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Turkey in a Hurry

A turkey cooked quickly with lard, veal, ham, and white wine, served with a reduced sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Turkey in a Hurry

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the turkey

  1. Truss the turkey with the legs inward and flatten it.

Make the base

  1. Heat melted lard in a stewpan.

  2. Add chopped parsley, shallots, mushrooms, and garlic. Cook for a few minutes.

  3. Add the juice of ½ lemon.

  4. Transfer to another pan with slices of veal, ham, and melted lard.

  5. Season with salt and pepper.

Cook and make the sauce

  1. Cover the turkey with lard or bacon slices.

  2. Cook over low heat for 30 minutes.

  3. Pour in white wine and plain gravy.

  4. Strain the sauce.

  5. Add coulis.

  6. Reduce to a good consistency.

Serve

  1. Serve the turkey on a dish garnished with lemon.

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 + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Parsley + garlictop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,308 recipes

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

  4. Shallot + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,982 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Shallot + garlictop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,000 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Turkey
Is the main cut of meat that cooks gently under cover to stay moist.
Shallots
Add aromatic sweetness and savory depth as they soften in the lard.
Mushrooms
Release moisture and savory umami that enriches the sauce base.
White wine
Adds acidity and aromatic flavor that helps lift and balance the sauce.
Lard
Carries heat evenly and adds richness that helps the meat brown and stay tender.
Veal
Contributes meaty body and gelatin that thickens and enriches the sauce.

The step that matters

Reduce to a good consistency. Reducing concentrates flavor and thickens the sauce as water evaporates. Stopping too early leaves it thin, while over-reducing makes it salty and syrupy, so taste and check texture as it cooks.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turkey, parsley, shallot, mushroom, garlic, lemon, veal):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against turkey, parsley, shallot, mushroom, garlic, lemon, veal. 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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