Healthy Thanksgiving Sides: Apple-Cranberry Stuffing

My last recipe to complete your healthy, homemade Thanksgiving dinner is one of everyone's favorites: stuffing. I mean, who doesn't like eating loads of gooey flavory bread? It's a carb lover like myself's ultimate wet (or soggy) dream.

But most stuffings are stuffed with artery-clogging components like fatty sausages and butter, and weight loss enemies like white bread.

But with a few easy swaps, you can have your bread and eat it too. 

Simply replacing white bread with wheat, butter with chicken stock, and tasty extras like walnuts, apples, and dried cranberries for greasy sausages, will drop that cal count and still leave you with something your turkey can be proud to hold.

And for those who need more meat than just the bird, a diced up chicken apple sausage can be thrown in at a minimal extra cost (140 calories per link that is).

Cran-Apple Stuffing Surprise

Ingredients:

1 Loaf of Day Old Wheat Bread

1 C. Diced Celery

1 C. Diced Onions

1 C. Diced Mushrooms

1/2 C. Dried Cranberries

1/2 C. Chopped Walnuts

1 Chopped Green Apple

1/2 C. Chopped Parsley

2 Tbs. Thyme

3 C. Chicken Stock (low-sodium)

Salt and Pepper

Directions:

1. Set oven to 400 degrees.

2. Coat a skillet in cooking spray and saute onions, celery, and mushrooms for about 5 minutes.

3. While that's cooking, chop the loaf into 1 inch pieces. 

4. Combine the bread, walnuts, and cranberries in a large bowl and set aside.

5. Add apples and spices to the skillet and continue to cook for 5 more minutes.

6. Combine the skillet ingredients with the bread bowl. Pour the chicken stock over the mixture until everything is soggy, but not soaked. This may take the entire 3 cups, or less.

7.  Coat a baking pan in cooking spray and dump in the mixture.

8. Cover the pan in tinfoil and bake for about 20 minutes. Then remove the tinfoil and bake for 10 more minutes.

9. Enjoy!

I don't have an exact calorie count on this one since every loaf will be different, but it should be around 200 calories per serving (serves 12). Regular stuffing can be anywhere from 200-400 per 1/2 cup serving, and loaded with fat.

Chow down on your Cran-Apple stuffing with my other tasty side dishes: Candied "Yams" and Mashed "Potatoes."

And if you're doing the vegan thing, swap out your turkey with a delicious Thanksgiving Lentil Loaf:

Gobble, gobble!