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Turkey, Roast
There are several methods of preparing a turkey for roasting. The bird may be simply trussed like a fowl, and roasted without being stuffed at all, and will be found excellent, the pure flavour of the bird being then presented unmixed with any taste that does not belong to it. When dressed in this way it should be served on a dish garnished with water-cress, and no other sauce than its own gravy should accompany it. The usual way of serving roast turkey, however, is to stuff it either with veal forcemeat, chestnuts, or sausage-meat, and to send it to table accompanied by a string of sausages, bread sauce, cranberry sauce, or chestnut sauce, and brown gravy. Forcemeat flavoured with oysters or mushrooms, and the accompanying sauces are more suitable for boiled than roast turkey. Pluck, draw, singe, and truss the turkey. Tie a buttered paper over the breast, and hang the bird before a clear fire. Baste frequently whilst it is being roasted. Unless this point is attended to the meat will be dry and tasteless. A quarter of an hour before the bird is taken down, remove the paper, dredge a little flour over the breast, and baste it well with cold butter. This will make the froth stronger than if hot dripping is used. Let it brown brightly. Garnish with lemon and sausages, or forcemeat balls. Serve very hot. Time for a small turkey, an hour and a quarter to an hour and a half; for a moderate-sized turkey weighing ten pounds, about two hours; twelve to fourteen pounds, about two hours and a half. Probable cost, moderate-sized turkey, 8s. to 14s., excepting at Christmas.
This is spit-roasting instructions, written for a bird turning on a jack in front of an open fire, so the method needs translating before the timings make any sense.
- Fire to oven"Hang the bird before a clear fire" means vertical spit-roasting with radiant heat on one face at a time, which is why constant basting matters so much. In an oven, roast at 325-350F on a rack in a shallow pan; the buttered paper becomes a loose tent of foil over the breast.
- The timings are shortAn hour and a quarter for a small turkey assumes fierce radiant heat and a bird far smaller than a modern one. Judge by temperature, not the clock: 165F in the thickest part of the thigh, away from bone. A 12-14 lb bird typically takes 3 to 3 1/2 hours at 325F unstuffed.
- Stuffing changes everythingIf you stuff the cavity as suggested, the stuffing itself must reach 165F, which usually means overcooking the breast. Bake the veal forcemeat, sausage-meat or chestnut stuffing separately in a dish and put aromatics only in the cavity.
- Frothing with cold butterThe final flour dredge and cold-butter baste is a genuine technique, not a quirk; the recipe's own reasoning is that cold butter gives a stronger froth than hot dripping. Do it in the last 15 minutes and watch it, since flour scorches quickly.
- Pluck, draw, singeAll of this is done for you. "Singe" burned off residual pin-feathers over a flame; on a supermarket bird, just pull any stubs with tweezers and pat the skin dry.
- Veal forcemeatA bound mixture of minced veal, suet, breadcrumbs, lemon and herbs. Ground veal is scarce and expensive now; ground pork, or the sausage-meat the recipe also offers, gives the same effect.
- Resting, which the book omitsVictorian instruction assumes the bird goes straight to table "very hot". Rest a large turkey 20 to 30 minutes loosely covered before carving; it will still be hot and the juices will stay in the meat.
- Yield and costAllow about 1 lb of undressed weight per person for a generous meal with leftovers, so a 12 lb bird serves 10-12. The "8s. to 14s." is late-Victorian shillings, a substantial sum that explains the note about Christmas prices.
Cassell's lists the unstuffed bird first, and the argument it makes — that the pure flavour of the turkey is better unmixed with anything that does not belong to it — was a real position in nineteenth-century English cookery, set against the older habit of loading a large roast with forcemeat. The distinction drawn at the end is worth noting: oyster and mushroom forcemeats belong to boiled turkey, chestnut and sausage to roast, a division of accompaniments often said to have persisted in English household books. Turkey had been raised in England since the sixteenth century and by the time this dictionary appeared it was firmly the Christmas bird for those who could afford it, gradually displacing the goose in middle-class households; the price note, singling out Christmas as the exception, is the clearest sign of that seasonal demand. The vertical spit before a clear fire was still widely used for large roasts even as closed ranges spread, on the reasoning that radiant heat browned better than an enclosed oven.