

I make my dressing from scratch (including baking my own bread for the bread crumb) and the dressing recipe is designed to be baked in the oven. I've had stuffing before and I thought it was mushy and over cooked. I get raves for my dressing ever year.

[Rhythm]

10. Stuff the bird every year with no food-safety problems...

We always make a separate pan of stuffing for those who have qualms about the in-the-bird stuffing, but because both Lyric and I are fastidious about food-safety, we have been doing stuffed-birds successfully for 15 yrs now.

[bigwillq]

12. No, but not because of all the "warnings"

We just make the stuffing on the side. Always have.

[Wounded Bear]

13. Warnings?

What warnings.

Been doing it all my life. Perhaps that's why I have a healthy immune system.

[malthaussen]

18. Yeah, I didn't get the memo, either.

To quote Zonker: "How distressing! I do so try to keep up with current events!"

-- Mal

[shenmue]

14. I hate stuffing

I don't eat it.

[fizzgig]

26. i thought i was the only person who felt that way

i think it's gross.

[shenmue]

27. You are free!

Behold, I set you free!

[PennyK]

15. NOTHING tastes like in-the-bird stuffing, I admit

I loved it when my mother made her traditional dinner. I could pretty much have filled up a plate with that unbelievably scrumptious stuffing! But...
I try as hard as possible to stick to my low-carb regimen, even on holidays. And these days I don't make a whole bird, just a turkey breast. Stuffing was always my favorite, so I cook up a casserole of just the vegetables - celery, onion, mushrooms, with broth and the spices. Tastes the same and I can eat as much as I want...and still wear my skinny clothes for the feast.

[DinahMoeHum]

16. The only things I put in a turkey are seasonings and a few veggies.

"Stuffing", if cooked outside a bird is better known as dressing and that's what i make instead. After the turkey is cooked and is resting. During that time, I also make the gravy.

[Phentex]

17. Same here...

herbs or veggies are okay. I don't want to slow down the cooking process.

[sharp_stick]

19. Always

Last edited Mon Nov 3, 2014, 12:28 PM - Edit history (1)

My wife bakes the bread and I do the rest. Usually a pretty traditional stuffing with her sourdough, mushrooms (oyster, shiitake or whatever I can find), celery, onion, thyme sage and her homemade chicken stock.

It makes way more than I can stuff into the bird so there's always another baked dish with the rest.

I prefer the stuffed product but I'll never turn down the baked either.

As long as you cook it to the proper temperature it's perfectly safe.

[oneshooter]

34. I make from scratch buttermilk cornbread

Then make from scratch cornbread dressing from that.

[Tom_Foolery]

20. As I let the bird cook, I periodically drain the broth...

And I use that to make my dressing on the stove top. DEE-licious!

[femmocrat]

22. Absolutely!

I do remove it right away though. It's delicious!

And I make a side casserole dish of vegetarian stuffing.

[dr.strangelove]

23. always stuff it and cook it ... "in the bird"

I like to live dangerously

[rug]

24. I don't even wash my hands before I stuff it.

[Autumn]

41. I don't even kill the turkey before I stuff it. It's easier that way.

[rug]

42. That must be one noisy turkey.

[elleng]

28. Yes, and haven't died yet,

haven't even gotten sick.

[DebJ]

29. Been eating and/or doing just that for 57 years. Not dead or sick yet! Just the usual

OMG all I want to do is sleep after the traditional meal.

It just doesn't taste the same outside the bird.
Make my own, always have. Nothing else is as good.

On edit: my mother always left the leftover meat and stuffing on and in the carcass for many days in the fridge
as we ate it down to nothing, too. No one ever got sick. Another factor likely is that back then, a fridge could
last 30 years and keep proper temperature.... (I myself just replaced one fro 1984 two years ago). The crap
they make today....................

I don't do that myself though.... take it off and freeze it.

[a la izquierda]

30. My mom does some in, some out...

and a whole separate pot for me, complete with moaning and bellyaching that she has a vegan daughter. Every year I offer to make my own (which I much prefer, based on her recipe), along with the rest of the dishes I make for myself (and some for my brother in law, who is just a picky eater). Every year, she just chooses to whine about the stuffing.

The horror.

[haele]

31. I do put herbs and fruits inside the turkey when cooking...

Sort of pack them up against the carcass with a cup or bowl wrapped in aluminum foil. A half hour before the turkey is done, I take about three cups of the stuffing I had been baking alongside the bird for a half hour or so inside and put it in place of the cup/bowl and finish cooking it.
Also baste the stuffing left out of the turkey with turkey juices so that the flavor can even out. Not quite the same thing.

Damn, I've got to finish putting down the dining room floor. Otherwise, no Thanksgiving Dinner! The kitchen floor can wait, but the diningroom is down to the subfloor and needs to be finished so we can move the table in and feed more than three people at a time. I refuse to have another thanksgiving dinner served on recliners and folding tables.



Haele

[Hatchling]

32. Nope, too lazy.

I've gotten older and weaker and it's hard stuffing that heavy bird.

[My Good Babushka]

33. I never cooked it in the bird

because I like the top of the stuffing crunchy, I bake it in a lasagna pan.

[Kali]

35. Yes and I don't even like it.

I prefer to do it like in your pictures so I can get it all back out without contaminating the carcass with soggy bread (talking phobia here). the rest of the hordes like it so much I make it in a pan too.

love the smell, can't handle the texture

[sakabatou]

36. Nope. It's cooked seperately

[blaze]

37. One year, Mom completely forgot the stuffing!!!

We spent the entire dinner saying, "Great stuffing, Mom!!""

And we repeated it at every subsequent Thanksgiving!!! (She never forgot it again, but we never let her live it down. <g&gt

[Liberal Veteran]

38. That depends...does chicken stuffed into a duck stuffed into a turkey count as stuffing?

[jmowreader]

40. Considering that you have to put stuffing between the three birds, I would say yes

Ah, Turducken: an engineering project disguised as Thanksgiving dinner!

[jmowreader]

39. No, because it won't fit

You SHOULD be putting two chopped big-ass onions, two stalks of chopped celery, two chopped carrots, a clove of garlic, a quartered lemon, a tablespoon of sage, a tablespoon of rosemary, a tablespoon of thyme (sorry guys, parsley has no flavor so leave that shit out), a tablespoon of black pepper, a stick of butter chopped into little pieces and put in there at random, and a quarter-teaspoon of chili powder in there. If you do that, there'll be no question as to whether you should put stuffing in there - no, because nothing else will go in.

And when the bird is cooked, shovel all that out, run it through your food processor with the giblets you have already boiled, then put it in your gravy.

"But Jim! I have no food processor!" You have the address of the local Goodwill, don't you? Twelve bucks should get you a perfectly serviceable machine.

[RavensChick]

43. Agreed!

I always prepare the dressing (I don't use the word stuffing since I'm south of the Mason Dixon Line) on the side, never in the bird. Putting the veggies and spices in the bird is a good alternative (I'll do that next year) because I only put in salt, pepper, a little butter and olive oil in the bird as well as the outside and it still came out tender and juicy. No fuss, no muss!

[RavensChick]

44. Nope!

Why make the job harder than it already is?

[Rhiannon12866]

45. Yes, since that's what my mother did and her stuffing is Thanksgiving to me

I'd be happy with just the stuffing. My aunt did it the same way, think my mother got the recipe from her. None of us has ever had a problem and I'm pretty obsessive compulsive about how I do these things.

[LP2K12]

46. Both

I grew up with my mom baking it inside the bird, she still does and I love it. My wife on the other hand only makes her stuffing outside of the bird.