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Wild Turkey Braised

A wild turkey marinated in wine, vinegar, herbs, and spices, then braised with pork and lard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Rosemary and sage match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 465 recipes. Both carry 1,8-cineol, which smells eucalyptus, camphor. The science ↓

Wild Turkey Braised

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Cover the turkey with sweet herbs and spices, then soak it in a mixture of wine and vinegar for 24 hours.

  2. Coat the turkey with more sweet herbs and slices of fat pork, tying them securely over the bird.

Braise

  1. In a large stewpan, create a bed of pork, herbs, and seasoning, then place the turkey on top.

  2. Pour a little wine over the turkey, cover it, and let it cool for several hours.

Brown and finish

  1. When nearly done, remove the pork and brown the turkey in the oven at 400°F (200°C), basting with the pan juices.

  2. Baste the turkey with cold lard to achieve a crisp and brown skin.

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. Rosemary + sagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together465 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1,8-cineol (eucalyptus, camphor).

  2. Thyme + sagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,485 recipes

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

  3. Thyme + rosemarytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,340 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  4. Turkey + porktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together830 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  5. Turkey + sagetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together154 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Wild turkey
Forms the main body of the dish, becoming tender through long slow cooking.
Wine
Adds moisture and acidity that helps tenderise the meat during soaking and braising.
Vinegar
Acidity in the soaking liquid helps break down muscle fibres for a more tender bird.
Fat pork
Adds fat and moisture, basting the bird as it cooks and keeping it from drying out.
Lard
Fat for basting that promotes browning and a crisp, golden skin.

The step that matters

Browning the turkey in the oven. The bird is already cooked through, so the oven step is only for colour and crispness. Basting with pan juices and lard helps the skin brown evenly without drying the meat.

Swap the rosemary

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turkey, thyme, sage, wine, vinegar, pork):

  1. Marjoramfits about as well
  2. Rosemarythe original
  3. Tarragonfits less well
  4. Allspicefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against turkey, thyme, sage, wine, vinegar, pork. 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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