turkey and gravy = yum

Jenny and I decided to make a turkey this year for Thanksgiving, so I headed to the store (the day before the feast) and bought a 19 lb. behemoth. Luckily, Safeway had thawed turkeys for sale, else I would have been screwed. Apparently, a frozen turkey thaws out at the rate of 5 lbs. every 24 hours (so it would have take FOUR days to thaw out a 19 lb. ice-bird).

Never having prepared a turkey before, I quickly discovered that it is quite the visceral experience. The recipe I used (rosemary roasted turkey) called for preparing a rub (consisting of olive oil, fresh basil, fresh rosemary, and garlic), and then inserting the rub between the bird’s skin and meat, without tearing the skin.

This step was probably the most difficult part of the whole process. I had to slowly insert my hand between the skin and the flesh, and rip up the fascia binding the skin to the rest of the animal. It was a slow and tedious process, as I gripped the flap of skin near the neck hold with my left hand, and then gingerly proceeded to violate the turkey and root around with my right hand in places where God never intended my hand to be. Owing to the large size of the bird, I was literally up to my elbow in turkey at moments, when I had worked my way around to it’s butt area. (fun side note: birds have both anuses and urethras, but they are internal “holes” that discharge into a holding area called the cloaca. A bird then opens the cloaca sphincter to actually discharge the pee or poop into the rest of the world, so from your point of view, birds only have one visible no-no hole)

In any case, with the fascia broken up and the skin still sitting loosely on the turkey, I was then able to grab handfuls of the rub and work it between the skin and the meat. The combination of fresh rosemary, basil, and garlic was quite pungent, and it made my arm smell kinda good but kinda nauseating for quite a while. (if I remember correctly, it took about 4 washings to get all the smell off).

Turkey prepared, I put it into a roasting bag, and stuck the whole shebang into the oven. Done.

I wanted to make home made gravy too, but unfortunately, there are scheduling issues (har har, bet you never thought that computer architecture had anything to do with turkeys, eh? Where is the culinary equivalent of Tomasulo when you need him?). In short, to make gravy, you need the stuff that leaks out of the turkey when it’s done roasting. But it takes about 1 to 2 hrs to make a good gravy, so what to do? (I found out later that what people do is use a baster to siphon out the juices from the bottom of the roasting pan while the bird is still roasting in order to paralleize the process a bit. This is the cooking equivalent of register forwarding (although with only a 2-stage pipeline)).

In any case, I tried my best at scheduling the gravy by making broth from the neck and giblets (boiling them for 1 hr) and getting that ready before the roasting juices were done. I used this recipe: No guts, No Gravy, but I must have screwed something up because it calls for 4 cups of turkey broth, plus roux, plus the turkey juices. When I added the turkey juices, the gravy was totally watery and disappointing. I let people use it, but after people were done eating, I put it back on the stove, and it took another 2 hours to boil off enough water so it would thicken up. In retrospect, the key instruction of the recipe is: “As a general rule of thumb 1/2 cup of roux will thicken 4 cups of gravy.” I’d made 1/2 cup of roux for the 4 cups of turkey broth, but when I added the turkey juices, that was probably another 4-6 cups of liquid. So next time, I will just make more roux and see how it goes.

In any case, all the food (except for the gravy) turned out fabulously, and we were able to feed about 19 people. Big fun.

Here are some other links I collected for your enjoyment and edification:

• http://hgic.clemson.edu/factsheets/HGIC3560.htm
• http://www.hormel.com/templates/knowledge/knowledge.asp?catitemid=36&id=412
• http://www.ehow.com/how_2710_carve-turkey.html