Mummified Turkey Remains? Yum!
As the sated guests left my in-laws' house last Thursday, each held in tow leftover stuffing, mashed potatoes, green beans, and cake, depending on who pounced earliest. My own pouncing was plenty early, but I wanted just one thing: the carcass that had been a 24 lb bird, and was now looking more like a turkey-colored model for a new Aliens movie.
Do you have turkey relics still in the fridge? There's still time to do the best thing possible with what's left: make soup.
1. Put the whole thing in a pot: bones, meat, skin, doodads, everything. Break it up by hand if you need to, in order to make it fit. Use a big enough pot so that you can cover the bones with (cold) water, with maybe 1 inch more water above the bones.
2. Bring to a boil. As the pot approaches boiling point, you might start seeing some foamy scum accumulate on top. Skim this off with a spoon, and discard. After your pot is boiling in earnest, turn heat down to medium-low.
3. Add:
one peeled onion, quartered
two peeled carrots. Cut the carrots lengthwise, so that the maximum flavor is released; then chop into smaller pieces.
one stalk of celery. Cut off the bottommost part of the celery, split the stalk lengthwise, and likewise chop up, including the leafy top.
1 tbsp dried parsley
1 teasp whole coriander seeds
1/2 teasp allspice
Simmer on medium low for at least 90 minutes, preferably 2-3 hours. Drain the soup into another pot, and discard the bones. Hard-core types can pick the meat off the bones and add to the soup, along with the chopped veggies. Depends on your aesthetic, and how hungry/broke/cheap you are.
Cover the pot and let it sit for an hour or so, unheated, on your stove to cool down. Then, place the pot in your fridge. If there's still residual heat in the pot, wait longer--don't put a hot pot on your cold fridge's glass shelf! Leave the pot in the fridge overnight.
Next day, take the pot out of the fridge. All of the fat from your turkey should now be congealed on the top of the pot. Skim it off.
Voila! You now have a couple quarts of nutritious, and yummy soup. Freeze some for later, and sever the rest with noodles or rice as the foundation for a great winter meal.
Do you have turkey relics still in the fridge? There's still time to do the best thing possible with what's left: make soup.
1. Put the whole thing in a pot: bones, meat, skin, doodads, everything. Break it up by hand if you need to, in order to make it fit. Use a big enough pot so that you can cover the bones with (cold) water, with maybe 1 inch more water above the bones.
2. Bring to a boil. As the pot approaches boiling point, you might start seeing some foamy scum accumulate on top. Skim this off with a spoon, and discard. After your pot is boiling in earnest, turn heat down to medium-low.
3. Add:
one peeled onion, quartered
two peeled carrots. Cut the carrots lengthwise, so that the maximum flavor is released; then chop into smaller pieces.
one stalk of celery. Cut off the bottommost part of the celery, split the stalk lengthwise, and likewise chop up, including the leafy top.
1 tbsp dried parsley
1 teasp whole coriander seeds
1/2 teasp allspice
Simmer on medium low for at least 90 minutes, preferably 2-3 hours. Drain the soup into another pot, and discard the bones. Hard-core types can pick the meat off the bones and add to the soup, along with the chopped veggies. Depends on your aesthetic, and how hungry/broke/cheap you are.
Cover the pot and let it sit for an hour or so, unheated, on your stove to cool down. Then, place the pot in your fridge. If there's still residual heat in the pot, wait longer--don't put a hot pot on your cold fridge's glass shelf! Leave the pot in the fridge overnight.
Next day, take the pot out of the fridge. All of the fat from your turkey should now be congealed on the top of the pot. Skim it off.
Voila! You now have a couple quarts of nutritious, and yummy soup. Freeze some for later, and sever the rest with noodles or rice as the foundation for a great winter meal.
Comments