We traditionally serve sage and onion stuffing.

Fry an onion in butter, add breadcrumbs, chopped sage, seasoning. SOme people add an egg but I prefer it without. Stuff bird, or bake in a dish or roll into balls and bake.

Try adding some thyme and a little white wine.

How about adding butter & poultry seasoning?

Sage sausage would add flavor and fat, if you are prepping it outside of the bird and don't mind a little pork.

PA Dutch sounds about right. Don't know about the eggs but they might be in there. Sriracha would never pass muster, although it improves almost anything. <lol>

What's the general ratio of potatoes to bread?

I have a recipe somewhere for pancakes that involves separating the eggs, whipping the whites, and then folding them back in. Great pancakes. I wonder if something like that would work for the stuffing to give it lightness.

The recipe I use is four or five pounds of potatoes to four slices of cubed bread, 2 stalks of diced celery, 1 diced onion, milk, butter, four well-beaten eggs, chopped parsley, marjoram, salt and a bit of Old Bay seasoning or celery salt. I cook the celery and onion in butter, mash the potatoes with milk and butter, S & P and in a mixer, mix the potatoes, half of the bread, and half of the eggs. Then I blend in the rest of the ingredients by hand.

You could try the whipped egg whites idea but they'd be hard to fold in unless you added to them to the potatoes before adding any bread.

So the ratio of bread to potatoes seems pretty low. If you don't mind me asking, what's the purpose of the bread in the recipe? Do you just cube whatever bread you have on hand or do you buy the bagged stuff?

Instead of potatoes, use chestnuts.

dcarch

Before bread was filled with all kinds of preservatives, most cultures used stale bread in a myriad of ways, some still existing to this day: panzanella, meat loaf, gazpacho, bread pudding, scalloped tomatoes, French onion soup, stratas, and ribollita are some that come to mind. I guess potato filling is just another one of them.

If your mother is going to stuff the turkey with a different type of dressing, why not just suggest plain mashed potatoes? I doubt she'll go for it but you can try.