A Carolina Thanksgiving

Robert Stehling makes huge batches of jelly to give as gifts. He serves it here with goat cheese and Sesame-Cornmeal Crackers, a savory version of the traditional sweet benne (sesame) wafers that are popular throughout the South. This intensely spicy condiment is also great as a barbecue sauce for grilled pork and chicken.

This more delicate cousin of New Orleans gumbo is a spicier version of the crab soup Charleston is known for.

In keeping with his motto that “everything is better with bacon,” Stehling makes a bacon-herb paste that he stuffs under the turkey skin to produce an incredibly moist and smoky bird.

This deliciously rich gratin is Stehling’s take on the Southern casseroles he refers to as “church-supper dishes.”

Spoon bread, a cross between corn bread and soufflé, is a Southern classic. Stehling likes to add cooked spinach or fresh corn and chopped and sautéed bacon or ham to his plain sweet potato version.

The pie, studded with pecans, gets a kick from two jiggers of bourbon. It can be made ahead and refrigerated overnight.