How to Make a Turducken
Posted: October 14, 2013 Filed under: Event, Food, Home, Seasonal | Tags: Cooking a turducken, Homemade Turducken, How to make a turducken, Making a turducken, Special Thanksgiving Recipe, Steps Turducken, Thanksgiving, Turducken, Turducken Cook Time, Turducken in Toronto, Turducken Recipe, Turduken Reviews, Turkey, What is a turducken Leave a comment
Cy and I have a secret handshake when we celebrate small and big things. After we pulled off this turducken, we must have done this handshake like 100 times. I mean, we had to pull this off. We didn’t want to disappoint ourselves and the friends that we promised to feed.
So, this is how we did it!
Buy all of these necessary ingredients: Whole turkey, whole chicken and duck breast. Meatballs are optional.
Buy or make your favourite stuffing.
1) Preheat the oven to 375 Fahrenheit.
2) Debone the chicken – yes, the chicken first before the turkey! You can “practice” on the chicken, and it doesn’t matter if it looks “bad” since it goes in the turkey. Use a sharp knife – we didn’t have a filleting knife, so Cy used both a Chef’s knife and utility knife.
3) Debone the turkey. If you are using a frozen turkey, make sure that it is completely defrosted!
4) Remove the duck skin from the duck breast.
5) Brine all the meats overnight. Use 1 cup of salt, 1 cup of brown sugar dissolved in 1 gallon of water.
6) Remove meats from the brine, and start the meat layering! Open the turkey breasts, and place stuffing inside. Then, layer the chicken, and duck on top.
7) Sew up the turducken. We MacGyvered it, and used the twine we had at home. Once sewn up, we stuffed it with meatballs to “fill it up”. Tie the turducken so it holds it’s shape – across it’s “waist” and from “head” to “butt.”
8) Season the turducken however you want. We used a mixture of rosemary, garlic powder, basil, freshly ground salt and pepper. Plus, we added garlic slivers in the skin.
9) Slather the turducken with melted butter, and cover it in foil. Throw it in the oven, and baste every 30 minutes.
10) Remove the foil with 1 hour left to brown it! 25-30 mins/lb of turducken.
Slice, and serve! And, secret handshakes.
*Happy Thanksgiving to everyone*
First and last picture by Susan – thank you for being our star photographer!
Pumpkin in the City
Posted: October 1, 2012 Filed under: Food, Seasonal | Tags: Pumpkin, Thanksgiving 2 CommentsFall is here with some obvious signs. The chill of the morning air. The changing of the leaves from greens to burnt oranges and vibrant reds. The Christmas decorations are in stores. And, pumpkins start replacing watermelons in the huge bins in front of grocery stores.
It’s not just pumpkins that take over the grocery stores. You can’t avoid the pumpkin pies (see BlogTo for the best bakeries to buy pumpkin pie)! I wanted to find more pumpkin treats, and my search took me from uptown to downtown Toronto. This is what I found:
Heavenly hash is what this is. These spring rolls contain buttery mashed pumpkin and buttery mashed potato. Talk about a fantastic fusion treat.
From Crown Princess | $4.30 for 4 pieces | Rating: 8/10
Congee is a rice porridge, and it’s definitely a Chinese comfort food. In this version, it had some pumpkin, lily and kernels of corn. It was good, but tasted a lot like cream of corn.
From Crown Princess | $5.30 | Rating: 6/10
This might not make the CNE’s list of fried foods. The slices of pumpkin are huge (not a bad thing)! The batter was a bit too heavy (not a good thing), but I really liked the hint of spiced salt.
From Crown Princess | $5.30 | Rating: 5.5/10
It looks like a mini cheeseburger, but it’s better. The creamy pumpkin filling tasted almost like dulce de leche with pumpkin spice – perfection!
From Nadège Patisserie (Summerhill) | $2.15 | Rating: 8.5/10
It looks like a little pumpkin! It tastes so light and leaves you wanting more. Look at the layers of cake, cream and pumpkin filling. At first, Cy wanted just one bite…
From Nadège Patisserie (Summerhill) | $8.00 | Rating: 9/10
Two scoops of delicious, creamy pumpkin pie! Just the right amount of spices. I appreciated the subtle and natural colour of the gelato. No bright orange food colouring in this! The only thing that was missing was pieces of pumpkin pie crust.
From Hollywood Gelato | $3.95 for small | Rating: 8.5/10
The moment that I took a whiff, I knew that the tea was going to be one of those you savour to the last drop. The lady at the store explained that the tea was best served on it’s own – no milk or sugar needed! The purist approach helps bring out the flavours, and the pumpkin taste is subtle.
From House of Tea | $6.50 (50 grams) | Rating: 7.5/10
This craft beer is great for sharing. It’s on the heavier side and you can definitely taste the pumpkin with a little sweetness and a little spiceness to it. Did I mention that it was 9% alcohol?
From LCBO | $7.95 | Rating: 7/10
After an entire day of sampling pumpkin treats, I’m done for the year! But, you could probably tempt me with pumpkin cheesecake.
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