Once you have decided on the Turkey Recipe for Thanksgiving, what is the next dish that comes to mind? Stuffing, that side dish that marries all the other recipes together into one delicious dish. We’ve made many variations over the years, from the boxed stuff to an old from scratch family favorite. For the past couple of years we’ve been making our own Fresh Fruit and Herb Stuffing using cranberries and apples from the orchard and a few ready made ingredients from the grocer.
Our family has differing opinions when it comes to our preference of the texture of stuffing. I prefer a drier stuffing that you can see every ingredient individually while others prefer their stuffing to be extremely moist and blended together where the ingredients are indistinguishable.
We are huge fans of the fresh cranberries in this stuffing, but it’s not for everyone. The tartness of the fresh cranberries can surprise you when you first try this recipe. As an alternative you can substitute in dried cranberries
We first tried this recipe after Aimee from Simple Bites shared it during the Virtual Progressive Thanksgiving Dinner in 2010. We changed some of the ingredients to suit our tastes and those of our boys and we’ll use whatever spices we happen to have on hand at the time. I encourage you to do the same, get creative and soon you’ll be adding this to your family’s Thanksgiving menu every year too.
Fresh Fruit and Herb Stuffing
- Total Time: 1 hour
Description
Fresh fruit and herbs fill these ordinary stuffing recipe with LOTS of flavor!
Ingredients
- 1 cup celery, diced
- 2 cups yellow onio, diced
- 1/2 cup butter
- 1 tablespoon dried Thyme
- 1 teaspoon rubbed Sage
- 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1 tablespoon salt
- 2 cups diced Granny Smith apples
- 1 cup chicken or turkey stock
- 1/2 cup chopped walnuts
- 1 cup fresh cranberries, chopped
- 8 cups cube unseasoned stuffing
Instructions
- Add butter, celery and onions to a skillet over medium heat and cook for 5 minutes stirring occasionally.
- Add the salt, pepper, thyme and sage. Cook until tender then add apples and cook for 2 minutes longer.
- While vegetables are cooking add unseasoned stuffing to a large mixing bowl. When vegetable mixture is done cooking transfer to mixing bowl and toss together with bread cubes.
- Add cranberries and walnuts to bowl and mix well. Pour turkey/chicken stock over stuffing and mix well.
- Pack stuffing into a buttered ovenproof dish and bake at 350 F for 45 minutes or until golden brown. Serve it hot.
Notes
Make this stuffing up to 24 hours in advance, wrap and refrigerate. Increase cooking time to take into account it will be cold coming out of the refrigerator.
- Prep Time: 15 mins
- Cook Time: 45 mins
- Category: Side Dish
3 Comments
looks so good! I would be honored if you shared this at my Ginger Jamboree Link Party!
Is there a typo in this recipe? A tablespoon of salt and thyme seems like a lot. Should it be a teaspoon of each? Looking forward to trying this.
Hi Deborah, the tablespoon is correct. There is a lot of bread in the stuffing that will soak up the seasoning. You can certainly decrease the amount if you want, it won’t hurt anything.
~Liz