Is stuffing best prepared inside or outside of the turkey on Thanksgiving? There are people who swear by each method, and the debate will likely rage on for eternity. In case you haven’t settled on your Thanksgiving cooking plans quite yet, here are the cases both for and against cooking stuffing inside a turkey.

(This post originally ran in 2015.)

THE CASE FOR STUFFING COOKED INSIDE THE TURKEY:

Frankly, I’m frustrated. Frustrated I feel the need to defend this at all. This is America, and in America stuffing goes inside the turkey, then onto the plate, then inside the human. It’s a sacred tradition, and I will not see it corrupted.

The reason it’s called stuffing is because you painfully and mercilessly cram it inside a turkey. Making ‘stuffing’ without ‘stuffing’ it into a turkey is a contradiction of the very word itself, and it’s offensive. Sure it’s a little soggy, but you’ll get plenty of crunch from the topping on the green bean casserole. Stuffing occupies a specific place in the thanksgiving food ecosystem. And remember the reason why stuffing is more soggy than dressing: It’s because it absorbs all that sweet, delicious turkey juice. There’s a supply and demand dynamic at play here, too. There’s only so much stuffing you can cram into a turkey, which means it’s precious and special. Space is hard to come in a Thanksgiving kitchen, and when you cook stuffing outside the turkey, the extra variable threatens to mess up the timing of things. The stakes are too high for that kind of risk.

– Luke Kerr-Dineen

THE CASE FOR STUFFING COOKED OUTSIDE OF THE TURKEY:

Commonly referred to as dressing (but let’s not get stuck on semantics), stuffing cooked separately from the turkey is a clearly superior product that’s easier to make and has a distinct look and taste that make it arguably the best side on the table.

You run the risk of ruining Thanksgiving by drying out the turkey in order to get the stuffing inside to the correct, safe temperature. Do you really want to be the person who RUINED THANKSGIVING? There’s also significant chance you might poison your whole family by serving them a side of salmonella. You know what’s better than stuffing from a turkey? Actually waking up on Friday. Stuffing from inside a turkey is just gloopy bread. Whatever flavor enhancement you get from cooking it inside of an animal is countered by the fact that you’re eating glorified soup by the time it gets to your plate, and a typical Thanksgiving table already has a multitude of mushy options to choose from. There often isn’t enough inside-the-bird stuffing to go around — especially if you have a big family — which means you either have to deny people the experience of eating stuffing or you have to cook extra, more heavenly stuffing outside the bird. A turkey is simply an inefficient vessel for cooking stuffing. Properly prepared stuffing is so wonderfully crunchy and substantial that you can skip eating a roll altogether, which leaves you with more precious plate room for green bean casserole or mashed potatoes.

-Nick Schwartz