The Tale of Two Turkeys

It was the best of times; it was the worst of times. Well, it really was just the best of times, but I couldn’t leave Dickens hanging with a title like that. My dad and I wanted to do two very different preparations for the turkeys this year. We bought two 10 lbs turkeys for the 18 person feast, and we each took the mantle of preparing one. For the one I made, I decided to use a slow cooking “oven smoked” method. The slow cooking method uses a sauce called liquid smoke, which is made from distilling smoke through water. Liquid smoke can be found at most supermarkets with the BBQ sauce. For more info on how liquid smoke is made click here. My dad decided on a high heat, fast cooking method. This is a simple way to cook any poultry, and similar cooking styles have been featured on Ty’s Kitchen before with chicken. Both turkeys were delicious, moist, and very different.

Turkey Gravy

Any turkey meal is incomplete without some good turkey gravy to go along with it. Gravy is pretty simple to make and all you need is the neck that comes with the turkey, some vegetables and spices, water, and time to let it simmer. For this gravy, my dad and I used the neck to make a turkey stock, reserved some of it for the stuffing and mashed potatoes, and used the rest for the gravy along with the giblets (gizzard and heart).

Mushroom, Oyster, and Sausage Stuffing

I am a big fan of Thanksgiving stuffing, but when you think of it conceptually, it’s a pretty silly dish. You take croutons or toasted bread, douse it in stock, mix it with meat, veggies, shellfish, or anything else you want, and bake it. You’re basically taking bread, drying it out, moistening it up, mixing it with some other ingredients and then drying it out again. It’s almost like a very confused sandwich (and for anyone who’s had a Thanksgiving sandwich, that is an even bigger and more delicious conundrum) For our stuffing this year, we made two variations on the same theme. Both of them were basic mushroom and sausage stuffing, but one was made with oysters, walnuts and cornbread.

Roasted Butternut Squash

Squash is the fruit of fall (technically the gourd of fall). I love the warm and sweet taste of squash, and it’s mild flavor works really well with any seasoning and any other ingredients. Butternut squash has such a nice flavor on its own that little is needed to make a really tasty dish with it. For this dish, I did a very simple preparation, and the results were full of flavor.