• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
MENUMENU
  • Home
  • Article Categories
    • The Arts
      • Iconography & Architecture
      • Literature
    • Hagiography
    • History & Tradition
      • Canons and Ecclesiology
      • Church History
    • In Depth
    • Library
    • Liturgy, Scripture, Church Seasons
      • Liturgy
      • Major Feasts [Select Sermons]
    • Living Well
      • Cooking
        • Fasting Reciples
        • Orthodox Cuisines
    • Philosophy & Theology
      • Orthodox Philosophers
      • Philosophy Matters
      • Topics in Orthodox Theology
    • Popular Patristics
      • Reardon -- Pastoral Ponderings
    • Politics & Society
      • Culture Wars
      • Political Philosophy
      • Social Crisis
      • The Wider World
    • Spirituality
      • Practical Christian Life
      • The Saints
  • Videos
    • Frederica: Topics in Orthodox Christianity [VIDEOS]
    • Frederica: An Overview of the Divine Liturgy [VIDEOS]
    • Mixed [VIDEOS]
  • About
  • Editors
  • Contact
  • Archives
    • Articles by Date
    • Articles by Author
    • Articles by Category
  • Above Ground Blog

Another City

A Journal of Orthodox Culture

Rod Dreher’s Christmas Toasted Cornbread-Pecan Dressing

December 23, 2017 / Rod Dreher

My favorite part of holiday dinners is not the turkey or the ham, but the cornbread dressing. It’s been like that for me since my childhood in the rural South. I can’t separate my fondness for cornbread dressing from memories of my grandmother, at whose cottage table I ate helping after helping of it every Thanksgiving and Christmas, until she passed away the summer I was nine, and took her recipe with her.

When I married and began preparing holiday meals with my wife, we tried several different cornbread dressing recipes (always cornbread in the South). When we were living in New York City, of all places, we happened upon the one below from Christopher Kimball, in his cookbook The Cook’s Bible: The Best Of American Home Cooking. Julie and I agreed that it was the best we’d ever tasted. For most of the 20 Christmases we’ve been together, we have prepared the dressing below — and we still agree that it’s the best part of any holiday meal.

I encourage you to make your cornbread from scratch, instead of from a box. It won’t be the end of the world if you use a box mix, but homemade is not hard, and it’s so much better. Also, I discovered a couple of years ago the Bavarian spice blend from The Spice House (available by mail order), which is superb on pork and chicken, and can be substituted for the dried thyme and sage in this recipe.

Toasted Cornbread-Pecan Dressing

6 cups coarsely crumbled cornbread
3/4 cup pecans
1/4 pound bacon, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 cups finely chopped onions
3/4 cup finely chopped celery
1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves or 1 teaspoon dried
1 tablespoon fresh sage, minced, or 1 teaspoon dried
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
4 tablespoons bourbon
1 cup chicken stock
1/2 cup minced flat leaf parsley

  1. Heat over to 350F. Spread crumbled cornbread onto a baking sheet. Coarsely chop pecans and add to cornbread. Toast in oven for 25-30 minutes or until cornbread is golden, tossing the crumbs once or twice during toasting. Cool and place in a large mixing bowl.
  2. Cook bacon over medium-high heat in a saute pan of skillet. Remove bacon with a slotted spoon to bowl with cornbread and pour off all but 1 tablespoon of drippings (mmm…bacon drippings). Add butter and olive oil to skillet and when butter has melted add onion and saute for 5 minutes over medium heat. Add celery and saute another three minutes. Stir in thyme and sage and salt and pepper to taste. Add to cornbread.
  3. Turn up heat under saute pan and add bourbon. Stir vigorously for 2 minutes with a wooden spoon, scraping the bottom of the pan. Add chicken stock, cook for 1 minute, and add mixture to bowl. Add parsley to bowl and adjust seasonings.
Another City: A Journal of Orthodox Culture

About the Author

Rod Dreher
Rod Dreher is an American writer and editor. He is a senior editor and blogger at The American Conservative and author of several books, including How Dante Can Save Your Life.
  • December 23, 2017ArticlesRod Dreher’s Christmas Toasted Cornbread-Pecan Dressing

Tags: cooking, Rod Dreher

Primary Sidebar

Notes From Above Ground

Mother and Child

December 30, 2019
Frederica Mathewes-Green

Tending Time in Lent

Tending Time in Lent

March 13, 2018
Nicole Roccas

The Real Jesus

Looking for the Real Jesus? Try the Gospels

December 29, 2017
Bruce Seraphim Foltz

Visit Notes from Above Ground Blog

The Vision of Another City

Another City. But what is this other city? The Other City is Jerusalem, the Holy City standing on Mt Zion high above the pagan cities of the Ancient World. Yet it is also the obscure, outlying village of Bethlehem, in which Christ Himself was born. It is Constantinople, the New Rome, and it is the Desert City of the monks, set up spontaneously as a spiritual alternative to the imperial city. It is the Heavenly City, which stands as a beacon to present-day civilization, and ultimately it is the New Jerusalem, for which we yearn and toward which we strive.
St. Sophia Cathedral

Another City News


Around the Web

  • The Fantastic Basilica San Vitale is the Last Entirely Intact Byzantine Church
  • The Constant Consumer | Amazon’s mission is to make customer identity more primary than citizenship
  • We Are All Accumulating Mountains of Things: How Online Shopping and Cheap Prices are Turning Americans into Hoarders
  • People’s egos get bigger after meditation and yoga, says a new study
  • Traumatised Bears, Wolves Find Solace at Greek Sanctuary
  • Meditation without Faith Does Not Make You A Better Person
  • I have 1,605 Facebook friends. Why do I feel so alone?
  • Everything you know about the Gospel of Paul is likely wrong
  • Looking for Ancient African Religion? Try Christianity.
  • How the Great Books Are Revolutionizing College Admissions Tests
  • Calculating Christmas: The Story Behind December 25
  • The First Sexual Revolution
  • Pew Report: Two-Thirds of Americans Believe ‘Jesus Was Born to a Virgin’

Media

Click to open in new tab Click to open in new tab Click to open in new tab

Favorite Web Sites

  • JOURNALS / BLOGS
  • RESEARCH
  • American Orthodox Institute
  • Ancient Christian Wisdom
  • Byzantine, TX
  • Monomakhos
  • Mystagogy Resource Center
  • Notes on Arab Orthodoxy
  • Orthodox Arts Journal
  • Orthodox Christian Information Center
  • Orthodox Christianity
  • Orthodox Ethos
  • Orthodox Net
  • Pemptousia
  • Pravmir
  • Road to Emmaus
  • Early Church Fathers Library (Schaff)
  • Early Church Fathers (Pearse) Includes many not represented in Schaff
  • Eighth Day Books
  • Lives of the Saints
  • Myriobiblos Orthodox Library (Church of Greece) Includes complete prayer book
  • Monachos.net
  • North American Patristics Society Includes links to Patrologia Graeca texts, along with many other resources.
  • Orthodox Wiki
  • Septuagint Old Testament in English (Brenton)
  • Strong’s Concordance

Marketplace

Click to visit Uncut Mountain
Another City Marketplace
Click to visit Eighth Day Books
Another City Marketplace

Copyright © 2025 · Another City · A Publication of the American Orthodox Institute · Designed by LOGOS Web Services · Log in