Thanksgiving was Thursday, and my mother wanted to do Alton’s turkey recipe also.  Maybe I inspired her with my stab at it, maybe not.  Regardless, three weeks after my first relative success, I had a chance to improve on a second bird.  And improve I did – the turkey was perfectly cooked, moist and even more flavorful than the one I made at my apartment.  I suspect this had to do with the simple fact that my mother purchased a fresh turkey, while mine was frozen solid when I bought it.  The meat might have been more receptive to the brine.  Still, we had all the fixings – gravy, dressing, rolls, cranberry sauce, and a delicious green bean recipe with pancetta, roasted chestnuts and shallots.  That one will definitely be showing up on our table again next year.

As I helped her cut the breast off the side we didn’t eat, I looked longingly at the carcass.  I had made this promise – I had to go through the book linearly, get everything done in the order Alton did.  If I didn’t, then what was the point?  Why don’t I just skip around and make whatever I want?  Still, I was about eighty pages and a whole season away from Behind the Bird, the Thanksgiving leftovers show.  If I wanted to do it right, I would have to make a third turkey, and salvage the meat and carcass for the recipes in this chapter.  I couldn’t win, no matter what I did.

So, I made a fateful choice.  And it was predicated on one simple realization: “When the Hell am I going to have a turkey carcass again?”  I suggested I could come over the next day and work on some turkey soup.  She immediately agreed – I’m guessing she had no problem if someone wanted to cook another meal for her.

If I had to qualify this decision, it’s this: even though Behind the Bird is in season 3 and Romancing the Bird is the end of season 1, the show’s lore states that it takes place immediately after.  It’s a weird cooking show that has a Blair Witch plot to suggest the episode is actually a behind-the-scenes look at a Good Eats shoot.  So, yeah, even though I’ve gone around my original intent, I can at least justify it.  And I will not be breaking this again – not that I should need to, since I can’t immediately think of any episodes that are so dependent on another like these two.

So, the recipes.  They’re pretty simple, as you might expect a show about leftovers to be.  The soup starts with vegetable broth as its base.  We ended up adding the remaining turkey stock and some additional chicken stock, since it was just sitting around the pantry.  The carcass gets placed in the pot and brought to a simmer.  It simmers for an hour, then the carcass is removed.  At that point, the bones have given as much flavor to the liquid as possible, and the rest of the ingredients are added.  Some frozen vegetables, some uncooked white rice, some leftover turkey meat, some Old Bay, and some dried thyme.  That cooks for 20 more minutes, then the seasonings are adjusted.  It’s a tasty brew, and a good way to use up the entirety of the bird.

This wasn’t the only recipe in the chapter, and since I’m in for a penny here, I decided I might as well make the turkey salad as well.  Not much to write here, other than you take more leftover turkey meat, mix it with some mayo, lemon juice, celery, red onion, toasted pecans, fresh sages and dried cranberries.  Season to taste, then let it chill for an hour for the flavors to marry.  Spread onto toasted bread and consume heartily.  This takes longer to prepare than simply slapping it between two slices of bread, but it’s definitely worth it for the flavors of everything together.  No recipe on this one at foodnetwork.com, but if you go to Alton’s FB page, you can find it there!  Go now!

Next time, we get back to where we left off.  We look at what happens when good milk goes bad in just the right way…

Recipes:

Bird to the Last Drop