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Roast Tcrxst

A whole turkey roasted with salt, pepper, optional spices, and stuffed with bread and eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 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 ↓

Roast Tcrxst

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 the turkey

  1. Remove the vent and cut a slit from the end of the breastbone to take out the entrails, being careful not to break the gall on the liver.

  2. Take off the feet, bruise the bone close to the foot, and draw out the string from the leg.

  3. Cut a slit in the back of the neck, pass your finger around in front, and draw out the crop.

  4. Cut the neck short, leaving enough skin to fasten over the back.

  5. Wash the inside with cold water and wipe it dry.

  6. Mix the salt and pepper, then rub the inside of the turkey and the crop with this mixture.

Stuff and truss

  1. Prepare the stuffing by mixing bread, salt, pepper, butter, and optional spices or herbs with the beaten eggs.

  2. Stuff the body and breast of the turkey, then sew them closed with strong thread.

  3. Fill the crop, draw the skin of the neck over the back, and fasten it with a skewer.

  4. Turn the legs close to the body and run skewers through each hip joint, tying the ends of the legs together.

Roast and serve

  1. Roast the turkey at 400°F (200°C) for 1.5 hours, or 2 hours if it is large or old, basting frequently.

  2. Make gravy with drawn butter and the drippings from the pan.

  3. For oyster sauce, boil half a pint of oysters in a pan, thickened with butter rolled in flour, and let it boil once.

  4. Serve the roast turkey on a dish with mashed potatoes, turnips, dressed celery, pickles, and stewed apples.

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. Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  3. Lemon + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Turkey
Is the main protein; roasting cooks its meat while the skin browns and crisps.
Bread
Forms the body of the stuffing, soaking up moisture and flavour from the other ingredients.
Eggs
Bind the stuffing so it holds together when cooked.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, carrying flavour and aiding browning of the bird and gravy.

The step that matters

Roast the turkey at 400°F (200°C) and baste frequently. Basting keeps the surface moist and helps the skin brown evenly, while the cook must check that the bird is fully done, since a large or old turkey needs the longer time.

Swap the cinnamon

The recipe marks cinnamon as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turkey, pepper, bread, butter, lemon, parsley, thyme):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against turkey, pepper, bread, butter, lemon, parsley, thyme. 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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