One of our favorite ways to approach holiday cooking is to make traditional dishes that our families look forward to having every year, but with a twist.
Stuffing is one of those dishes whose essential components — leftover bread (cubed white bread, cornbread), sautéed meat (sausage) or seafood (shrimp, oysters), vegetables (carrot, celery, onions) and flavorings (herbs, spices, dried fruits) — can be varied in infinite ways based on different world cuisines.
This year, we came up with a stuffing based on fennel (the star of next week’s root source), cornbread, and a few traditional North African ingredients (merguez sausage, preserved lemons and dates) — with great results.
Here’s how we made it:
First, we prepared a few of the stuffing’s main ingredients. We chopped some dates and soaked them in Cointreau, toasted a combination of whole wheat baguette cubes and cornbread in the oven to toast, and diced a small preserved lemon.
Next, we sautéed merguez sausage, carrot, celery, onion and fennel in olive oil for a few minutes. We removed the mixture to a bowl and let it cool, before adding in some chopped fennel fronds, fresh chopped parsley, the soaked dates, chopped preserved lemons, bread cubes, a little water and a couple of beaten eggs.
We poured the stuffing into a lightly oiled baking dish, and baked it until the crust was light brown and crispy, about 40 minutes.
Recipe: Merguez, Fennel And Preserved Lemon Stuffing (Cookthink)
Recipe: Bread Stuffing With Sausage, Apples And Caramelized Onions (Grill Every Day)
Recipe: Sausage Hazelnut Stuffing (The Washington Post)
Recipe: Cremini Mushroom Unstuffing (Coconut & Lime)
Recipe: Quick And Easy Preserved Lemons (The Take-Out Menu Cookbook)
Reference: What is merguez? (Cookthink)
Reference: How to prep fennel (Cookthink)