The BEST Southern Cornbread Dressing Recipe for Thanksgiving (Easy Step-by-Step Recipe)

Stop searching—you’ve found the BEST Southern Cornbread Dressing recipe for Thanksgiving! This easy, step-by-step recipe shows you exactly how to make the classic, authentic Southern Cornbread Dressing that will be the centerpiece of your holiday meal. Forget the box mix; my family’s traditional Southern dressing recipe uses a homemade cornbread base and is baked to perfection.

This is a no-fail guide to making that famous holiday side dish. I walk you through every step to getting that incredible savory flavor and perfect texture. Every family has their own version, but this is the classic, traditional cornbread dressing that everyone loves and it’s my family’s recipe. Serve it at Thanksgiving or Christmas—it’s always a winner!

Recipe Ingredients & Full Instructions:
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We are getting ready to make southernstyle cornbread dressing. But if you have a hard time figuring out how much cornbread do I need to make my dressing, then you make your cornbread in the baking dish that you’re going to make your dressing in. Now, this recipe will be on my website, pamspres.com. I am making a very small portion today because this is a couple of months before the holidays that I’m actually filming this and I don’t want to make a lot right now. So, I’m just making a little bit and it’s hard to make a very very small amount. So, the larger scale like 9 by13 pan will be on the website. So, I’ve already made my cornbread, but I will do a different cornbread um recipe just for you guys in a whole different video. So, stay tuned for that. You will need the trinity, which is celery, green bell pepper, and onion. However, you will need more onion than celery, more celery than green bell pepper. Doesn’t matter what size pan you’re using. If you’re using a gigantic pan, whatever you pan you pick, you need more onion than celery, more celery than green bell pepper. And this is to make sure that your dressing comes out flavorful and balanced because green bell pepper is the strongest. Celery is the next strongest and onion is actually the mildest. So if you want it balanced, you need it in that order. Okay. So, the first thing we need to do, I already have mine cut up. We’re going to head to the stove and get it sauteed. We are sautéing our onion, celery, and green bell pepper, but we are not using any oil because you do not want your dressing to be oily. But you need to get your vegetables, onion and celery, and green bell pepper tender for your dressing. So, that being said, we add in chicken broth. You can also add in water. You can also add in vegetable broth. And we’re just going to let this cook until they are nice and tender. You want them to be tender because when you actually bake your dressing, it doesn’t need to bake that long and you’re not you don’t have anything in there that needs to be cooked. Okay? So, you want to have them already sauteed. So, we’re going to just let this cook. I have my stove on medium high. We’re going to just let this cook until they become soft. One thing you’re going to need for your southernstyle cornbread dressing is sage. Okay, this is rubbed sage. I actually grew this in my garden and turned it into rubbed sage. If you can get rubbed sage, you want rubbed sage, not dry sage. The difference is rubbed sage is fluffy. See how fluffy that is? It’s not completely dried out and fine like pepper or other seasonings. It’s fluffy. So when you go into the grocery store, you can buy rub saged in the grocery store. I bought it for years before I started growing it. Look for rubbed sage. If you open that container up, it will be fluffy, okay? It will not be dried out. So, make sure you have rubbed sage. And that gardening channel is at the scaredy-cat gardener on YouTube. Okay. For my dressing, now there are a thousand ways to make southern style dressing. So, if you don’t make yours the way I make mine or you’re looking at somebody else that makes theirs a different way, there are a multitude of ways to make it. For me, I put bread crumbs in mine. These are just pieces of bread, like deo bread that I actually stuck in my dehydrator and dried completely out. It’s not fine like the bread crumbs that you uh use when you batter uh chicken or fish or whatever you want to batter them with or put them in for a binding. You want chunks like this. This will help maintain the moisture in your cornbread. So now I’m just going to take this cornbread out of here and we’re just going to break it up into the bread crumbs. Okay. And it’s still kind of warm. And I’m not doing anything to this pan because our dressing is going to go right back into it. Okay. I’m going to wipe it out so that I can butter it a little bit and that will be it. Make sure that your corn bread is crumbled up. Okay. So, you want to crumble it up. Make sure your hands are absolutely clean. Okay. [Music] It doesn’t have to be fine crumbs, but it does need to be broke up. Okay. Quite a bit. All right. And just kind of mix it in with those bread crumbs. I’m going to go over here and clean my hands and I’ll be back. Okay, I have a little butter here and I am just buttering up my dish. It’s okay if a little butter is still in there. That will be just fine. Now, grabbing our onion, celery, and green bell pepper. Put it all in there. The broth, anything that’s in your skillet, put it in there. All the liquid goes into your cornbread. Okay, we’re going to take one egg and lightly beat it. The egg helps to keep it together. It helps to bind it so that it won’t be crumbly. Go ahead and add that in. Now, from here, we’re going to start adding in some of our sage and our chicken broth. I’ve got a whole pot of chicken broth over there on the stove that I’m making. I’m going to start with this first because I already had this in my refrigerator. This is some from uh what I made and I still have a pot over there. So, I may need more. You’re going to need quite a bit of liquid. Do not be afraid to add the liquid to your dressing, okay? You want to use a chicken broth if you can because again, you’re adding in more flavor. Okay, so I’m going to add in some sage. And that’s another thing when it comes to your sage. That’s your flavor bomb. That’s your flavor bomb. Okay. Add in some of your chicken broth and begin to combine it. Okay. That sage is what gives it that color as you can see, but you need to have it moist going into that oven. Don’t be afraid of the liquid. Put that liquid on in there. This is one dish that you’re going to have to keep tasting after you go so far. You want to taste it. All right. If you’re cooking for a group of people or other people outside of maybe yourself and your significant other or your immediate family, please use multiple forks to taste with or wipe it off, wash it off. Please don’t taste it, sit the fork down, and then taste it again with that same fork because that is called crosscontamination. Now, you’re going to see me do it, and that’s why I told you not to do it because this is for me and my husband. So, it don’t matter about crosscontamination with us. I’m just saying. Delicious. Add in more sage. You need to taste the sage. All right. The only salt that is in here right now is the salt that was in the cornbread. So, you may need to season yours with a little salt. Taste it and see. This is where you have to kind of make it your own. And that’s why you taste it. It should taste going into the oven. It should taste just like it would when it’s completed, when it’s done, when you’re through. Okay. And since I just tasted mine, I’m going to go in with just a little bit of salt. Not much to start with because you cannot get it back out. Okay. So, just put a tad bit in there. And the key here is to combine this well. Okay. And taste. And yes, I put raw egg in here. And yes, I am tasting it. But that one egg is all over this whole thing. And I probably got a millimeter or centimeter or something awful small on this fork, if that much at all. Also, my eggs are pasteurized. I’m tasting it. If you don’t want to taste it because you put a raw egg in it, don’t taste it. Let it come out however it’s going to come out. Okay? But I’m tasting mine. Just saying. Perfect on the salt. I don’t need any more salt. I do need a little bit more sage. And that little sage should do it. I’ll taste it again with the raw egg. Yep. I’m tasting it with the raw egg, y’all. Oh my gosh, I’m acting crazy today. And besides that, if you awful that awful fearful of tasting something cuz you had a little piece of raw egg in there, let me tell you something. Your taste buds are on your tongue. They not down your throat and in your stomach. So you can literally put it on your put it in your mouth and taste it and spit it out cuz that’s where your taste buds are. They ain’t nowhere else. So you ain’t even got to swallow it. Okay, that’s just for my extras. Oh, I like that word by extras. This is delicious. And I didn’t need any more. Well, I still need a little bit more. Do that in the end. So now we’re just going to put it in our baking dish. This may be too much for this little dish, but this is what I cooked the cornbread in, so it should be fine. You see how it expanded? Because once cornbread gets wet, once the bread crumbs get wet, they expand. Okay? So, you see my container was not full to the brim of cornbread. So, that’s another way to gauge it. Don’t overfill your container, but cook it in that same container so that you’ll know that you have enough. Okay, we are going to bake this in a 350° oven. Everybody’s oven is different. I can’t stress that enough. Mine is probably going to be in here 20 minutes, maybe not that long. Um, you’ll be able to tell. It’ll be set on the top and starting to brown. Okay, so you may need to go a little bit longer. You may not need to go as long. Now, grab a spoon and take some of your chicken broth and put it on top. Okay, you need that moisture so it won’t dry out. We’re not covering this. We’re going to put it in there just like this. I’m going to set my timer for 15 minutes so I can peek. Make sure I remember to peek. And I’m going to go longer than that. Probably at least another 10 minutes past that. But I want to make sure I take a look at it at a certain point in time, even if I have to reset my stove. And as you can see, it’s moist. I’m putting this on here. It’s moist on the top. You don’t want it soaked, but you do want to be able to see all of the liquid ingredients that you are putting on the top. Okay. And this is what it should look like going into the oven. And we shall be back. Ooh, we are done with our dressing. Look at that. Look at that. Doesn’t that look amazing? Oh my goodness. Oh my goodness. Southernstyle dressing is often traced back to the tradition of using stale bread and leftover scraps. A resourceful practice that turned humble ingredients into a celebratory dish, especially for Thanksgiving and other holidays. This beloved side dish has been a centerpiece of southern culinary tradition for generations. Okay, it is nice and moist on the inside and that’s just what we’re looking for. If you are new to the channel, welcome, welcome, welcome. Thank you for coming and hanging out with me today. Take a second and subscribe to the channel. Make sure to turn on that notification bell. Returning subscribers, thank you so much for keep coming back. And channel members, thank you from the bottom of my heart. If you are not part of Pam’s Pantry, check that out. That join button is right below. And I also want to say before we do our taste test that I do not use my giblets, my liver and any sausage or anything like that inside. That’s what you want to do. Go right ahead. I don’t care for that. I’ve got my dressing with my actual turkey cuz I cook like a 24 lb turkey. So I got my dressing. It’s like my side. I don’t need meat in that and meat on the side too. I use my giblets, my liver, and my neck that come from my full turkey to make all my broth with. Okay? Because I make a lot of broth because I have to base that turkey and then I have to cook like five times this much of dressing and other things. So, I don’t use that for that. I don’t put it in there, but feel free to do that if that’s what you want to do. Okay, we’re going to do our taste test. Moo. [Music] Have a bite. Oh my goodness. You can smell the onions and the pepper and the the green pepper and you can smell the celery and all the sage that’s in it, too. Oh my goodness. See, that’s why I made a small See, that’s why I made a small amount. And yes, I’m double dipping. Oh my goodness. But it’s mine. Delicious. Delicious. Delicious. Your guest will be so amazed and happy. Remember, the full recipe is on pamspres.com along with my seasonings, which I didn’t use any in this recipe. I will see you next time. The good Lord willing and the creek don’t rise. Oh my goodness. Bye-bye.