Stuffin' Muffins

At turkey time, the stuffing bowl always seemed to be the first to be emptied at the dinner table even though I’d stuff the bird in every possible place. Not only that, but the kids always fought for the crispy parts of the stuffing that baked on the outside of the bird.

I finally found a way to make enough stuffing for everyone, and have it crispy on the outside... I bake my stuffing separately in muffin tins instead of in the turkey. The problem of course is that you don’t get the nice turkey flavor if you don’t cook it inside the turkey unless you have another way of getting it.

My solution is to boil the neck, gizzard, liver and heart in a saucepan with 4 cups of water for several hours and a chopped up onion, celery, 1 tsp salt and 1/2 tsp pepper and 1 tsp poultry seasoning. If you have dried or fresh parsley, that also adds a wonderful flavour. The resulting broth is perfect to both stretch your gravy if you need to do that, and also to give your stuffing that wonderful turkey flavour. I like to chop up the turkey parts into small pieces and leave it in the broth for extra texture and flavour, but you can also just use the juice if you prefer

STUFFIN’ TURKEY MUFFINS

This recipe makes about 8 muffins. Just duplicate it as many times as you need for however many muffins you need. If you are serving a big crowd of people, this is one way to ensure that everyone gets some stuffing.

• 1 cup of finely chopped onion
• 1 cup of finely chopped celery
• 2 tablespoons of parsley (optional)
• 10-12 slices of bread cubed into 1/2 inch cubes ( or 8 cups of cubed bread)
• 2 tbsp butter
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp pepper
• 1 tsp poultry seasoning
• 1 cup of turkey broth
• 1 egg slightly beaten

Saute the onion, celery and parsley together in the butter until tender. Add salt, pepper and poultry seasoning. Add turkey broth and stir.

Put your bread cubes in a large bowl and toss with the beaten egg.

Slowly add the above mixture to the cubed bread and mix thoroughly.