Cornbread Sausage Stuffing Muffins

Cornbread Sausage Stuffing Muffins are a perfectly portioned side dish with tons of delicious flavors! Freshly baked cornbread, sweet Italian sausage, dried cranberries, walnuts, and apples are combined into muffins that bake up crispy on top and moist and tender inside.

Perfectly portioned stuffing muffins

Anyone who has hosted Thanksgiving dinner knows that the logistics of serving everything hot out of the oven is one of the most challenging aspects of preparing the meal!

Good news – these Cornbread Sausage Stuffing Muffins are a delicious way to make dinner prep much easier.  Plus, each muffin is the perfect amount of stuffing (or dressing) to serve to each guest.

• The combination of flavors – cornbread, spicy sausage, sweet dried cranberries and apples, and crunchy walnuts – is a delicious side dish for Thanksgiving turkey, or even a roast chicken dinner served other times of the year.
• You can do all of the prep for these Cornbread Sausage Stuffing Muffins ahead of time, then bake in the oven while the turkey rests before slicing. Or, you can bake these stuffing muffins earlier in the day and serve at room temperature or reheat them to hot just before serving.
• Depending on your family’s preferences, you can bake these muffins to a crisp texture on top or leave them soft and moist if you prefer.

• Prepared Cornbread – To keep prep simple, we used boxed corn muffin mix as the base of these stuffing muffins and prepared it according to the package directions with eggs and milk.  If you have time, you can make your own cornbread following one of our recipes. Just note that for twenty-four muffins (we assumed two muffins per person), you will need about ten cups of cooked cornbread.
• Unsalted Butter
• Olive Oil
• Onion – We used a yellow onion in our recipe today.
• Celery
• Fresh Garlic
• Sweet Italian Sausage – Buy a pound of bulk Italian sausage, or buy the links and remove it from the casings. (If you want spicier stuffing muffins, you can buy hot Italian sausage instead.)
• Fresh Sage and Rosemary — Fresh sage and fresh rosemary make all the flavor difference. If that is not possible, use half the amount of dried.
• Stock or broth – Canned, boxed, or homemade turkey or chicken stock or vegetable broth can be used
• Dried cranberries
• Chopped walnuts
• Granny Smith Apple
• Eggs

1. Prepare the cornbread. Cool, then cut into cubes and place onto two sheet trays and bake to crisp and dry.
2. Sauté celery and onions in butter and oil, then add sausage, salt, sage and rosemary and cook until sausage is no longer pink. Deglaze pan with some of the stock.
3. In a large bowl, mix cornbread cubes, remaining stock, cooked sausage and vegetable mixture, cranberries, walnuts, apple and eggs and toss gently to combine. (Don’t overwork the mixture)
4. Butter two standard muffin tins and, using an ice-cream scoop, divide the stuffing between the 24 cups.
5. Bake for 20 minutes on two racks positioned in the upper and bottom thirds of your oven.
6. After 20 minutes, swap pans between the two oven racks, rotate pans and bake 20 more minutes.
7. Serve hot.

• Can I make Cornbread and Sausage Stuffing Muffins ahead of time?  Yes. Although we definitely feel that these stuffing muffins are the very best served hot out of the oven, but you could prebake the cornbread and sauté the meat and vegetables ahead of time – then assemble and bake when ready. You can also bake them earlier in the day, then reheat in the oven while your turkey rests.
• How do I store leftovers?   Store refrigerated for up to two days
• How do I reheat leftovers? Reheat in the microwave or drizzle on a little butter and stock and reheat in the oven
• Can I freeze?  These can be frozen, but as mentioned above, they are best freshly baked.

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