Looking for a fun, bite-sized twist on classic stuffing? These Apple Sausage Stuffing Bites are adorable, perfectly portioned, and a hit with kids and adults alike! Made with sweet apple sausage, crisp celery, and tender apples, they bake up golden and delicious in a muffin tin.
Table of Contents
Why I Love This Recipe
- Small size: This bite-sized stuffing is perfect for kids! They get golden and crispy around the edges in the oven and are perfect for little hands to dip into warm gravy. Even adults love miniature food like these.
- Customizable: You can use whatever is on hand as far as type of bread, sausage, or produce. Try swapping the baguette for a rich brioche stuffing base or a slightly sweet cornbread cranberry stuffing for a fun twist!
- Make ahead: Save space in your oven on Thanksgiving Day and make these the day before! Easily reheat them day-of. Looking for more tips to help you prep for Thanksgiving? Check out my Thanksgiving Menu and a Step-by-Step Prep Schedule for some ideas!
The Ingredients
- Bread: This is the perfect way to use up day-old bread you have around, or just make sure to set it out the day before you use to get stale.
- Sausage: I chose a sweet apple chicken sausage to mesh well with adding apples and chicken broth.
- Broth: Go all in and use homemade chicken stock or feel free to use your favorite brand from the store.
- Eggs: Eggs are used to bind the stuffing together. This will ensure the mini muffins stay in one piece!
- Produce: Apple, onion, and celery all add a fun crunch and lots of extra flavor.
Substitutions and Variations
- Change your bread: You can use any type of bread, such as sourdough. However, I do recommend you use a bakery-type bread that has a hearty crust. This will hold up much better than a loaf of bread off the grocery shelf.
- Switch up the sausage: Use up any sausage you have on hand. Maybe a turkey breakfast sausage would taste great! You could also use ground sausage, but you will want to cook and drain it first before using.
How to Make Apple Sausage Stuffing Bites
Step 1: If your bread isn’t stale, toast it in a 300°F oven for 8-10 minutes to dry it out.
Step 2: Dice and brown the sausage in a sauté pan for 4-5 minutes or until golden. Add to large mixing bowl and let cool enough to handle.
Step 3: In the same pan, sauté the produce until tender. Add to the same mixing bowl as the sausage.
Step 4: Add the remaining stuffing bite ingredients into the large mixing bowl with the sausage and sautéed produce.
Step 5: Spoon the stuffing mixture into greased muffin tins, filling all the way to the top. Pat the mixture down to pack it well.
Step 6: Bake for 45 minutes or until crispy around the edges.
Tips and Tricks
- Toasted bread: Even better than using stale bread is to toast your bread cubes first. Don’t skip this step!
- Cooked meat: Always use fully cooked sausage in your stuffing muffins. They don’t cook long enough for raw meat and you will also have a greasy mess on your hands.
- Let the Ingredients Cool: Let the ingredients cool slightly before adding the beaten eggs to the mixture—this prevents the eggs from cooking too soon and keeps your stuffing bites perfectly fluffy.
- Pat Down: Don’t forget to pat the mixture down in the muffin tin before you bake to ensure everything sticks together while baking.
- Let rest: Allow the muffins to rest about 10 minutes in the pan before removing to ensure they stay together.
FAQs
This is a must do in my book! Stale bread is better than fresh, but toasted is even better. By completely drying out the bread, it will more readily soak up the egg and broth mixture. This will also help the muffins hold their shape. Fresh bread isn’t able to soak up as much liquid and will also fall right apart.
These are a great option to make ahead of your holiday dinner. If making ahead, store in an airtight container in the fridge. Remove from the fridge for about 30 minutes to come to room temperature before doing a quick toast in the oven as you set out the other dinner items. This way they will get their crispy edges back but won’t dry out. I also think they taste great cold and pack them in my kids’ lunches!
A fully cooked chicken sausage is the perfect option here, though I do brown it in the skillet first. Browning always adds more flavor! However, feel free to use ground pork, though you will want to precook it first to break it into crumbles as well as drain off any excess grease. It would also be fun to use cooked and crumbled bacon or even a turkey breakfast sausage.
More Thanksgiving Favorites
These Apple Sausage Stuffing Bites are a total game-changer for your holiday table! With their bite-sized charm, crispy edges, and delicious blend of sweet apple sausage, veggies, and herbs, they’re sure to be a hit with everyone coming to enjoy Thanksgiving dinner. I’d love to know what you think of this recipe — leave a comment and rating below!
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Apple Sausage Stuffing Bites
Ingredients
- 1/2 baguette, cut into 1/2 inch cubes (about 4 cups)
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 1 tablespoon oil
- 2 sweet apple sausage links, chopped (about 1 cup)
- 1 medium apple, chopped (gala, fuji, or golden delicious)
- 1 small yellow onion, diced (about 1 cup)
- 2 stalks celery, diced (about 3/4 cup)
- 1 teaspoon minced fresh thyme
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 cup low sodium chicken stock
- 2 large eggs, beaten
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 300°F.
- Toast the bread cubes for 8-10 minutes to dry them out. Alternatively, you can use day old bread that is already dried out.
- Increase oven temperature to 350°F.
- Heat oil in a sauté pan. Add the sausage and cook for 4-5 minutes, stirring occasionally, or until slightly golden. Remove sausage to a large mixing bowl to cool.
- In the same saute pan, add the butter and sauté the onions for 3 minutes. Add the celery, apples, and thyme and sauté for an additional 5 minutes, until everything is heated through and the veggies are tender. Allow to cool a few minutes before continuing.
- Place the bread cubes, cooled sautéed vegetables and remaining ingredients into the large mixing bowl with the sausage and toss to thoroughly combine. (It's important that your ingredients are cool to the touch before adding the eggs so that they don't scramble.)
- Spoon the stuffing mixture into greased muffin tins, filling all the way to the top. Pat the mixture down to pack it well.
- Bake for 45 minutes or until the tops are just golden.
Video
Notes
- Cooked meat: Always use fully cooked sausage in your stuffing muffins. They don’t cook long enough for raw meat and you will also have a greasy mess on your hands.
- Let the Ingredients Cool: Let the ingredients cool slightly before adding the beaten eggs to the mixture—this prevents the eggs from cooking too soon and keeps your stuffing bites perfectly fluffy.
- Let rest: Allow the muffins to rest about 10 minutes in the pan before removing to ensure they stay together.
- Prepare the Mix in Advance: Make the stuffing mixture a day ahead, then cover and refrigerate. When you’re ready to bake, simply scoop the mixture into greased muffin tins and pop them in the oven.
- Bake and Reheat: Bake the stuffing bites completely the day before, let them cool, then store them in an airtight container in the fridge. On the day of serving, reheat in the oven at 350°F for about 10-15 minutes until warmed through and crispy on the edges.
I would bake them fully and reheat in the oven just before serving! They’re also great at room temp, but you should remove them from the muffin tins immediately to avoid them getting soggy if you go that route. 🙂
I want to bring these to a Christmas eve dinner and for a Christmas day dinner. I’m not sure how to plan the baking. Should I bake fully day before and then just heat up in oven before serving or should I place mixture in muffin tin, refrigerate and wait to bake them the 45 min when I get to the houses I’m going to? Thank you for your recipes and your help!
They would still take the same amount of time to bake because the time in the oven helps them sort of stick together. I wouldn’t suggest a mini muffin pan though, because I don’t think you will be able to get enough of each element in this little cups for these to really come together!
How long would you bake these for if you made them in a mini muffin pan?
I can’t wait to try these! Getting recipe ideas for a Christmas party- will be seeing my Dad for the first time in years. So excited to have these on the menu. Thanks Catherine! You always save the day.
I made these for my daughters school potluck but they seemed a little dry. Do I need to add an egg or add fewer bread cubes? I love the idea of these and yours look so pretty.
You can leave it out, or use something hearty like mushrooms!
Fun fun fun
But, what would you suggest to replace the sausage if I was going for a vegetarian option?
I haven’t tried freezing them, but I’m sure that would work!
Can these be frozen?
Forget Thanksgiving, I’m making these tomorrow. They are so adorable, I know my kiddos would love them!
I’ve learned the same about families and their stuffing! My Italian family made stuffing with pasta in it (and I still make it every year) so I really didn’t experience traditional stuffing of any kind until I met my husband’s family 🙂 I always bring my stuffing as something different to contribute to where ever we are having Thanksgiving – it’s so hard to give up family tradition!
Now these stuffing bites look so tasty and amazing, my kids would LOVE them! I think we should have a Thanksgiving meal once a month to try all the different recipes floating around 🙂