Serve a Good Dick's Stuffing (Thanksgiving Burger Dressing) to Raise Money for Farestart! (Patreon)

Every city has a burger institution, but in Seattle, Dick’s occupies a special tier of civic identity. It’s the place you go after concerts, after breakups, after soccer practice, or after a long shift. So when Production Manager Lena suggested that we should make Thanksgiving stuffing out of your dad's favorite burger joint, I was in.

Lena immediately contacted the folks at Dick's and pitched the idea that we could use the recipe as a fundraiser for Farestart, the Seattle nonprofit that trains and places folks facing barriers into food-service careers. It's a wonderful organization that has helped train and place nearly 15,000 adults and has served over 19M meals to folks in need. Dick’s said they’d match up to $5,000 in donations, and I'm personally matching an additional $5,000.

Short story: You can triple every dollar you donate to Farestart via this link.

The math was simple. The idea was ridiculous. Or so we thought.

A bike ride to Wallingford, two greasy sacks of Dick's with a dozen plain burgers in each, and an hour in the kitchen later, we pulled a casserole out of the oven with the deeply savory aroma of seared burger patties, sage, onion, and celery, with a custardy, moist interior and a top reminiscent of perfectly griddled buns.

It was honestly great. Not just "fun stunt food for charity" great, but actual great-for-the-Thanksgiving-table great.

Here's how we did it, and how this Thanksgiving you can have your own good Dick's stuffing.

Dick’s Stuffing: How Seattle’s Favorite Burger Ended Up in My Thanksgiving Pan

Back in my early Serious Eats days, we tested White Castle stuffing—that legendary (or infamous?) recipe that calls for chopping up sliders and baking them into a casserole. It was obviously born from marketing, but once we made it, we realized: huh, this is actually… not terrible. It worked for the same reason my classic sage-and-sausage stuffing works: soft white bread, seasoned beef, onions, and steam. It wasn’t the kind of dish you’d brag about serving, but you also wouldn’t be sad to eat it.

But Dick’s is not White Castle. Dick’s is Seattle. It’s been part of the cultural fabric since 1954. The fries went up in price and people acted like it was a constitutional crisis. It’s the place you go when you move here, the place you go before you leave, the place where the smell of onions, clove-scented tartar sauce, and griddled buns somehow counts as civic infrastructure. And because those buns are toasted to order—lightly golden, faintly sweet, with a fine crumb—they make for a stuffing bread that behaves almost exactly the way I want bread to behave: toasty enough to add flavor, but spongy enough to absorb plenty of turkey stock and aromatics.

If you’ve cooked from The Food Lab, you know my philosophy: stuffing is a savory bread pudding. The bread should be dried in the oven before soaking (not necessarily staled). It should soak up broth and egg like a sponge without dissolving. It should hold its shape in a custard. It should crunch on top and melt underneath. And above all, it should taste like Thanksgiving: butter, onion, celery, sage. The kind of aroma that makes Chen tilt his head and pad his way into the kitchen to see what’s going on.

The surprising thing was how naturally Dick’s hamburgers slotted into that structure. The buns dried quickly and evenly in the oven. The patties, once broken up with a pastry blender (yes, the humble pastry blender is the unsung hero of cooked-meat breakup) acted like a very stripped-down sage sausage with a built-in griddled sear. Add the classic aromatics, pour in the turkey stock (mine was homemade, but store-bought chicken broth works fine), stir in the eggs, fold in the toasted buns, and suddenly we weren’t making a joke dish anymore. We were making stuffing. Good stuffing.

And because it’s Dick’s, it also smelled like standing under the neon sign in Capitol Hill after a concert (minus the sweat, vomit, and teenagers).

When we pulled the pan from the oven, the top was bronzed, the edges were crackly, and the inside was exactly what stuffing should be: soft, custardy, rich, fragrant. It tasted unmistakably like Thanksgiving. And yet there was this added nostalgia—Dicksiness, if you will—that came from the buns and the seared beef. A little sweetness, a little fast food, and a lot of Seattle.

We took a bite and immediately exchanged the “oh no, this is actually really good” look. It might not be easier than making normal stuffing, and despite Dick's famously fair pricing, it’s definitely not cheaper than buying a loaf of bread, but it works.

If you live in Seattle, I genuinely recommend trying it. If you don’t, recreate it with whatever your city’s hometown burger joint is. (Just make sure to ask for them plain. I know from experience that cheese, pickles, ketchup, and especially iceberg do not work in stuffing).

And whether you make the stuffing or not, remember, if you donate to Farestart via this link, your money will be matched by both Dick's and myself, so your donation will be tripled (up to a total of $5,000). The stuffing is just a delicious bonus.

Recipe: A Good Dick’s Stuffing (AKA Seattle Burger-Joint Dressing)

Ingredients

24 plain Dick's hamburgers (no cheese, pickles, sauces, or lettuce)

4 tablespoons (113g) unsalted butter

2–3 celery stalks, split lengthwise and diced

1 large onion, diced

2-3 tablespoons finely chopped fresh sage (or 2 teaspoons dried)

Optional: ¼ cup chopped fresh parsley or a few sprigs thyme

1 quart (950ml) turkey or chicken stock

3 large eggs

Salt and pepper only if needed

Method

Dry the buns:Heat oven to 375°F (190°C). Spread buns on baking sheets and toast until dry, crisp, and lightly golden, about 10 to 15 minutes, flipping once.

Build the base:Unwrap burger patties into a large pot with butter, onion, celery, and sage. Cook over medium heat, breaking up the burger patties with a wooden spatula or a pastry cutter until the vegetables soften, 5 to 7 minutes.

Add stock and eggs:Whisk eggs with a splash of stock to thin. Add remaining stock to the pot, stir, then remove from heat. Slowly add the egg mixture while stirring constantly so it blends smoothly.

Fold in the buns:Add the dried bun pieces, stirring until evenly moistened. The bread should not have any dry bits. If necessary add a splash more stock or water to fully moisten. Fold in the parsley or thyme, if using.

Bake:Spread mixture into a deep 9×13-inch casserole dish (no need to butter it, though it doesn't hurd). Rough up the surface with a fork or spatula for better browning. Bake 350 to 375°F until the top is deeply browned and the center custardy but set, about 45 minutes.

Serve:Let sit 10 minutes before scooping. Eat with turkey and gravy… or pretend it’s 1 a.m. on 45th and serve it with fry sauce. The stuffing can be prepared in the casserole dish and stored, covered, in the fridge for up to a few days. Bake directly from the fridge.