The Secret Ingredient

(Jump to Recipe) [Link has been disabled]

It’s getting close, my friends! The holiday season is closing in on us faster than my Aunt Trudy can say “fruitcake” and throw back a cocktail! So what does this mean for those of us doomed to put a smile on our faces while we welcome the in-laws, cousins, black sheep, and freeloaders? It means we scour the internet looking for the best recipes to impress even your mother-in-law, who is arguably more judgmental than an entire panel of Supreme Court Justices. 

You may be wondering the secret of choosing the “perfect” recipe to please even the pickiest of crowds seating themselves at your festively adorned table. Well, I’m going to share that secret with you here, today. Right in this very recipe. No, not in the second paragraph! Are you crazy? Keep reading. 

The secret to the perfect recipe is one my dear mother shared with me years ago, as we labored in the kitchen preparing meals for my family. It’s a secret her mother, my dear grandmother, shared with her. Back in those days, we planned meals by the month. Large meals on Sunday afternoon, leftovers on Mondays, meat on Tuesdays (Taco Tuesday was not invented until 1997), soup on Wednesdays with leftover meat, pasta on Thursdays, Meatloaf on Fridays (payday), leftovers on Saturday. This was written in the Kitchen Constitution, not to be amended but for the result of Acts of God or unforeseeable circumstances. (Like in 1996 when the meat on Tuesday was ham, but it rolled off the baking pan onto the floor and was immediately pounced upon by our two shih-tzus with visions of Porky Pig dancing in their brains.) 

Holiday meals were also written in stone in my house. My grandmother swore that if you turned over Moses’ tablets with the 10 Commandments, holiday meal guidelines were etched into the back. She may have been right. Thou shalt prepare thy turkey with stuffing! 

Speaking of stuffing, my grandmother made the best stuffing you could ever hope to tickle your tastebuds. It was made of three types of stale bread, the perfect amount of celery (Shush about celery. I know it’s from the Devil’s garden of useless vegetables, but it is needed in this recipe), and chicken stock with more flavor than any bouillon cube this side of the Mississippi. My grandmother prided herself on her stuffing, as she should have. It’s the first bowl to be emptied every Thanksgiving and Christmas, with family folklore telling the tale of a fist fight between cousins Hank and Roger over the last savory square back in 1972. 

Today, I’ll share with you my grandmother’s beloved recipe, passed down to my mother and myself. You must remember, however, that “with great power comes great responsibility”, as I believe was stated by a legendary person. I’m not quite sure who, though. I’ll get back to you on that. We have more important matters at hand anyway. 

This recipe calls for stale bread, and that is where the magic comes from. Stale white bread, stale sourdough bread, and stale rye bread are the starchy cornerstones of this dish. You can use the ends, middles, any section cut in cubes to perfection. I would recommend leaving the cubes out overnight to truly get that stale feel. Just leave them where the cats won’t knock them off the table, being the salty sous chefs that they are. Yes, this did happen to me, which is why I am warning you. 

Along with the stale bread trio, you will also need fresh garlic, onions, and sage. I’m leaving the rosemary out of this recipe because my father is allergic to it. Do I want to induce an allergic reaction and have him need to leave the dinner table in an anaphylactic scene, knocking over chairs and spilling his beer as he rushes to the medicine cabinet for an epipen? Of course not! The sage more than makes up for the lack of rosemary here, and you’ll just have to put your wholehearted trust in me on that. 

This leads me back to my promise from earlier, the secret to a perfect recipe for the holidays. And now if you’ve stayed with me this far in the recipe, it is only fair to let you in on it at this point. The secret my grandmother shared with my mother, and that my mother shared with me. When preparing my grandmother’s recipe, the most important ingredient is certainly a secret one. You are likely wondering why. Well, it’s because it can only be found in certain areas, can be difficult and expensive to obtain, and over the years my grandmother didn’t even realize it was her secret ingredient! 

Let’s go back, briefly, to Thanksgiving in 1965. Times were tough, money was tight, and my grandmother was raising six kids all on her own. But she made holidays very special for everyone, and we always knew her cooking was the key to our happiness. My uncle Ted also loved cooking, from a young age, but especially in his teens. He’d help my grandmother in the kitchen, and even began growing his own herbs on his windowsill in his bedroom to use in recipes. As I said, money was tight, and my grandmother was very appreciative that Uncle Ted was growing fresh basil, oregano, and parsley, among others to use in the cooking. When it came time to make the stuffing that Thanksgiving, my grandmother went to my Uncle Ted’s windowsill and gathered fresh herbs, along with some dried herbs he also had in his room. And that, my fellow chefs, is the secret. Grandma had been cooking with a very “special” herb starting in ‘65, and used it every year in her stuffing. She shared that secret ingredient with my mother, who also cooked it in her stuffing, and now I use it as well. It’s the secret ingredient that makes holidays warm and fuzzy. It makes in-laws tolerable. It makes everything right with the world. It even makes you hungry later to munch on all the leftovers you can find. 

And now, my cooking friends, you have the secret to culinary success, thanks to my grandmother. Scroll down for the full recipe, and be sure to keep your stove set on low when preparing this stuffing sensation. Happy holidays to you all! 

Follow me for more recipes on my blog, Mary Jane’s Cooking Secrets!