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Turkey, Blanquette of

A creamy turkey dish simmered with stock, butter, flour, cream, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Mace and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Turkey, Blanquette of

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the turkey into neat slices and set aside.

  2. Put the bones, trimmings, onion, mace, and a little salt and pepper into a saucepan. Cover with cold water.

  3. Simmer gently for at least 1 hour.

  4. Strain the mixture.

Make the sauce

  1. Heat the butter in a saucepan. Add the flour and cook for a few minutes without browning.

  2. Add the stock to the butter and flour mixture. Stir until boiling.

  3. Simmer gently for 10 minutes.

  4. Season to taste. Add a pinch of nutmeg.

Finish and serve

  1. Put in the turkey slices. Heat until hot but do not boil.

  2. Mix the cream and yolk of egg together. Add to the saucepan.

  3. Stir gently for about 5 minutes before serving.

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. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,920 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Remains of a cold turkey
Forms the main body of the dish and supplies the meat that is gently heated in the sauce.
Butter
Enriches the sauce and carries the flour, giving it a rich, smooth base.
Flour
Cooked with butter to form a roux that thickens the stock into a smooth sauce.
Yolk of egg
Thickens and enriches the sauce when gently heated with cream, adding richness.
Cream
Adds richness and a silky texture to the sauce.

The step that matters

Adding the cream and yolk. Egg yolk thickens by setting when heated, so if the sauce boils after it is added, the yolk can curdle and the sauce turns grainy. Keep the heat low and stir gently.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turkey, butter, flour, egg, cream, mace, nutmeg):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against turkey, butter, flour, egg, cream, mace, nutmeg. 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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