I am making my first Thanksgiving dinner..?

Question

What are some good turkey recipes?

Answer 1

Works every year...

Brine:
1 gallon water
1/2 ounce ground cloves
1/2 ounce ground ginger
4 ounces cracked black peppercorns
12 bay leaves
1 pound kosher salt
24 ounces honey
24 ounces maple syrup
1 (10-pound) whole fresh turkey, giblets and neck removed and reserved for stock
1 stick butter, room temperature
2 teaspoons chopped garlic
1 teaspoon chopped fresh rosemary leaves
2 teaspoons chopped fresh sage leaves
2 apples, quartered and cored
1 onion, peeled and quartered
2 rosemary sprigs
3 sprigs sage
Olive oil, for drizzling

1 cup cubed carrots
1 cup cubed celery
1 cup cubed onions
1/2 cup white wine
1/2 cup Madeira wine
4 cups turkey stock, recipe follows
1 sprig thyme
2 sprigs parsley
Beurre manie (2 ounces butter mixed with 2 ounces flour until it forms a soft dough)
Salt and pepper


In a large stockpot, bring the water, cloves, ginger, black peppercorn, bay leaves and salt to a boil. Lower to a simmer and stir in the honey and maple syrup until well blended. Turn off heat and allow to cool to room temperature.
Rinse the turkey inside and out with cold tap water. Reserve the neck and specialty meats for pan gravy. Set the turkey in the brine, making sure that the turkey is fully immersed in the brine. Place a weight on top of the turkey to make sure it is always covered with brine. Marinate for at least 4 hours to overnight, depending on the weight of the turkey, in the refrigerator.

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.

In a shallow roasting pan, place the carrots, celery and onions. Remove turkey from brine.

Mix together the butter, garlic, chopped rosemary, and sage to make a compound butter. Using your hands, loosen to the skin from the breast by gently inserting your fingers between the skin and the flesh. Rub the compound butter underneath the skin. Insert the apples, onions, and whole rosemary and sage into the cavity of the turkey.

Place the turkey over the vegetables, breast-side up, in the roasting pan. Tuck the wings back and under the turkey. Using kitchen twine, tie the legs together. This will make a compact shape and will create a great presentation. Drizzle the turkey with olive oil and rub it into the skin. Roast the turkey to at least 165 degrees F in the breast, about 2 1/2 hours. If the skin gets too dark during roasting, tent with foil.

Transfer turkey to a platter and allow to cool. Meanwhile, prepare the pan gravy.

Tilt the pan and skim as much fat as possible off the juice with a spoon. Set the pan on 2 burners set on medium heat. Deglaze roasting pan with white wine and Madeira. Scrape the bottom of the pan to loosen any brown bits. Reduce until only a quarter remains. Add the turkey stock, thyme and parsley. Bring to a boil and strain into a saucepan. Bring back to a boil, skim and lower to a simmer. Whisk in the beurre manie until well incorporated and continue to cook until gravy has thickened. Season, to taste, with salt and pepper.


Turkey Stock:
Giblets and neck from 1 turkey
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 cup port wine
1 cup roughly chopped onions
1/2 cup roughly chopped carrots
1/2 cup roughly chopped celery
2 sprigs rosemary
5 peppercorns
Water, to cover

Heat a saucepan over high heat. When the pan is hot, add the olive oil and heat. Add the neck and giblets and cook until browned all over, about 7 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat and deglaze with the port. Return the pan to the heat and cook until the port is almost completely evaporated, about 10 minutes.
Add the carrots, onions, celery, rosemary and peppercorns. Cover with cold water by 4-inches. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat to a simmer, and simmer for 2 hours, adding a little more water, if necessary. Skim any scum that rises to the surface of the stock and discard.

Strain the stock. Use immediately, or cool and refrigerate for up to 4 days.

Answer 2

considering you like cooking, indexed below are some suggestion to your Thanksgiving dinner. in case you're doing Turkey with stuffing, get the turkey all waiting by way of cleansing it, removing the bag with the middle and different stuff previously. sparkling the turkey and placed it interior the refrigerator the night till now. Make stuffing and put in a bowl interior the refrigerator to boot. you're able to do any cakes and a few cranberry sauce the day till now, so which you at the instant are not swamped on Thanksgiving Day. Breads, pie, any style of goodies and potatoes might nicely be accomplished the day till now. Cooking is relatively approximately corporation, to boot as liking to do it, with some adventure you strengthen your own way of doing issues. On Thanksgiving day you are able to stuff your turkey and placed it interior the oven, do the potatoes, finally finally end up something of the failings for the meal. Set the table and its all waiting. you prefer basically to heat up the failings you made the day till now, make the gravy and cook dinner the vegetables! stable success, i'm specific you will do a competent activity and the meal would be great.

Answer 3

Chop up some Celery and Onion and place it inside the turkey while cooking to add flavor. I also like to use a little Cayenne (not much at all) to rub on the skin to give it a nice color

Don't forget if your buying a whole turkey, to take out the giblets, heart and neck which will be stuffed inside the bird in a little bag...sometimes two

Answer 4

First off Congrats! On your first Thanksgiving Dinner, second, Some of my favorite Turkey dishes for Thanksgiving are Turkey stuffing of course, and also sometimes my mom makes Turkey Wings (baked of course) sorry If I couldn't be of any help I don't eat much turkey.

Answer 5

I've been make cooking turkey for about 6 years now. and the way I make it is to place it in sea salt and water for about 48 hrs before cooking. Making the water very salty. When it is time to cook it I dry it off real well and cover in real butter. I place about 2 large sliced onions and 3 celery sticks in the the middle cover with foil and bake . I've never had any turkey left over yet!!

Answer 6

here's a second for my_belovd's answer, the value of which is in the first steps. It's all about the brine since that moistens the turkey. Flavor is nothing if you dry out the bird and you'd have to throw a brined turkey into a raging fire to dry it out.

Answer 7

Go to Foodtv.com See Alton Brown's (his show is Good Eats) link. He has an awesome method of cooking a turkey which is a bit labor intensive (it includes brining the bird first), but the results are quite fabulous!

Answer 8

Alton Brown's recipe for brining a turkey before roasting it. Tried it last year and it was the juciest most flavorful turkey i've ever eaten. Everyone I made dinner for wanted the recipe.
((I skipped the allspice, apple, cinnamon, and ginger becase I just didn't have them around at the time and it was still AWESOME))

1 (14 to 16 pound) frozen young turkey
For the brine:
1 cup kosher salt
1/2 cup light brown sugar
1 gallon vegetable stock
1 tablespoon black peppercorns
1/2 tablespoon allspice berries
1/2 tablespoon candied ginger
1 gallon iced water
For the aromatics:
1 red apple, sliced
1/2 onion, sliced
1 cinnamon stick
1 cup water
4 sprigs rosemary
6 leaves sage
Canola oil

Combine all brine ingredients, except ice water, in a stockpot, and bring to a boil. Stir to dissolve solids, then remove from heat, cool to room temperature, and refrigerate until thoroughly chilled.
Early on the day of cooking, (or late the night before) combine the brine and ice water in a clean 5-gallon bucket. Place thawed turkey breast side down in brine, cover, and refrigerate or set in cool area (like a basement) for 6 hours. Turn turkey over once, half way through brining.

A few minutes before roasting, heat oven to 500 degrees. Combine the apple, onion, cinnamon stick, and cup of water in a microwave safe dish and microwave on high for 5 minutes.

Remove bird from brine and rinse inside and out with cold water. Discard brine.

Place bird on roasting rack inside wide, low pan and pat dry with paper towels. Add steeped aromatics to cavity along with rosemary and sage. Tuck back wings and coat whole bird liberally with canola (or other neutral) oil.

Roast on lowest level of the oven at 500 degrees F. for 30 minutes. Remove from oven and cover breast with double layer of aluminum foil, insert probe thermometer into thickest part of the breast and return to oven, reducing temperature to 350 degrees F. Set thermometer alarm (if available) to 161 degrees. A 14 to 16 pound bird should require a total of 2 to 2 1/2 hours of roasting. Let turkey rest, loosely covered for 15 minutes before carving.

Answer 9

Materials:
4 Test Tubes
Bunsen Burner
Eye dropper
Test tube rack
Clamp
Safety Goggles
Lab Apron
Meat Tenderizer
Meat grinder
Cat

Reagents:
HCL
Turkey

Carefully baste turkey with 8M solution of HCL. Place over bunsen burner and let simmer for 8-12 hours. Then, take a meat tenderizer and carefully smash bird. Put turkey through meat grinder and feed to cat. Wait for your cat to "do its business" and collect its feces. Let cool for for 30 minutes. Serves 1-16 people.

Answer 10

I know I am not being helpful, because I have never made a turkey dinner, but wanted to give my support anyway...

Good Luck!