Cranberry Cornbread Dressing

Make cornbread: Preheat oven to 400° F. and butter two 9- by 5- by 3-inch loaf pans.

Into a large bowl sift together flour, baking powder, and salt and whisk in cornmeal and sugar until combined well.

In a bowl whisk together milk and eggs until just combined.

Add butter to flour mixture and with an electric mixer beat until mixture resembles coarse meal. Beat in egg mixture until just combined (batter will be thin).

Pour batter into pans and bake in middle of oven until golden and a tester comes out clean, about 50 minutes. Cool corn bread in pans on a rack 10 minutes and turn out onto rack to cool completely. Corn bread may be wrapped in plastic wrap and kept in a cool, dry place 2 days or frozen 2 weeks.

Prepare stuffing: preheat oven to 325° F.

Cut corn bread into 1/2-inch cubes and in 2 large shallow baking pans bake in middle of oven until just dry, about 20 minutes.

Transfer corn bread from 1 pan to a large bowl and in pan toast pecans in oven until insides are golden, 10 to 20 minutes.

(Omitted leeks)

Chop celery (Saute celery, see below).

In a 12-inch skillet cook celery in butter with salt and pepper to taste over moderately low heat, stirring,

(Omitted sausage, but add optionally)

In a small heavy saucepan cook cranberries with sugar over moderately high heat, stirring, 5 minutes, or until some begin to burst.

Chop parsley.

To bowl of corn bread add remaining corn bread cubes, pecans, cranberries, parsley, broth, and salt and pepper to taste and toss together. Cool stuffing completely. Stuffing may be made up to this point 1 day ahead and chilled, covered. Bring stuffing to room temperature before proceeding.

For cooking stuffing inside poultry: any frozen poultry destined for stuffing should be completely thawed, and the stuffing itself brought to room temperature before it’s put into the turkey. Do not stuff your bird the night before you cook it; such a seeming time-saver can have dangerous results. Instead, it is best to loosely fill the bird’s neck and body cavities immediately before roasting. And always use a meat or instant-read thermometer: The meat is done when the temperature of the thickest part of the thigh (be careful not to touch the bones) reaches 180°F.; the stuffing baked inside the bird is done at 160°-165°F. After roasting, let your stuffed poultry stand 15 to 20 minutes, a double assurance that the requisite temperatures for food safety have been reached.

For cooking all or part of stuffing outside poultry: in a shallow baking dish bake stuffing in preheated 325° F. oven 1 hour (for moist stuffing, bake covered entire time; for less moist stuffing with a slightly crisp top, uncover halfway through baking time).