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Thanksgiving Recipe Tips

Cooking the Bird, Temperature:

150-160 degrees is a perfect temperature for your bird to be FULLY cooked. Don't wait until the timer pops, that is when the bird is cooked to 180 degrees! Never Over Cook Your Bird!

Moist Suffing Outside of the Bird:
If you are cooking your stuffing in a roasting pan alongside (but not in) your turkey and feel it is too dry, just use some pan drippings, wine, stock, or even water to moisten it when it is cooked.

The Best Oven-Roasted Potatoes:
Cut your potatoes so they are uniform size and put them in a pot of cold salted water. Bring to a boil, then immediately remove them from the water. Let them dry out in a warm oven or at room temperature. Roast the potatoes at 450F with lard or olive oil, salt and pepper, and whatever herbs

Making Gravy in Advance:
Melt 3 tbsp butter in a pan, add 3 tbsp flour. Cook for 5 minutes over medium flame, until this turns a sandy-blonde color. Add a little red wine to deglaze it (half bottle) and bring to a simmer. Add twice as much chicken stock, simmer for an hour, then strain it. When you cook your turkey the next day, add all the pan drippings to this gravy (if there are brown bits stuck to the bottom of the roasting pan, add some gravy to that and scrape it all up with a wooden spoon, then pour it back into the original gravy pan). Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Brining Your Turkey:
Make a salt-water solution with lots of added flavors, like citrus, sugar, rosemary, garlic, pineapple, etc (whatever you like). Cook a 27-pound turkey slowly, around 300F until a pop-up thermometer says it's ready. At the end, raise heat to 500F to brown and crisp the skin.

Cooking Chestnuts
To cook fresh chestnuts, score the nuts with an X and roast in a 400F oven or boil in salted water for 10 minutes. Let cool completely, then peel off shells.

But it is much easier to simply buy them pre-cooked, either peeled and frozen, canned as puree, or jarred, whole.

Published: 02/07/06