Getting the ball rolling.

At some point today, hopefully between 11 and 11:30, we will be hitting the road to go to my moms for Thanksgiving.  This will mean tackling Snoqualmie Pass, which for now as least is below the snow level.  Luckily this string of moisture that's been coming in to the Northwest has brought mild temperatures, because 3 inches of rain is enough moisture to have dumped 2-3 feet of snow if we had already had Arctic air in place.

All my mom has asked us to bring(other than her grandkids) is my cornbread, sausage and apple stuffing. 

My mom is a bit of a traditionalist when it comes to cooking, where I buy into all that new fangled stuff like 'brining' and not 'stuffing the bird'.  For decades, she made Her Moms stuffing...shredded white bread that sits on the counter overnight, Bell Seasoning, celery, onions and broth.  I wasn't a big stuffing fan growing up.  Then when I was in the Navy, I went to a friends house for dinner, and his wife from Tennessee had made a sausage and apple cornbread stuffing, and I was transported to a better place. 

I still remember the first year I hosted Thanksgiving, and I made the recipe above.  My mom still made a pan of Her Moms stuffing...and it went virtually untouched.  This continued a few years, to the point where now we just make my stuffing.  And...yeah, while it makes me feel like I know how to cook, it also bummed me out a bit...I didn't want to take that tradition from my mom, I just wanted to make some tasty stuffing!  Reheated with gravy, my stuffing is tasty, and just about a meal unto itself.

Rather than buy cornbread croutons, I just bake a few pans of Jiffy Cornbread mix, which I did last night.  I then crumbled it, and stuck in a zip lock baggy, to save time tomorrow.  I'll also go ahead and brown the sausage(I use Jimmy Dean Sage instead of the Italian that the recipe calls for) tonight.

I'm not responsible for any desert this year...my mom is making a pumpkin, a pecan, and a lemon meringue pie.  I thought about make a faux pumpkin Hubbard Squash pie, but we don't need two pumpkin pies. 

Plus, I would feel kind of guilty when it came out better than the fresh from the can pumpkin pie my mom is making.  I