Yet again I have a turkey breast on the bone including back (so us and the dogs get dinner) and I am sooooo freaking bored with roast turkey. Any ideas? Must be gluten-free and preferred but not required carb free. I am more than willing to cut the meat off the bone if you have a recipe for turkey breast fillets.
The best thing to do with it is smoke it, preferably with mesquite. If you don’t have the means to do that, you’re kind of stuck. IMHO, most ways to cook turkey produce an unpalatable mess. Anything that smacks of boiling, simmering, or grinding ruins turkey, as far as I’m concerned.
Maybe a different style of roasting? Stuff it with garlic and onions, maybe. Hm. You could try butterflying it, basting it with olive oil and seasonings (I recommend garlic, red pepper, black pepper, and salt), and broiling it.
Just wanted to say that your thread title gave me a Pinky flashback.
That is all. Oh, and Balance is right. Smoke it.
In my family, the only thing to do with extra turkey breast is to make turkey curry! We sometimes buy and roast turkey breasts just to have meat for the curry. I’m not gluten-free, but it looks like there are plenty of gluten-free turkey curry recipes online.
Chop it up in a food processor. Make turkey croquettes (this recipe used breadcrumbs but I’m sure you can get around that).
White sauce is traditional. But my mom always made them with cheese sauce.
Oh, I don’t know. You could try poaching it Red-Cooked style (an easily available Chinese recipe incorporating soy sauce, sake, star anise, etc.) until cooked through but not falling apart.
Slice it thick and serve with rice dribbled with the cooking juices. I’ve done chickens this way with great success.
Many things that work with chicken do not work with nearly as well turkey, unfortunately. That’s not to say your suggestion necessarily wouldn’t work, but I’m not optimistic. Cooking turkey in any kind of fluid usually results in lumps of soggy turkey in a sauce that tastes of wet feathers.
Here’s what I do when I have “too much turkey breast” (if there really is such a thing): buy a quarter ham and a block of Swiss cheese, dice the turkey, dice the ham, dice the Swiss, break out the crepe pan, some spinach, a little flour, some milk, and 2 ounces of egg-like product - ham, turkey, Swiss, and spinach crepes.
Wrap turkey breasts with Parma-style ham.
The French poach turkey parts all the time. Thighs braised over lentils and a savory, fragrant stock is particularly delicious. Turkey necks stewed with white beans is outstanding, and will cost you maybe 5 bucks for all the ingredients.
The one thing they DON’T do is roast it whole, because they know how to cook things and just look at that son of a bitch, all those drumsticks and wings poking out and that huge fat breast and how you gonna fit it in an oven and cook it so it comes out EVEN, huh?
Chop two large onions and a very small clove of garlic. Put them in a dutch oven on medium to simmer/brown (with some veggie oil - preferably safflower as turkey really picks up any flavors in the oil.) You want the onions to turn translucent before the browning begins.
Dice the turkey and add to pot, brown it too. After that you may need to deglaze with a splash of white wine, or whisky, whatever is on hand and sounds good. Any time the bottom of the pan threatens to turn too dark a brown, use just another splash, but don’t make it liquidy.
Add a bunch of chopped celery and carrots (shaving the carrots into curls with a potato peeler will speed things up considerably, and it makes for a lovely texture.)
Chop up about a cup and a half (or two-ish) of dried apricots and soak them in 2 parts water, 2 parts whatever deglazer you chose above. Just enough to cover. Add a bit of dried basil, maybe a teaspoon or so? And some black pepper.
After the turkey is browned, then cooked through, add the apricot mixture and cook down as necessary. Add 1 tblsp butter and a plash of heavy cream. If the apricots haven’t thickened the sauce, shake up some potato starch with some cold water and pour it in sparingly. Serve over whatever noodles work for you, spaetzle if you can get it (does it come in gluten-free?) You could also serve it over roasted and mashed cauliflower.
Yeah, I’ve never had an issue with turkey braises. They cook up just fine, much like chicken, but with a, well, turkey flavor, of course. I don’t find the meats really cook all that differently, except in terms of how much mass you have.
Cut the breast meat off, slice cross-wise into ‘steaks’ about an inch thick. Flatten them a bit, salt & better, dip in egg wash then breadcrumbs and then sauté. Serve with whatever type sauce appeals – or none.
Very easy, takes just a couple minutes to cook.