Turkey & Dressing for Thanksgiving
Great tips and tricks to make a Thanksgiving dinner easy and memorable or to have Turkey & Dressing any time of year!
Everyone has their own Thanksgiving traditions and recipes. Some people probably eat the same thing year after year, while others look for new ideas and incorporate them around a few standards. But what if you're just starting out, or starting over? Or what if, like me, you have a bad memory and need to refresh yours on what you need for a successful Turkey & Dressing Thanksgiving Dinner? Or any other time of year?
I have four tips that will help your success after many years of trial & error.
Tip Number One - Buy a Fresh Bird
Fresh turkeys are almost always available around the holidays. Buy one a day or two before Thanksgiving and you will wind up with a tastier, juicier dinner. Fresh turkeys are actually partially frozen, kept at a temperature of 32°-34°F. They are cold and there will be some iciness inside the cavity of the bird, but the meat remains unfrozen in that hard, glacial state and it requires no thawing time. Frozen turkeys, on the other hand, are maintained at sub-zero temperatures. They are rock solid, take days to thaw properly, and their meat is usually drier and less flavorful than a fresh bird.
Tip Number Two - Wrap the Bird in Bacon
Yes, just ordinary or thick-sliced breakfast bacon. Wrap it where all top-facing surfaces of the turkey are covered with a slice of bacon. Roast your turkey 3/4 of the way through before removing the bacon, then finish the bird without the bacon for the last 1/4 of its cooking time. The turkey will require no basting and will come out of the oven a beautiful golden brown every time. The bacon also makes a nice little appetizer about an hour before dinner.
Tip Number Three - Use a Meat Thermometer
Like many other recipes in this blog, I strongly urge the use of a digital meat thermometer to eliminate the guesswork. Under-cooked turkey is dangerous to eat. Overcooked turkey is terrible and ruins the meal entirely. Only a meat thermometer will get you to the right point in time, perfectly, every time. I personally like the kind of thermometer that has an oven-proof probe attached to a control unit that remains outside the oven. Place the thermometer probe in the thigh portion of the turkey, just below the breast meat. Be careful it is not touching bone. Roasted to a temperature of 155°F, the turkey will be absolutely perfect if allowed to rest covered in its roasting pan for 30 minutes after being removed from the oven.
Tip Number Four - Use a Disposable Roasting Pan
I know this sounds silly, but really, do this. Buy two of them and stack one inside the other, so you don't have to worry about the thing cratering on you. This makes clean-up so much easier and does nothing to diminish the quality of the product. The only drawback is that you cannot put this over the stove to make your gravy, but with my method in the recipe below, you don't have to.
How Much Turkey and For How Long?
You’ll read commonly among food bloggers to assume 1-1/4 to 1-1/2 pounds of gross weight turkey per person. I’ve never been able to make that work. Perhaps people are more glutenous at my dinner table. I’ve always assumed 2 pounds per person because there are a lot of inedible parts of the birds and I’m poor at carving. Use the chart for an approximate cooking time, but don’t reply on it. Rely only on your meat thermometer.
To Stuff or Not to Stuff?
I'm not sure I understand the concept. In stuffing the bird, you don't have enough to serve everyone, and will end up having to put half of your stuffing in casserole dishes anyway. So then you wind up with two different products (because they will taste differently), and you have significantly increased your workload and the amount of time it takes to cook the turkey. Just put all your dressing in a casserole dish, and leave the bird un-stuffed. However, I do recommend a few aromatic fruit and vegetables in the cavity of the bird as a flavor and moisture enhancement, as you will read in the recipe.
Great accompaniments to any Turkey & Dressing Dinner are, of course, Gravy, the recipe for which is included below; and Cranberry Sauce. Consider the Kitchen Tapestry recipe for Cranberry Orange Sauce which can be made a day or several days in advance.
Turkey & Dressing for Thanksgiving
Ingredients
- 8-10 lb fresh turkey (with neck and giblets included)
- 1 lb thick-cut bacon
- 3-4 tbsp olive oil
- 2 tbsp rubbed sage
- 2 tbsp ground thyme
- 2-3 sprigs fresh sage
- 1 small apple, cored and quartered
- 1 small yellow onion, peeled and quartered
- 10-12 grinds freshly cracked black pepper
- 8 oz each corn bread dressing and white bread dressing (like, Pepperidge Farms)
- 1 medium yellow onion, finely diced
- 1 cup celery, finely diced
- 8 oz fresh button mushrooms, sliced
- 2 large eggs, beaten
- 4 tbsp rubbed sage
- 3-4 sprigs of fresh sage
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- 1-1/2 stick unsalted butter
- 3-4 chicken stock (like Swanson's or Kitchen Basics)
- 1/4 tsp fine sea salt
- 10-12 grinds freshly cracked black pepper
- non-stick cooking spray (like, Pam)
- reserved neck and giblets from the turkey
- 1-1/2 cups dry white wine
- 1-1/2 chicken stock (like Swanson's or Kitchen Basics)
- 1/2 small yellow onion
- 3 tbsp butter
- 4 tbsp pan drippings from the turkey
- 6 tbsp all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup heavy cream
- 1 tsp Kitchen Bouquet
- 1/8 tsp fine sea salt
- 10-12 grinds freshly cracked black pepper
Instructions
- Pre-heat your oven to 350°F and make sure the oven racks are situated such that the oven will accommodate the height of your turkey in its roasting pan.
- Remove the turkey from its packaging and remove the neck and giblets from the cavity, placing them in a medium sized sauce pan for the moment.
- Thoroughly rinse the turkey inside and outside with cold running water. Drain it thoroughly and the place the turkey on top of some paper towels and pat dry. Put the turkey in your disposable roasting pans.
- Pull the wings of the turkey up and then behind the bird to get them out of the way. Your turkey should have come with something to keep the legs together. In some cases, this is a metal cuff (or other oven proof material). In other cases, the legs have been bound together with the excess skin from the turkey. In either case, you'll need to free the drumsticks so that you can access the cavity of the bird.
- Rub olive oil over all the exposed surfaces of the bird. Dust the bird with the rubbed sage, ground thyme and black pepper.
- Stuff the apple, onion and sprigs of fresh sage into the cavity of the bird. This will not be eaten, but will provide moisture and aromatic flavors to the bird during cooking. Once you have placed these items into the cavity, you can return the drumsticks back to the device that was holding them together.
- Layer the bacon one strip at a time over the entire exposed surfaces of the bird. It's okay if some of the slices overlap other slices. Be sure to lay slices of bacon over the legs of the bird as well.
- You don't need to insert the meat thermometer at this point. Put the turkey in the oven and set the timer for two hours.
- In the saucepan where you placed the neck and giblets of the turkey, also add the dry white wine, chicken stock, the small onion, cut in half, and the sprigs of sage.
- Set the saucepan on a back burner on your stove on very low heat. Cover and let it be for now. You don't want it to simmer, but merely to sit and steep for the duration of time the turkey will be in the oven.
- Heat the olive oil in a skillet, and sauté the celery and onion until they have collapsed and are translucent. Do not caramelize.
- Add one stick of butter and allow it to melt, then add your mushrooms. Sauté until the mushrooms have collapsed and are starting to turn brown.
- In the meantime, put the cornbread and white bread crumbs in a large mixing bowl.
- Add the celery-onion-mushroom mixture to the bread crumbs and stir to combine. Add the rubbed sage, salt and pepper, beaten eggs, and stir to combine.
- Pouring the chicken stock a cup at a time, continue stirring the mixture until it all begins to clump together. You want your dressing very moist, but not runny. It will dry out some in the oven during cooking, so you want the dressing a little more moist than dry.
- Use a casserole dish that has a lid and coat it with the non-stick cooking spray. Press the mixture down into the casserole dish so that it is level, fairly dense and has an even consistency.
- Dot the top of the dressing with the remaining 1/2 stick of butter. Cover and place into a 325°F oven for one hour during the last hour of cooking your turkey.
- Remove the turkey from the oven and remove 4 tablespoons of the drippings in the bottom of the roasting pan to a skillet.
- Then, cover the bird with aluminum foil. Allow the turkey to sit for 20-30 minutes before carving while you prepare the gravy.
- To the turkey drippings in the skillet, melt the three tablespoons of butter, and then add the 6 tablespoons of flour a little at a time to make a roux.
- Cook the roux until slightly browned, about 15 minutes.
- Strain out the turkey neck, giblets onions and sage leaves from the turkey broth.
- Pour the cream and one cup of the turkey broth into the skillet with the roux a little at a time, mixing well with a whisk. Bring it to a bubble after each incorporation before adding more liquid.
- Allow the gravy to simmer for 1-2 minutes after all liquid has been incorporated with the roux.
- Finish the gravy with a bit of the Kitchen Bouquet for color and added depth.
- Carve the turkey (You Tube has a wealth of tutorials in how to do this), serve along side portions of the dressing on a dinner plate and top with gravy.
