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Koast Turkey

A roasted turkey stuffed with a dressing of bread crumbs, eggs, butter, parsley, thyme, and celery, served with gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Koast Turkey

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Wash the turkey thoroughly inside and out.

  2. Plunge the turkey into boiling water for 10 minutes.

  3. Prepare the dressing by mixing bread crumbs, chopped hard boiled eggs, butter, parsley, thyme, and celery.

  4. Rub the cavity of the turkey with salt and pepper, then fill it with the dressing and a slice of pork or bacon.

  5. Rub the outside of the turkey with butter and sprinkle with salt and pepper, then dredge with flour.

Roast and serve

  1. Place the turkey in a roasting pan with a slice of pork or bacon and 1 pint of boiling water.

  2. Add the liver and gizzard to the pan.

  3. Roast in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C), basting and turning frequently until golden brown, about 3 to 4 hours.

  4. When the turkey is amber in color, cover it with a buttered sheet of writing paper to keep it moist.

  5. Season the gravy with minced parsley and celery, and serve with cranberry sauce.

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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Parsley + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Thyme + celerytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,193 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Thyme + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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 and cooks into tender meat under dry heat.
Bread crumbs
Absorb juices and butter in the dressing, giving it a soft, moist body.
Hard boiled eggs
Bind the dressing together and add richness and body to the stuffing.
Butter
Adds fat that promotes browning on the skin and enriches the flavour.
Flour
Dredged on the skin, it helps the surface brown and crisp during roasting.
Pork or bacon
Adds fat and savoury flavour that bastes the bird as it renders.

The step that matters

Covering the turkey once it is amber. Browning happens quickly at high heat, so covering with buttered paper once the colour is right slows surface browning and traps moisture, helping the meat stay juicy while the inside finishes cooking.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turkey, bread, egg, butter, parsley, thyme, pepper):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Sagefits better
  3. Winter savoryfits better
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against turkey, bread, egg, butter, parsley, thyme, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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