All About the Turkey

The stuffing/dressing recipe is for a 10 to 12 pound turkey. Stuff the turkey loosely and put remaining stuffing in baking dish to bake later (I usually do for 1/2 hour at 350 degrees and moisten with a bit of turkey juice from roasting turkey) This is the basic recipe...we add more celery, onion and parsley and taste it until we like it. We use canned chicken broth to moisten - try to find unsalted or low salt. Read through everything before starting. When you are here, we can do a turkey together.

Old Fashioned Dressing

12 cups of bread crumbs (I buy white bread, cut it into smallish cubes and dry out completely in oven)
1/2 cup butter
1 cup finely chopped onion
3 cups finely chopped celery
3.4 cup finely chopped parsley
salt
poultry seasoning
sage
paprika (I only use it if I have some around)
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1 egg, slightly beaten.

Melt butter. Saute onion and celery about five minutes. Mix with all the other ingredients. Moisten with chicken broth...don't want it too wet as you will baste the stuffing with the turkey juices as it is roasting, but it should be moist. Taste and add more onion, celery and parsley. We always add way more. And often add another egg, more butter, etc. Add seasonings until you like it. We make the dressing the night before and refrigerate overnight.

Turkey:

Take out giblet packet. Wash turkey with cold water. Pat dry inside and out with paper towels. Sprinkle inside cavity with a bit of salt and pepper. Spoon dressing into body and neck cavity. Don't stuff tightly...the dressing will expand a bit. Rub outside of turkey with melted butter. Wrap ends of drumsticks and wings with foil. Follow roasting instructions on turkey (you can get ones with the pop up thermometer). Baste, baste, baste. I usually put a tent of foil over the breast to keep from getting too brown. If you do that, take foil off for last 1/2 hour. Aim to have turkey come out of oven at least 20 minutes to 1/2 hour before serving. Put on platter. Cover with foil and then with towels to keep warm. The turkey will exude juices so keep an eye out for those and spoon into cup to use for gravy. (I once forgot and had turkey juice all over the table and floor).


Gravy:

Take the giblet and neck and hack into smallish pieces. I always discard the liver. In a pot, melt 2 tablespoons butter/2 tablespoons oil and saute the giblet and neck until brown. Toss in a can of chicken broth, a cup of white wine or white vermouth, a chunked up carrot, a couple stalks of celery and an onion quartered and let simmer all morning. Strain broth.

Take the pan that the turkey was roasted in (make sure this is one you can put on the stovetop). Spoon out most of the fat...you should have a good two tablespoons of fat left in the pan. Heat. Add a couple of tablespoons of flour. Stir and smush on low heat until the flour and fat are sort of incorporated. You want to cook this enough so the flour is "cooked" but don't want to really brown it too much. Stirring and scraping up browned bits, add the broth, any saved turkey juices to pan and whisk and whisk...bring to a boil...it will thicken somewhat...keep stirring so you don't have lumps....if you need to, you can add a bit of canned chicken broth to thin if too thick and you don't have enough juices. Just important to keep stirring. Off heat strain through strainer and you should have a tasty gravy.