Why it works: Turkey and pork work together. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 830 recipes. Both carry trans-2-decenal, which smells waxy, orange. The science ↓
Boiled Turkey
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Fill the turkey with oyster stuffing and tie the legs and wings close to the body.
If desired, roll the turkey in a cloth dipped in flour, but note this may affect the flavor of the broth.
Boil
Place the turkey breast down in salted boiling water.
Skim the water often and boil for about 2 hours, but do not let the skin break.
Boil a piece of salt pork and serve a thin slice on each plate.
Serve and save
Serve with oyster or celery sauce.
Save the broth for soup by adding seasonings similar to chicken soup.
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.
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Turkey + porktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together830 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
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Oyster + porktop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,255 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
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Turkey + oystertop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together473 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).
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Turkey + flourtop 22% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together963 recipes
Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).
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Oyster + flourtop 25% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,582 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (grass, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Turkey
- Forms the main body of the dish, providing the meat that is cooked gently in the water.
- Oyster stuffing
- Fills the bird, adding moisture and savory flavor as the turkey cooks.
- Salt pork
- Adds savory, salty flavor to the dish and to the broth as it boils.
The step that matters
Skim the water and keep it at a gentle boil. Skimming removes foam and impurities that would cloud the broth. Keeping the water gently simmering rather than vigorously boiling helps protect the skin from breaking and the meat from toughening.
“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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