Happy Monday guys!  We are officially ten days away from Thanksgiving and I am pretty darn excited about it!  Everyone has a favorite dish that makes or breaks a good Thanksgiving meal, and for me that dish is stuffing...or dressing...or whatever you call it.  My homemade sausage stuffing is honestly my favorite part of the entire Thanksgiving meal.  It's the texture, it's the flavor combinations, it's that combined with a bite of turkey it is just the perfect Thanksgiving bite wrapped into one!  To me, if there is one dish to make to go alongside your turkey this year, it's gotta be my homemade sausage stuffing!

Bread combined with herbs, onions, celery, broth, and savory sausage creates something magical if you ask me, and I have decided I need to make stuffings year round because they are just too delicious to only eat around the holidays!  You can tweak this recipe by omitting the sausage if you prefer a meatless stuffing or you can add apples etc. to make it your own!  However you do it, I can assure you that it will be delicious and you can make it ahead and simply bake the day of to relieve a little Thanksgiving day stress in the kitchen!

Ingredients:

• 8 Cups Cubed French Bread

• 1 Lb. Hot or Mild Ground Sausage

• 1 Cup Chopped Celery

• 1 Cup Chopped Onion

• 1 Tbsp. Finely Chopped Rosemary

• 1 Tsp. Finely Chopped Sage

• 1 Tbsp. Fresh Thyme

• 4 Tbsp. Butter

• 1-2 Cups Chicken or Turkey Stock

• 1 Tbsp. Kosher Salt

• 1 Tsp. Black Pepper

Directions:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

• Place bread cubes on a baking sheet and bake for 10 minutes until slightly golden brown.

• In a large skillet sauté sausage until golden brown. Remove from pan and drain on paper towels.

• Add butter to the same skillet and then add onion, celery, herbs, salt and pepper and sauté for 5-10 minutes until veggies are tender and then add sausage back into the skillet and toss to combine.

• In large bowl combine bread cubes and sausage and veggie mixture and then pour 1 cup of chicken stock over top and toss to combine. If bread still feels dry add the other cup slowly until bread is just moist, but not soggy.

• Spread into a 9 x 13 baking dish and bake for 40-45 minutes until bread is golden brown on top.

• Serve immediately.

For another great side, I also love my mom-mom's sweet potato casserole that borders along the lines of a vegetable posing as a dessert!  Yum!

Of course Thanksgiving means yummy food, but it also means to me that I can officially decorate for Christmas, which if you know me at all, you know that I get a little too excited for the holiday season!