Thanksgiving blessings: A beloved grandmother is gone, but her handwritten dressing recipe lives on

Gainesville resident Missy Harlin will be hosting her family’s Thanksgiving gathering this week for the first time,  she said Monday, following the death of her beloved “Pud” - short for Puddin’, the nickname for her grandmother, Lois Lorene Workman.

Mrs. Workman, who was 96 when she died in January, always hosted the holiday meal for her family, which also includes Missy’s brothers Aaron Workman and Jafey Workman and other family members, young and older.

“She was a storybook grandmother,” Missy told the Times. “Always had something sweet baked, whether it was her raisin pie, chocolate cream pie, brownies or strawberry shortcake.” 

This week on Facebook, Missy posted a photo of her grandmother’s hand-written recipes for Thanksgiving turkey, which includes the instruction to “get up at 3 o’clock,” and, most importantly, for the dressing. That recipe starts with, “Make 2 or 3 pans of thick cornbread.”

The treasured cookbook was Pud’s Christmas gift to Missy one year, she said.

Missy doubts that she can duplicate Pud’s cooking, “but I’m going to give it a shot.” She added that she wouldn’t be getting up at 3 a.m. to put the turkey in the oven, though. “It’s going in the fryer,” she said, adding, “The turkey is just a turkey. It’s the dressing that we all loved.”

Missy said that, despite their loss, she and her family, including husband Chris and daughters Abbi and Faith, are looking forward to the holiday gathering. “Change can be good, even though there will be a sweet little lady missing at the table. She died, and we have nothing but good memories.”