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Roast Turkey

A roasted turkey stuffed with bread crumbs, sausage meat, herbs, onion, and optional liver, heart, sausages, and sweet salt pork.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and summer savory match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 214 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Roast Turkey

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stuffing

  1. Prepare the stuffing by mixing bread crumbs, sausage meat or sweet salt pork, thyme, summer savory, onion, pepper, and coarse sea salt.

  2. If using, chop the liver and heart and mix them with the stuffing.

Stuff and truss

  1. Fill the turkey's body with the stuffing, sew up the opening, and truss it.

  2. Optionally, place a ring of sausages around the neck of the turkey.

Roast and serve

  1. Place the turkey in a pan with 1 cup of hot water.

  2. Roast slowly at first, basting frequently.

  3. If there is a risk of scorching, cover the breast with white paper.

  4. Roast for 2.5 to 3 hours, until cooked through.

  5. Serve with rich brown gravy and browned sausages on the breast.

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. Thyme + summer savorytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together214 recipes

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

  2. Thyme + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

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

  3. Summer savory + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together671 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Thyme + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,171 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Summer savory + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together299 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

Bread crumbs
Bulk the stuffing and soak up juices, keeping the filling moist and light.
Sausage meat or sweet salt pork
Adds fat and savoury richness that keeps the stuffing and turkey moist.
Onion
Adds aromatic flavour to the stuffing as it cooks inside the bird.
Thyme
Contributes herbal aroma that complements the rich meat and stuffing.
Summer savory
Contributes a peppery, herbal aroma that flavours the stuffing.

The step that matters

Roast slowly at first, basting frequently. Slow initial roasting cooks the bird gently so the interior heats evenly, while frequent basting keeps the surface moist and helps it brown without drying out.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, meat, thyme, summer savory, pepper, pork):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, meat, thyme, summer savory, pepper, pork. 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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