ANyone know what to do with a whole turkey?
I have a free one in my freezer. I've only ever cooked the turkey whole, and then after a few days of cold turkey sandwiches it's gone. I'm a horrible cook and not creative - so I have no idea what to do.
Turkey Pot Pie? Soup? Any tried & true recipes for turkey? I think it's an 18 pounder.
My freezer is starting to look pretty sparce. Tomrrow I need to inventory the pantry and figure out meals with our random stuff...
Bake Turkey:
Use #1 - Turkey Dinner
Use #2 - Put enough meat together for as many sandwiches as you will be eating.
Use #3 - Turkey Tetrazinni *recipe included
Ingredients
1 (16 ounce) package uncooked spaghetti 1/2 cup butter 1/2 cup all-purpose flour 3 cups chicken broth 2 cups milk 1 2/3 cups grated Parmesan cheese 4 cups chopped cooked
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease a medium baking dish.
Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add spaghetti, and cook for 8 to 10 minutes or until al dente. Drain, and place in the prepared baking dish.
Melt butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Stir in flour. Mix in chicken broth and milk. Cook and stir until the mixture comes to a boil. Stir in about 1 1/3 cups Parmesan cheese, and remove from heat.
Mix chicken broth mixture and turkey with spaghetti. Top with remaining cheese. Bake 1 hour in the preheated oven, until surface is lightly browned.
Use #4 - Turkey Stock for soup and or stews... (Remember to keep the carcas, do NOT throw out
Ingredients
1 turkey carcass
16 cups cold water
2 large celery ribs, sliced
2 large carrots, scraped and sliced
2 onions, quartered (do NOT peel)
4 smashed garlic cloves
Directions
1 You will also likely discover that you'll be able to rescue a lot of meat off the carcass; this is a bonus, since you now have the meat for the soup as well.
2 Try to make the stock the day after or within 3 day that the turkey was cooked, but if you have to wait another day or so, that's okay; it'll taste best, though, if you can get to it soon.
3 Get out a large pot. Next, start to strip off any meat clinging to the carcass; put this in a container and set aside; note that this is a hands-on job and you will get a little messy; that's okay, both your hands and your counter wash up easily. As you are stripping off the meat (don't fret, you won't get it ALL, some stubbornly clings to the bones and that's okay, it too flavours the stock), continue to break up the bones and put them in the pot; also put in the pot any turkey skin and all the other assorted"bits" that aren't edible meat.
4 When you have the pot full of bones, pour the cold water over and turn heat to high; bring to a boil.
5 Wash up and prepare the veggies and garlic; make sure to leave the onion skin ON as it gives your stock a lovely rich colour.
6 When the stock comes to a boil, add all remaining ingredients and turn heat down to a lightly bubbling simmer, the type where the bubbles barely break the surface.
7 Simmer for 3 to 7 hours, stirring every once in a while.
8 Reduce down to where I'll only get 7 or 8 cups of stock.
9 If you only let it simmer till you have about 12 cups of stock, it will be ready sooner but the flavor is much weaker.
10 Once you feel your stock is ready, strain it through a fine-meshed sieve into a large bowl; if your sieve is not fine, line it first with cheesecloth; discard the bones and veggies you used to make the stock, all their goodness is now in your stock.
11 Refrigerate stock, covered, for several hours or preferably overnight; then you can either make soup the next day, or freeze the stock; make sure you skim off the solidified fat before you either make soup or freeze the stock. Your stock will be gelatinized.
He says Reese's is legalized crack. 
