The Cynosural Blog

Now that you've cooked all of that food, what do you do with the leftovers? There are three things that I do.

Turkey Stock

Take the back, carcass, and any leftover thighs or drumsticks, and stick in a pot with the normal onion, garlic, celery, carrots, parsnips, whatever aromatic veggies you like, parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme, bay leaf and cloves in a bouquet garni, add the defatted pan drippings you saved, and a mushroom or vegetarian stock that you always have in the freezer and boil all day long on the simmering bricks. Removing any meat from any bones after 45 minutes or so.

Turkey Tetrazinni

Take the meat you removed from the stock, and any other leftover turkey, and cube it. You can even use up any leftover wild mushroom and giblet gravy that you might have. Update: Silly me, I forgot the pasta - one pound of fettucini, cooked, drained and mixed with the meat in the casserole. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Place the meat in a buttered casserole dish, and cover with a sauce made of:

• melt one stick of butter in a heavy pan
• sauté 1/2 pound of cremini mushrooms, and add in some soaked, minced porcinis
• blend in 1/4 cup of flour and allow to cook, without much browning, over low heat for 3 minutes
• whisk in 2 cups of the stock
• then 1 cup milk
• then 1/2 cup white wine [from what you'll serve with the meal
• and 1 cup heavy cream
• add 2 teaspoons salt, or to taste
• and a couple of grinds of peppercorns
• then grate fresh nutmeg and stir it all up and pour over the meat & fettucini

Top with 3/4 to 1 cup of soft, finely diced bread crumbs mixed with grated parmigiana and pecorino cheese.

Traditional Thanksgiving Leftovers Sandwich

I know of two places that serve this year round: one is in Pennsylvania, but it's been too many years and I don't remember the name of the place. The other was Two Fools Café in Half Moon Bay, except they've shut down. /sigh

Use your favorite sandwich bread, make it open faced or closed, on a roll or sliced bread, toasted bread or not, with some mayonnaise or basil aioli on the bread or not, the sandwich filling is sliced turkey, sliced stuffing [or, this year, the wild mushroom bread pudding] and cranberry sauce. Another variation on the preparation is to use an herbed focaccia or slab bread, even a ciabatta would work, slice it in half between the top and bottom, put in the filling, and grill it as a panini.

Letti, thank you for stopping by. I actually worked, about 25 years ago at Westinghouse Marine Div. with the grandson of the Japanese farmer who brought mandarin oranges to the USA. Your pies look great. I don't think you can find real mince meat any more, the one with venison and suet in it.

I hope that everyone had a great Thanksgiving. Enjoy your leftovers, or tira, as my partner would say.