This is the BEST Stuffing Recipe

You know how you hear about people taking recipes to their grave? My husband’s grandma seriously did that with her Thanksgiving bread stuffing.

It was the best turkey stuffing in the whole wide world, and I consider myself a stuffing aficionado. It had a simple, comforting flavor and was toasted to perfection.

Try as we might, we never got Mary Ellen to give up the recipe for her turkey stuffing. The only detail she ever gave us was “well, I just soak the bread in milk, really.”

So, ever since Mary Ellen passed, it’s been my mission to try to recreate this recipe. Using some flavor memories based on what Jeff and I can recall about Grandma’s stuffing, I first published my best educated guess of how this stuffing was created back in 2014.

Using reader comments and e-mails ever since, I’ve made revisions to the recipe to keep getting it closer and closer to the original.

The recipe card below reflects nine years of work, and at least a dozen tests. At this point, I think I’m a close as I can get to honoring the flavors of Mary Ellen’s stuffing.

The recipe in the card below will yield you a delicious old fashioned bread stuffing to serve alongside your Thanksgiving turkey, I guarantee it.

“I ran across your Grandma Mary Ellen’s stuffing recipe last year and what a hit it was!! Thank you!! I too have been searching for a recipe similar to my Grandmother’s and your recipe is spot on!”

—Mary

What is stuffing?

Stuffing, also known as dressing, is a quintessential part of holiday feasts, specially where turkey is served. It’s a mixture of cubed bread, vegetables, and seasonings, and it produces a very comforting blend of flavors and textures.

Technically, it’s called “stuffing” when it gets stuffed into the bird, and “dressing” when its cooked in a separate baking dish.

But, since you tend to have to overcook the turkey to make sure the stuffing reaches a safe temperature, we just cook ours in a baking dish, but we’ve always still called it stuffing.

The post Grandma’s Old Fashioned Bread Stuffing appeared first on Foxes Love Lemons.

This Burrata Peach Salad is the perfect balance of flavor.

Since I’m not the world’s biggest fan of peaches eaten on their own or in sweet dishes, my goal this summer was to make the best savory peach dish ever.

This Burrata Peach Salad lives up to those expectations and more.

While many peach burrata salads also include tomatoes or avocado for filler, or prosciutto, this one needs no filler or meat at all.

The co-stars of this show are lots of juicy grilled peaches and luscious burrata cheese.

The supporting players are a flurry of fresh herbs, pine nuts, and a sweet-savory dressing made with honey and shallots.

The special guest star is some rustic pesto croutons which you’ll want to gobble up before they even make it onto the salad.

The post Peach Burrata Salad appeared first on Foxes Love Lemons.

Melted ice cream seems like it should be one of life’s great heartbreaks.

Maybe you had a birthday party and left it out a few minutes too long. Maybe your husband accidentally put the ice cream away in the FRIDGE and not the freezer (ask me how I know).

No judgement here. However you got here, we’re going to repurpose that melted ice cream into something magnificent!

This Brioche French Toast recipe uses melted ice cream in place of the dairy and vanilla extract found in traditional French toast recipes.

The subtle sweetness of the ice cream, along with the perfectly crisp golden brown crust on the French toast may have you melting ice cream on purpose for brunch!

Allow me to introduce you to this ice cream French toast recipe that is made with melted ice cream. It’s a kitchen “hack” that has probably already made the rounds on Tik Tok, but I’ve been making since long before that.

The post French Toast with Ice Cream appeared first on Foxes Love Lemons.

When you think of a charcuterie board, you might think of a cocktail party, a light dinner or even an afternoon snack. But I also think of breakfast!

As I’ll explain below, charcuterie for breakfast is quite common in Europe, and I think we should celebrate here in the United States, too!

Read on to learn how to build an epic Breakfast Charcuterie board perfect for a weekend brunch or holiday gathering like Mother’s Day.

The post Breakfast Board Ideas appeared first on Foxes Love Lemons.

When I think of “party food,” it begins and ends with dip for me. Personally, I feel that no party is complete without chips and dip, veggies and dip, crackers and dip, bread and dip, buffalo chicken dip, or maybe all of the above.

And OK, maybe some charcuterie cups or shrimp deviled eggs, but those are in no way as important as the dip.

When I was a kid, I would look forward to my parents’ get-togethers with their friends only for the dip. I knew that a party meant that my mom would be buying potato chips and French onion dip, and I was probably going to eat half of it by myself.

Nowadays, I still love a good creamy dip with simple, delicious ingredients. This Roasted Garlic Dip recipe has a pretty short list of ingredients, but the roasting of the garlic imparts an incredible flavor into the cooling sour cream and creamy mayonnaise mixture.

Add the citrus zing of some lemon juice, and this dip is positively irresistible. 

Use this garlic dip for chips, crackers, toasted bread, or even as a dipping sauce for mini Hasselback potatoes or lamb lollipops.

The post Roasted Garlic Dip appeared first on Foxes Love Lemons.

Am I the only one that considers ordering pizza to be the weirdest, most awkward social experiment? By nature, it’s designed to be shared with a group. But that also means that you and your friends all have to agree on toppings.

I don’t know about your group of friends, but mine have pretty varied tastes. One person wants mushrooms, somebody else stand them (too bad, because they’ll miss out on chicken stroganoff!).

Somebody else wants olives, but another person would rather have anything but olives. Oh, and then somebody wants a chicken pizza and the pepperoni lovers give them the side eye.

This usually results in ordering ALL of the pizzas and having leftovers for days (and spending way too much money).

With game day coming up, I came up with a fun option where everybody can get their way. It’s not quite the same as a regular pizza, but this crostini pizza bar is a fun appetizer to pair with other game day food like healthy buffalo chicken dip and my football themed charcuterie board.

By the time you load your plate up with snacks, you pretty much have a meal, right?

The post Crostini Pizza Bar appeared first on Foxes Love Lemons.

Disclosure: This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of the Michigan Apple Committee. All opinions are 100% my own. #MIApples

I’m not on TikTok. The only TikToks I see are the ones my friends text me, or the ones popular enough to eventually make their way onto Instagram. Honestly, if I signed up, I’d probably spend way too much time on it, so I’m OK staying off of it.

This means that most of the current food trends fly right past me, because most of them originate on TikTok. But once in awhile, some, like jarcuterie and breakfast charcuterie boards are popular enough that even I can’t ignore them.

One of the original TikTok trends, Dalgona coffee, has made it’s way into my repertoire, and when I’m not making caramel iced coffee, I’m still making Dalgona coffee (more like still trying to make my way through the HUGE jar of instant coffee granules I bought).

And recently, of course, I haven’t been able to miss the butter boards making the rounds on all forms of social media. Whether you love them, hate them or haven’t tried one yet, I’m sure you’ve also realized they’re impossible to ignore.

Give me room temperature salted butter any day of the week, and I’m in. And with it being apple season (also known as autumn) here in Pure Michigan, I thought I would combine butter with APPLE butter made from Michigan Apples to create my own spin on this wild, fun trend.

Grab some friends, and, for those over the age of 21, a round of bourbon apple cider cocktails or caramel apple mules, and let’s dive in to this butter board recipe!

The post Autumn Butter Board appeared first on Foxes Love Lemons.

What are your thoughts on Thanksgiving appetizers? I think it kind of depends on what time you eat your main dinner.

I know some families that will do an appetizer lunch earlier in the day, but then have their main dinner with bourbon glazed turkey and grandma’s old fashioned dressing and all the other trimmings later in the evening.

My gathering usually eats our meal around 3pm, so we keep appetizers pretty simple (maybe a very small charcuterie board idea) so that we don’t fill up too much before the main event. I mean, I like to save some room for Thanksgiving salad and Thanksgiving fruit salad, because I’m a weirdo.

This simple baked goat cheese cranberry appetizer for Thanksgiving is a little something to nibble on that won’t fill you up terribly.

Plus, like my cranberry tart pie, this appetizer with goat cheese is a nice way to incorporate cranberries into this seasonal meal if traditional cranberry sauce just isn’t your favorite thing.

The post Baked Goat Cheese Cranberry Appetizer appeared first on Foxes Love Lemons.

Weird story about my childhood: there was a 2 to 3 year period growing up where I just hated bacon. I don’t even know WHY, I just turned on it one day.

So, while my parents enjoyed BLT’s with juicy Midwestern tomatoes and a side of my mom’s potato salad during the summer, I literally ate lettuce and tomato sandwiches.

The good news is, I got over this phase (I even have a popular tutorial on how to cook bacon in the oven). I’m still not bacon crazed, by any means, but it certainly has a time and a place.

I love a bacon wrapped hot dog, and a salmon recipe, and truly, nothing beats a BLT. While it’s hard to improve on such a classic sandwich, I do make tweaks to it now and then.

One day I had some extra smoked salmon in the fridge, and this smoked salmon BLT was born. It’s made with a lemon herb mayonnaise that take this sandwich to the next level.

The post Smoked Salmon BLT appeared first on Foxes Love Lemons.

Prosciutto Italian Sandwich

In my house, it’s rare that prosciutto makes it “into” anything other than straight into my daughter’s belly. It’s been one of her very favorite foods since she started eating solids!

I try to limit her consumption so she doesn’t overdo it on the salt and fat intake, but let’s face it: she’s onto something. Prosciutto is delicious.

So every once in awhile I’ll splurge and buy TWO packages – one for my daughter to eat, and the second to actually make something with, like prosciutto pinwheels or Easter salad.

Today, I’m sharing one of my favorite simple sandwiches. All you need is bread, prosciutto, pears and an easy homemade herby-cheesy mayo.

The post Best Prosciutto Sandwich appeared first on Foxes Love Lemons.