Need Christmas Dinner Advice? Ask Here...

The Black Oil

Have never brined a turkey. Next year will involve kicking off the brinepocalypse chez TBO. :pac:

Gloomtastic!

The Black Oil wrote: »

Have never brined a turkey. Next year will involve kicking off the brinepocalypse chez TBO. :pac:

I'm fed up with dry white turkey meat so next year I'll try brining it first. If it fails then it's spiced beef from here on (never had it before but it can't be worse than dry bloody turkey meat!

Animord

Gloomtastic! wrote: »

I'm fed up with dry white turkey meat so next year I'll try brining it first. If it fails then it's spiced beef from here on (never had it before but it can't be worse than dry bloody turkey meat!

Brining was the best thing I have ever done. It was very good. Mind you I also treated myself to a meat thermometer too, which helped, I took the bird out earlier than I would have done if I were just using the usual checks. But the meat had a much better flavour.

Unfortunately my sister in law decided that it had to be 'used up' so made all the leftovers into turkey-bl**dy-curry - and a pretty rubbish one too on Stephen's Day. She has no idea how close she came to being forcibly ejected from the house.

Dizzyblonde

I had my carrots and parsnips parboiled 2 weeks in advance and frozen so they only had to be roasted on the day. I also had bread stuffing made, and Bazmo's stuffing balls made on Christmas Eve so they just had to be thrown in with the veg.
Next year I'll also be boiling my potatoes the day before, rolling them in the fat and putting them in the fridge so there'll be no boiling of potatoes on the day. I didn't do it because I was afraid they might go black, but I tried it last weekend and they were perfect.

BaZmO*

Animord wrote: »

Brining was the best thing I have ever done. It was very good. Mind you I also treated myself to a meat thermometer too, which helped, I took the bird out earlier than I would have done if I were just using the usual checks. But the meat had a much better flavour.

I think I'm gonna start using my meat thermometer a bit more in the future too.

Dizzyblonde

We never have the 'is it done/isn't it done' argument any more since I bought a meat thermometer

Gloomtastic!

Dizzyblonde wrote: »

We never have the 'is it done/isn't it done' argument any more since I bought a meat thermometer

But when the bag says cook for 5 hours and at 3.5 you check it with a thermometer and it says Ding! cooked. You have a problem with your oven. Brining might help.

I added ground up fennel seeds to the pork stuffing. It's my discovery of last year, fan-bloody-dastic!

Deise Musashi

The time per pound guide would have had my Turkey roasting for almost an hour more, removed from the oven when the internal temperature hit 75C, and it rose another couple of degrees while resting.
The meat was just done to perfection and still juicy and moist.

I've had the same good results cooking roast beef to medium rare, lamb, chicken and pork.
Just done, slightly pink if wanted, and just full of moisture and flavour compared to how overcooked I used to do them.

One of the best cooking gadget investments I ever made, though that's not right as it's not a "gadget", a great tool to control how well done you want your roasts.

jos28

I'd love to get a good meat thermometer, I had one before and it wasn't great.
Which one would you recommend
(Sorry, didn't mean to hijack the thread but it's hardly worth starting a new one for)

Gloomtastic!

jos28 wrote: »

I'd love to get a good meat thermometer, I had one before and it wasn't great.
Which one would you recommend
(Sorry, didn't mean to hijack the thread but it's hardly worth starting a new one for)

That's what chatting is all about!

fiddlechic

jos28 wrote: »

I'd love to get a good meat thermometer, I had one before and it wasn't great.
Which one would you recommend
(Sorry, didn't mean to hijack the thread but it's hardly worth starting a new one for)

This is exactly what I was thinking as I read down this page!
In Brown Thomas yesterday, they had no thermometer suitable for meat. Arnotts only have the Judge digital one, and I have had 2 of them, and they didn't last no time.

What's the verdict on any others? Would love a recommendation, too!:)

BaZmO*

This is the one that I have, but I don't remember it being so expensive.



I mainly use it for home brewing though.

jos28

That one looks good - but please don't send me to Homestore and More. I always spend a fortune when I go :D

fiddlechic

BaZmO* wrote: »

This is the one that I have, but I don't remember it being so expensive.

I mainly use it for home brewing though.

I had that 1 before and the judge one with a Round digital read out. Neither lasted long, battery cover fell off on the round one, couldn't fix with Sellotape. That one the display just got dimmer and dimmer despite new batteries!

At least they're cheap, but I would like to try something else!

Animord

I got this one from Amazon. I don't know how long it will last, but it was really only for the turkey which I cook in my mother's oven at home rather that at my house.

It might be useful for my stall too as when I do fresh things, I have to be able to prove to the EHO that my temperatures are below 4 degrees. Mind you, judging by the weather these days I might not be doing the stall again - too scared of being swept away in floods and hurricanes!

Dubl07

I have had this one for a couple of years and love it.

Faith

How do you all make brandy butter? My mum makes a DIVINE one with butter, icing sugar and brandy. It's more like a buttercream. But at my OH's parents house, I happily accepted some christmas pudding with brandy butter, only to find that the brandy butter seemed to be just brandy and butter.

It had never occurred to me that people make it differently than my mum!

The Sweeper

I'll do a turkey again the way I did it this year.

Place raw turkey breast-down on a chopping board. Slit the skin along the backbone from tail to neck. Ease the skin off the turkey, stripping it off the backbone and off the sides and then off the two breasts. When you get to each leg, crack the shoulder joint and cut the legs off the body, keeping all of the loose skin attached to each leg. You now have a nude turkey body and two separate legs with a load of loose skin on them.

With the body, I cut off the two wings and removed the wing tips, and put them in the stock pot. I also cut the backbone out of the turkey and put that in the stockpot. I then put the crown breast side down in a brining liquid in the fridge overnight (very mild brine with some rosemary stalks in it).

I took the legs and boned out the thigh bone on each leg. Tunnel boning it was too difficult, so I just cut the thigh and removed the bone.

I made stuffing from breadcrumbs, onion that had been sweated in a lot of butter, chopped parsley, sage and thyme, 500g of sausage meat and about 8 cloves of confited garlic I'd made weeks previously.

I stuffed the two legs - just laid a large handful of stuffing on the fanned out thigh meat and used the loose skin to bind and wrap each thigh. Then I oiled all over the outside with olive oil and placed the stuffed legs and the two wings in the fridge overnight.

Christmas Day, I rinsed off the turkey crown. I brought a half pot of the turkey stock (from xmas eve) and a bottle of cloudy apple cider up to a simmer, and immersed the turkey crown, breasts down. I simmered for 30 minutes and then turned off the heat, put the lid on and pushed the pot to the back of the range, where it remained until I was ready to take the turkey out and carve it.

I roasted the two legs and wings on a bed of chopped vegetables. The legs could be carved simply across the thigh for slices of dark meat with stuffing in them.

The remainder of the stuffing - I sprayed a sheet of foil with oil spray, then laid streaky bacon across it. I heaped up the rest of the stuffing on the bacon, wrapped it all in the foil and cooked it as a bacon-wrapped stuffing log.

Then I made a complete dog's bollix of the gravy - too sweet and not meaty enough. I sliced the turkey breast onto a platter and ladelled over some of the 'gravy' (more of a pale sauce) and didn't bother putting the rest in a jug.

I was feeding 15 people and there wasn't a single slice of turkey breast meat left when they were done, and most of the legs were gone too.

Savages.

The Black Oil

No idea how to make brandy butter, I'm afraid. However, we have a dab of it with Christmas pudding - custard, cream and ice cream.

Animord

I do:-

Unsalted butter,
icing sugar
a couple of tablespoons of hot water
Brandy

Beat the bejany out of it.

Faith

Animord wrote: »

I do:-

Unsalted butter,
icing sugar
a couple of tablespoons of hot water
Brandy

Beat the bejany out of it.

Yeah, I've been googling since I asked and it seems it's always made with sugar. I'm not sure what I was served, but it wasn't brandy butter!

Loire

Only 'cos I'm proud of it here's the seafood starter (crab meat, smoked salmon, tiger prawns, scallop) I made as my first starter for Christmas


Xmas_starter by boardsmember, on Flickr[/B]

9st n 09

billie1b wrote: »

Sorry for the late reply,

This here is the recipe http://whatjessicabakednext.wordpress.com/2013/07/20/no-bake-ferrero-rocher-cheesecake/
As posted by another poster, I will for sure let ye know the outcome.
6 weeks on a diet, no cakes, sweets, sugar and so on, I will enjoy it no matter what

Thanks a mill for posting this, did it at the weekend for friends and it went down a treat, will deffo do again,

The Black Oil

Found this whilst searching for something else.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VsWfovenGuw

Loire

Mrs Fox wrote: »

I too have never been able to keep the turkey moist,

Hi Mrs. Fox,

This is what works for me:

Take the turkey out of the fridge early but about 30 mins before going into the oven I put a bag of frozen peas over the breast - this I find helps it cook slower than the tighes.

I take 2 long strips of tin foil and put them crossways on the baking tray, pop the turkey in the middle and fold the tinfoil over to make a tent. Seal it but with plenty of air inside, like a tent as I mentioned. I strip back the tinfoil for the last 30 mins to get the browning done

Loire.

Faith

Eh, Loire... Did you not realise that this thread is 2 years old? How did you even find it?! I'm locking it, as we have an active Christmas Dinner 2015 thread.