Grandmother Ward’s Cornbread Dressing

Over the years, I’ve posted my Kitchen Sink Dressing recipe and my mother’s Oyster Dressing recipe online, so today I complete the triumvirate.

My grandmother, Mildred Harlin Ward. I miss her so much.

My Grandmother Ward’s Cornbread Dressing has been on our Thanksgiving table for as long as I can remember. She was an amazing cook, and an expert baker. She worked all week as a secretary at the state unemployment office, and then on Saturdays she would bake bread and other goodies. After she played the organ at church on Sunday morning she would load up her car with her baked goods and drive around Lebanon delivering them to members of our church who were sick or needed cheering up. I used to love to go with her on her delivery runs. She lived long enough to lecture me about how I prepared my Thanksgiving feast, which included stern words about always baking this cornbread from scratch.

This recipe makes a big pan of dressing. Halve it if you are serving less than 12 people.

FOR THE CORNBREAD

INGREDIENTS:

• 2 cups yellow cornmeal
• 1 cup flour
• 2 cups buttermilk
• 1 cup milk
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup melted butter
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 2 teaspoon dried sage/ or heaping tablespoon of chopped fresh sage
• 2 teaspoons of dried thyme / or heaping tablespoon of chopped fresh thyme
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 loaf of store-bought French bread (sorry Grandmother)

DIRECTIONS:

1. Preheat oven to 425.
2. Combine cornmeal and flour. Separately whisk together buttermilk, milk, and egg. Add baking soda to milk mixture.
3. Stir milk mixture into cornmeal and flour. Stir in salt and herbs. Then stir in melted butter till blended. Don’t overmix.
4. Grandmother used cast iron skillets that she heated on stove with some shortening in them before she poured in the batter. I use a large casserole dish, but I butter it and then warm it in the oven before I pour in the batter.
5. Bake for 25 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean.
6. After cooled, cut in cubes and spread on cookie sheet to dry. I do this a day or twoahead to dry out the cornbread. Last minute you can always carefully dry out in a low temp oven.
7. Cut French loaf into cubes to dry out.

FOR THE DRESSING

INGREDIENTS:

• 1/2 pound sausage
• 1/2 pound bacon
• 2 medium or 1 & 1/2 large chopped onions
• 2 cloves minced garlic
• 4–6 chopped celery stalks
• 3 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
• Cubed dried bread and cornbread
• Chicken broth

DIRECTIONS:

1. Preheat to 350 or 375 ( I use whatever the other stuff I have in the oven calls for because this doesn’t need an exact temperature).
2. Cook bacon and sausage, remove from pan, crumble bacon after cooked. Using the grease left in pan, add a tablespoon or 2 of olive oil and sauté the onion and celery until soft. Add minced garlic and sauté another minute or 2.
3. In very large bowl mix the dried bread and cornbread. Add the bacon and sausage and the onion and celery mixture. Add the chopped fresh parsley. Slowly add the chicken broth so the bread absorbs it evenly. I use at least a carton of chicken broth, sometimes more. The mixture needs to be very moist of you dressing will be too dry.
4. Bake for 30 minutes until top browned.