TURKEY BAG RECIPES

Steps:

• GET AHEAD 1. Check the main turkey cavity for the bag of giblets; if they’re in there, remove and tip them into your roasting tray, discarding the bag. The added flavour they’ll give your gravy will be incredible – trust me. 2. Peel the onions, wash the carrots and roughly chop with the celery or the leek tops, then add to the tray with the unpeeled garlic cloves. 3. Place your stuffing in the neck cavity, then pull the skin back over it and tuck it under the bird. You’ll get a good contrast between the soft, juicy stuffing here inside the turkey, and the crispier stuff you can bake separately in a dish. 4. Place the softened butter on a board and press down with your hands. Pick over 3 sprigs of thyme, finely zest ½ a clementine and season with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, and scrunch all together to make your flavoured butter. 5. Halve the clementines and place in the main turkey cavity with the remaining thyme – not filling it too full allows hot air to circulate, cooking the bird from the inside out and from the outside in. 6. Get your turkey and use a spatula to work your way between the skin and the meat. Start at the side of the cavity just above the leg and work gently up towards the breastbone and towards the back so you create a large cavity. Pick up your butter and push it into the cavity you’ve created. Use your hands to push it through the skin right to the back so it coats the breast meat as evenly as possible. Do the same on the other side. 7. Drizzle the turkey all over with 1 tablespoon of olive oil and generously sprinkle from all sides with salt and pepper. 8. Cover the turkey snugly with tin foil and place it on top of the trivet in the tray. ON THE DAY 1. Take your turkey out of the fridge 1 hour before it’s due to go in the oven. 2. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/gas 4. 3. You want to cook a higher-welfare bird for 25 to 30 minutes per kg and a standard bird is 35 to 40 minutes per kg. For a 4kg bird, pop it in the oven for 1 hour 40 minutes, basting several times with all the lovely juices in the tray and covering with foil when beautifully golden brown. 4. The simplest way to check it’s cooked is to stick a knife into the thickest part of the thigh – if the juices run clear, it’s done. 5. Use heavy-duty tongs to lift up your bird so all the juices run from the cavity into the tray, then transfer the turkey to a platter and leave to rest for up to 2 hours while you crack on. You can cover it with a double layer of tin foil and a clean tea towel to keep warm, if you like. 6. Skim away the fat from the turkey tray, save it in a jar, and leave to cool. When cold, transfer to the fridge for cooking with at a later date. CARVING THE TURKEY 1. Once the turkey has rested, it’s time to carve. There are two ways you can do this. - The first method is to remove the wings, slice the skin beside the legs, then pull out and chop the legs off. You can either slice or pull this brown meat – it’s so tasty. Keep it warm while you move on to the breast meat. Use the full length of the knife in a nice smooth action to slice through the breast meat, transferring it to a platter as you go. - Alternatively, remove the leg as above, then feel where the backbone is and cut with the length of your knife all the way down beside it until you hit the carcass. You can then lift the whole breast off the bone. Remove to a board and slice.

Steps:

• Take everything out of the turkey. There will be a giblet bag and some other stuff.
• Next add vegetables to the inside of the turkey. You dont even have to peel anything. This is easy because the veggies are just for flavor -- you are going to throw them away later.
• Take the onion and cut it into quarters.
• Chop a nice long carrot.
• Do the same with a couple stalks of celery.
• Add several cloves of garlic that you mash between a broad kitchen knife and the kitchen counter.
• Throw it all inside the turkey.
• Then rub the turkey all over with olive oil -- not butter because butter usually has salt in it and salt is the enemy of a moist turkey. Make sure the whole bird is covered in olive oil.
• Put the turkey in a roasting pan and cover it with a large brown paper bag.
• Staple shut. If you have a huge turkey use two paper bags at each end. It wont stick to the bird because of the olive oil.
• Sprinkle the bag all over with water.
• Place into pre-heated 375 F oven. ON THE MIDDLE RACK.
• The bag wont burn because paper burns at 451 and we're at 375 degrees.
• The advantage of the brown paper bag over the reynolds cooking bag is that the paper breathes so the turkey ROASTS. In the reynolds bag the turkey STEAMS, giving it a different taste.
• Roast for 13-15 minutes per pound.
• When you think it's ready, shove a meat thermometer through the bag and into the turkey and give it a minute to register. Make sure it doesnt touch the bone.
• The thermometer should register between 163-170 degrees.
• Remove from oven, cut away the bag and remove the basting pan.
• Do not throw out the drippings!
• To make the gravy, strain the pan juices into a really big pot. Any juices that accumulate on the turkey platter get poured into the pot.
• Add six oz. of boiling chicken broth and 1/8 cup of corn starch to the gravy to thicken it up. Cook on low heat and stir and cook and stir.
• If it seems it isnt going to be thick enough, add a little more corn starch.
• What about the talk that brown paper bags are unsafe for cooking?.
• If you mean unsafe because of fire, it is important that the bag doesnt make contact with the heating element of the oven. If you mean because of the recycled paper bag releasing toxins into the turkey, all we can say is that this recipe has been around for over 30 years. We,ve been postonmg this recipe for over 10 years and never had a single complaint that anyone got sick. We've had hundreds of emails that this is the best turkey they've ever tasted and the perfect recipe for first time chefs!