THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, November 24, 1994 TAG: 9411240625
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: MARC TIBBS
LENGTH: Medium: 59 lines
Are you an ``outty'' or an ``inny''?
Do you prefer moist or dried?
White bread/corn bread mix? Or white bread only?
By now, these and other burning questions have been answered at your house: How do you like your stuffing?
No matter how you take yours, stuffing will probably be served a hundred other ways today.
If nothing else, Thanksgiving is a day of idiosyncrasies.
Nearly everyone trims a tree at Christmas or cooks out on Independence Day. But Turkey Day seems to offer a vast array of Americana. The way families celebrate is as varied as the country itself. Stuffing is just one example.
Grated potatoes. ``It really helps bind it all together,'' said one friend who swears by the buds in her stuffing. French bread and sausage are the main ingredients one Eastern Shore woman uses.
Onions, celery, with sage, without sage - our taste buds run the gamut. Some of us use oysters, ham, dried fruits and nuts. Still others prefer the more convenient store-bought, stove-top variety.
Stuffing cooked inside the bird leaves it soft and moist. Cooking it outside in a separate pan gives it more of a crust.
But stuffing is only the beginning.
Dinner time is never more varied in America than on Thanksgiving Day.
As a kid, we'd forgo breakfast and our family would start its sit-down dinner sometimes as early as 11 a.m. That's if we hadn't already filled up the night before on samples of nearly everything my mother prepared ahead of time. By 2 p.m. Thanksgiving Day we'd all be hunting for a quiet place to nap.
Other families spend the bulk of the day in anticipation of the big, November meal - bountiful aromas wafting through the house for hours before the dinner bell rings.
And at one time or another, we've all gone visiting or gone out for Thanksgiving dinner. It is, after all, the busiest travel season of the year.
Kids are home from college. Trails are blazed cross-country to Grandma's, or crosstown to eat Chinese.
Nothing, however, more readily defines our Thanksgiving than the way we use our leftovers.
For me, day-old stuffing, pan-heated with just the right touch of water to give it that pre-baked consistency, is the height of my holiday. And turkey sandwiches on toast just aren't complete without a potato salad sandwich spread.
Ask anyone around you, and you'll find myriad ways to use that second-day bounty.
Turkey salad. Turkey casserole. A cousin spends the whole day eating nothing but desserts.
But no matter how differently we spend our national commemoration of gratitude, we all feel one sentiment when it's finally over.
Stuffed! by CNB