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To Roast a Turkey
After the turkey has been properly cleaned place in a bowl, tail downward, put the prepared bread crumbs in at the neck until the breast becomes plump, then draw the skin together and fasten over on the back; reverse the position of the turkey in the bowl, put the remaining crumbs in the body and sew it up with strong thread; press the legs and wings as close to the body as possible, and secure them firmly in position with strings or skewers; lay the turkey, breast downward, on a sack in the roasting pan and let it simmer in that position until the back is a light brown color, then turn it over and let the breast and sides brown in a similar manner; do not put any water in the pan during this process. When the entire turkey is nicely browned, begin basting with a thin gravy; as this basting gravy evaporates, add a little boiling water to keep it from burning in the pan, and baste as often as the skin of the turkey becomes dry, until the roasting is completed.
The method here is sound and still worth following: the bird starts breast-down so the back takes the first heat, and no liquid goes into the pan until the skin has browned. What the original leaves out is every number a modern cook expects.
- Oven temperatureNo heat is specified; the text gives a colour to look for rather than a setting. Roast at 325F throughout; if you want faster colour on the back, start at 425F for the first 20 minutes and drop it.
- "Simmer" means roastThe word is used loosely for the dry, unbasted first stage. Nothing is submerged, and the explicit instruction to add no water confirms it.
- "On a sack"Almost certainly a rack, or possibly a cloth or trivet laid under the bird to keep the skin off the hot pan floor. Use a roasting rack; the intent is air circulation, not the material.
- TimingNone is given. For an unstuffed bird figure roughly 13 minutes per pound at 325F, longer when stuffed, and go by the thermometer rather than the clock: 165F in the thickest part of the thigh, away from bone.
- Stuffing inside the birdIf you follow the recipe and pack both the neck and the body cavity, the centre of the stuffing must also reach 165F. That usually means overcooking the breast. Baking the dressing in a separate dish avoids the problem entirely.
- The turnFlipping a hot, stuffed twenty-pound bird is the awkward part. Two wads of paper towel or clean tea towels give enough grip; do it on a pulled-out oven rack rather than lifting the bird across the kitchen.
- Basting gravyThis means a thin stock, not a thickened sauce. Warm broth topped up with boiling water keeps the pan drippings from scorching and gives you the base for gravy afterward. Cold water added to a hot pan will stall the browning.
- TrussingStrong thread for the cavity and skewers or twine for the legs and wings, exactly as written. Compact trussing helps the breast-down start; loose limbs are liable to scorch before the body is done.
- Resting and yieldRest the bird 20 to 30 minutes under loose foil before carving. A 12 to 14 lb turkey serves 10 to 12 with leftovers.
Roasting a bird breast-down for the first half of its time is an old range-oven habit that survives in modern kitchens for the same reason it was adopted: the thighs need more heat than the breast, and starting them nearest the pan floor buys the dark meat a head start while the breast steams in its own rising fat. The instruction to add no water in the early stage is a quiet argument in a long-running dispute, since other period recipes do direct water into the pan from the outset, effectively part-steaming the bird. Turnbull's book belongs to the run of household manuals that were trying to standardise home cooking without yet having thermometers or calibrated ovens to standardise it with, which is why the reader is told the colour to look for rather than the temperature to set. Stuffing pressed in at the neck to plump the breast is a presentation trick of the same era, when the roast turkey was carried whole to the table and carved in front of the company.