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Roast Turkey

A whole turkey roasted with salt, pepper, dressing, and fat, served with a giblet gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Turkey and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,636 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Roast Turkey

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the turkey

  1. Clean and dry the turkey.

  2. Season the turkey with coarse sea salt and black pepper.

  3. Stuff the turkey with desired dressing.

  4. Sew the turkey closed with coarse twine.

  5. Tie the legs to the tail and flatten the wings against the body.

  6. Cut off the neck.

  7. Sew the skin over the opening.

  8. Melt some fat from inside the turkey.

  9. Pour the melted fat over the bird.

  10. Dredge the bird with flour.

Roast

  1. Place the turkey in a baking pan.

  2. Add 1 cup of water to the pan.

  3. Brown the turkey on all sides.

  4. Cover the turkey.

  5. Reduce the heat.

  6. Baste the turkey frequently for about 2 hours until cooked.

Make the giblet gravy

  1. Boil the heart, liver, and gizzard in enough water to cover until tender.

  2. Chop the boiled giblets finely.

  3. Remove the turkey from the pan.

  4. Blend 3 tablespoons of fat with 2 tablespoons of flour in the pan.

  5. Add the giblet boiling water to the pan.

  6. Add more water to achieve the right gravy consistency.

  7. Stir in the chopped giblets.

  8. Season the gravy.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Turkey + peppertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,636 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Turkey + livertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together190 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  3. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Pepper + livertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,375 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Turkey + flourtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together963 recipes

    Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Turkey
Forms the main body of the dish, cooked through by roasting.
Fat from turkey
Carries flavour and browning, and combines with flour to thicken the gravy.
Flour
Dusted on the bird for browning and used with fat to thicken the gravy.
Giblets
Add rich meaty flavour to the gravy once chopped and stirred in.

The step that matters

Basting the turkey during roasting. Regular basting keeps the surface moist and helps the skin brown evenly as the fat and juices spread over the bird, while the covered pan cooks the interior gently.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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