I started putting meat in my stuffing a year ago. What a difference it makes. I make a plain jane bread stuffing, but add the meat from six hot Italian sausages to it. I fry it up, crumbling it up. (remove it from the casing first). Once the bird is stuffed, I put thick sliced bacon all over the top of the bird and put it in the oven, covered. I uncover the last 1/2 hour to 45 minutes to brown the bacon. Remove the bacon then crumble it finely. In the meantime, leave the bird in the oven and it'll brown nicely. When you take the stuffing out of the bird, mix in the crumbled bacon. I also add cranberries to the stuffing. One of the guys I work with told me his sister did this so I tried it for Christmas and it was an instant hit. You would think the spices from the sausages would over power the 'normal' dressing spices, but it actually enhanced them, with a tiny kick. Even people who don't like spicey would eat it, I'm sure.

Sharing leftovers is half the fun, and not just on Thanksgiving. I always try to make sufficient quantities of food for sharing. It is nice to have a meal or two of different sides than the ones you always make yourself. Or an easy sandwich or soup of leftover meat when exhaustion hits the next day. The exception is a certain relative's house where she won't put away the food for many hours after the meal because "No one has gotten sick and died yet." I've cleaned the kitchen and put food away in a timely manner quite a few times there. But when she insists I leave it and come into the living room to chat, I won't eat the leftovers. Luckily, she is not so careless with food safety during the prep and cooking part of meals. And luckily, no one has died from the leftovers yet.

There's barbecue sauce and barbecue sauce. I'm not surprised that it was yucky. Probably way too intense. A béchamel or tomatoey sauce with barbecue spices would have been better. So, constructing a casserole (American): There's usually a bottom layer that kind of ties it together, and it's often a starch. Done well, it doesn't stick to the dish, which makes lifting out somewhat tidy portions easier (do oil the dish first, though--it's not magic). The greens in mine were only a thin layer, and worked for this too. I've been known to prebake some seasoned up leftover rice into the bottom. I keep thinking it'll be crunchy Persian, but either it's just that my filling is too moist, or that I just don't have a deft hand at the rice (likely). Anyway, you can have layers of filling, which I often do for even distribution, or just dump stuff in. It should have a binder/moistener, like eggs or mornay/velouté/béchamel/bordelaise or regular gravy, or a bunch of grated cheese stirred in. If you want to really bind it and make it cuttable more than scoopable, use eggs. It can be eggs and, but a 9" square needs something like four eggs and a good bake to make cut squares. Then there's a top layer that's there to get hard and keep the filling moist (though, for instance, I made my T'day stuffing as a casserole, letting the bread on top get hard and be its own topping, or what one guest called "crouton"). Normally, it'll be a cheese or bread crumb or crumble topping (grains, plus). Usually, there's fat in the topping to help ti spread and brown and stay somewhat moist. The rest is just imagining what will taste good together. You can start by interpreting other flavors, like the bbq sauce one sounded like a taco salad or similar before the sauce. I think it would probably be good with a Mexican or cheddar cheese sauce (easy on the cheese--it's for flavor not "food") and taco seasoning. Sometimes there are things you want to use up but just won't play together--listen to your instincts. Seasoning is really important. The elements may be well seasoned, but combined, the seasoning may float away in the sauce. Keep what's already in the ingredients when you make your sauce, but make sure there's a lot of flavor in the sauce. The rest is experience. Practice makes perfect. :) And sometimes you' have an order pizza moment when you guess wrong. :)

Looks good, JL. Try to roll the pie crust much thinner. I can give you tips if you wish. Avoid over-handling the pie dough. Be sure enough COLD shortening cut into flour so mix appears to have petite pea sized bits of flour. You will have added a bit of fine salt to the flour, BTW. PREPARE a place to roll out dough, you will roll from center outward, not back & forth. I use a floured muslin pastry cloth ~ 30” square. Put a cotton stockinette on the rolling pin lightly lour that. Add the appropriate amount of ice cold water, SLOWLY, not all at once. Mix lightly with a fork (do not stir and avoid over mixing). Add the other few Tablespoon of ice wager in a similar way. You want to pretty much just get it moist, not gooey or soupy. Just moit. Only mix it a bit. It will begin to form a loose raggd ball. Remove the pek dough from bowl, press together a bit to form a quasi loose ball. Careful not to overhandle it or warm the butter. At this point, esp if you’re slow ;-) you can cover w plastic wrap and refrigerate for 25 minutes. Remove plastic and place dough on flored pastry cloth. Begin to firmly roll outward from the center. Keep enough light flour on rolling pin to prevent dough from sticking. Tidy up ragged or tearing edges as you roll outward. I sometimes patch them (rob peter, pay paul). You want to apply some firm force and pressure as you roll outward from center. Try to getpie dough rolled out so that it is thinner than as US quarter. If using for a whole 9” pie, there is a way to pick up dough w rolling pin (wrap it over). If cutting out for small pies, use a cookie cutter, allowing a bit extra for shaping into muffin tin or over the top. Fingers sore. must quit typing.