We are almost officially out of turkey. Tonight Mike made himself a hot turkey and gravy sammich from what was left of the sliced breast meat. Legs and wings…long gone.
All that’s left now is a container of turkey soup, which was made with the meat that got cooked off the carcass when I made the Slow Cooker Toikey Stock, Part Deux. To make the soup, I used a slight variation of Alton Brown’s Bird to the Last Drop leftover soup recipe.
I did not use the vegetable stock, as I had a good amount of the turkey stock. The Part Deux turned out to be a very thick, rich stock, even more gelatinous than the first go-round, the one I made before Thanksgiving with the turkey necks that I had bought. You may recall that this original stock was used to make gravy and moisten stuffing. Still, I had a good amount left, so that went into the crock pot with the hacked-up carcass and enough water to fill.
I strained out this stock, cooled it down, and put it in a container in the fridge. When it was fully chilled, all of the fat floated to the top and hardened, that was easy to scrape off. The stock underneath had gelatinized. Meanwhile, I picked over the meat, put that into another container for the fridge, and discarded the bones. Nothing more could I get out of them by this point. I wrapped the bones very carefully before throwing them in the trash, because I didn’t want the cats to be able to easily get to them. Poultry bones should not be given to kitties…nor dogs, they can splinter and cause choking.
When I was ready to make my soup, I dumped all of the thick stock into a large pot. Since it was so very thick, I added some water to thin it out a bit. The flavor would have been way too strong if I did not water it down. When it was boiling, I threw in some uncooked egg noodles. Yeah, I know AB calls for rice in his recipe, but I prefer noodles in my soup. When the noodles were almost all the way cooked, I threw in the frozen veggies (which had been thawed), the meat, and the seasonings. AB called for Old Bay Seasoning, dried thyme, salt & pepper, that is what I used. Old Bay Seasoning is something that is more frequently used for seafood, and at first sounds odd in a turkey soup. But I happened to have a tin of it on hand, and used it…it really does add something to the soup. If you don’t have any, and don’t want to buy any, you could always just use poultry seasoning, or some other pre-made spice mix. I like Emeril’s Essences and Paul Prudhomme’s Magic Seasonings, I always have a few varieties of those on hand, as well. Or you can mix up your own spice blend.
So there you have it…all that is left from our Thanksgiving feast is a container of soup and a little gravy. I think I will mix the gravy into the leftover soup to use it up.
For Christmas, I think we will have a ham. Ham is a lot less work, as hams are already fully cooked. And if you buy a spiral-sliced ham, which are usually on sale for under two bucks a pound this time of year, that is even less work. I just heat it in the oven for about an hour or so, and then brush it with a glaze made of apply jelly and Dijon mustard. Yummie! Recipe to come soon!
