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Roast Turkey

A turkey stuffed with sausage meat, roasted with butter and served with a strained gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Roast Turkey

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 stuffing and gravy base

  1. In a pot, boil the bones in 1½ pints of water or veal broth with salt, celery, pepper, and parsley for 1 hour.

  2. In a pan, brown the ham in fresh butter, then add a little flour and cayenne.

  3. Pour in the strained broth from the bones and simmer until needed.

Roast and serve

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Flour the turkey well and place it far from the fire until heated through.

  3. Fill the turkey with sausage meat or forcemeat, then roast.

  4. Baste the turkey continuously with butter for 1 hour and 45 minutes.

  5. Serve the gravy hot, strained and free of fat.

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. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  2. Bread + hamtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  3. Celery + corntop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together920 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).

  4. Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,324 recipes

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

  5. Turkey + breadtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together822 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Sausage meat
Forms the stuffing that fills the bird, adding moisture and rich savory flavor as it cooks.
Fresh butter
Basting fat that carries heat over the skin, promoting even browning and a golden, crisp finish.
Ham
Browned in butter to add savory, salty depth to the gravy base.
Flour (in the method)
Dusted on the turkey and stirred into the gravy base, where it helps thicken and set the sauce.
Bread crumbs
Bind and absorb fat and juices, giving the stuffing body and a tender texture.

The step that matters

Basting the turkey continuously with butter. Butter coats the skin and browns it through Maillard reactions, while steady basting keeps the surface from drying out. Gaps in basting can leave the skin pale and dry.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turkey, meat, bread, veal, corn, pepper, ham):

  1. Thymefits about as well
  2. Celerythe original
  3. Sagefits about as well
  4. Marjoramfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against turkey, meat, bread, veal, corn, pepper, ham. 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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