Thanksgiving 2016 – An Economical 12 Pound Turkey

Sorry for the picture overload but I wanted to show how many meals you can get out of one 12 pound turkey … 16 servings of boneless breast meat, 10 turkey patties, at least 2 or 3 turkey mole wraps or whatever you want to do with the drumsticks. And then there’s the turkey stock from the carcass. Oh, and that wingette snack.

The best part was that it was only 99 cents a pound.

PICTURE HEAVY

This year’s turkey was a frozen, young male, utility grade and weighed twelve pounds. Tasty and, as always, economical. He’s missing his left wingette and wing tip, which is what makes him utility and not Grade A.

Thanksgiving 2016 Supper – four servings just from the tenderloin roll

Leftovers – Hassleback potatoes and the rest of the swiss chard and mushrooms stuffing instead of a salad.

Because I had boned a whole chicken before, I thought I’d be able to bone this turkey too. However, I forgot all the tendons and ligaments on the drumsticks (pliers would have helped), and, my less than optimal boning knife had a hard time removing the flesh from the bone. It didn’t help that I decide to try de-boning from the front. I ended up hacking up the skin of the back.

After spending about 15-20 min on one drumstick (the guy in the video I watched did the whole turkey in 20 minutes) I gave up on boning the other drumstick.

Mostly boned turkey – Those are most of the tendons found in the drumstick, on the blue plate.

The breast on the left was marinated with garlic, dried sage and rosemary, salt and pepper and lemon zest. The one on the right was stuffed with sauteed swiss chard, mushroom and diced onions as were the 2 tenderloins (pounded flat first) in the middle. All three were tied and baked at 350 deg F for about an hour.

Close-ups of the sage and rosemary marinated turkey breast

After baking and cooling, the two breasts were wrapped up tightly in saran wrap and foil and frozen away in a large freezer bag. Each one will provide 6 servings of boneless breast meat.

The wingette was baked along with the carcass (stored away for stock) and served on Saturday … my reward for that boning job.

Drumsticks, bone in and mostly boned, seared and then braised in mole sauce.

Thighs and some of the white meat (ie drumsticks and breast trimmings) were ground up along with green onions, water chestnuts, an egg, soy sauce, 1/4 cup of seasoned Italian bread crumbs, and salt  and pepper before being formed into 10 quarter pound patties.