Luscious Thanksgiving leftovers. November 25, 2011
Posted by ourfriendben in recipes.Tags: making the most of Thanksgiving bounty, recipes for Thanksgiving leftovers, Thanksgiving leftovers, Thanksgiving sides, turkey leftovers
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Silence Dogood here, reprising a timely post from 2009. Leftovers are a fact of Thanksgiving life. And of course they’re delicious. Reheated turkey and dressing with cranberry sauce, or delicious turkey sandwiches with mayo: Yum!
But you can do a lot more with the leftovers from your Thanksgiving feast. Admittedly, my taste in food is simple: As long as it’s delicious, it never bores me. Back in the day when I still ate meat, I could have eaten turkey sandwiches or reheated turkey ’til the end of time. But as it happened, my Mama had a leftover turkey specialty that I loved best of all: creamed turkey.
After all the big slices had been cut off the turkey and used to make hot turkey or turkey sandwiches, she’d carefully cut off the remaining shreds and put them in a pot with plenty of butter, salt and white pepper, turkey drippings, and cream, and cook them until the turkey was heated through and the sauce had cooked down thick. Then she’d make toast and serve the creamed turkey over that. To me, this was heaven on earth: the creamy turkey and the crunchy toast. You could, of course, serve creamed turkey over biscuits, rice, pasta, or even cornbread, and I’m sure it would be delicious. But there was something about the crunchiness of the toast that made it really special.
Turns out, creamed turkey isn’t the only thing you can do with leftover turkey. In our paper, the Allentown PA Morning Call, food editor Diane Stoneback interviewed the local matriarch of all things turkey, Anne Jaindl, who at age 80 was still cooking turkeys several times a week and making the most of the leftovers. Here are three of her favorite recipes for leftovers:
Anne Jaindl’s Turkey Tetrazzini
8 oz. spaghetti (cooked according to package instructions)
6 Tbsps. butter
3 Tbsps. flour
1 1/2 cups turkey stock
1/2 cup heavy cream
3 Tbsps. dry sherry
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 lb. mushrooms, sliced
1 lb. cooked turkey cut into bite-size pieces (about 3-4 cups)
2 Tbsps. grated Parmesan cheese
Melt half the butter in a heavy saucepan. Sprinkle in flour. Stir over gentle heat for 2 minutes. Stir in hot stock and bring to a boil. Simmer until thick. Cool for 5 minutes, then add cream, sherry, nutmeg, salt and pepper. Melt remaining butter in separate pan. Add mushrooms and fry gently. Arrange cooked spaghetti, turkey and mushrooms in baking dish; cover with sauce. Sprinkle with Parmesan and bake at 375 degrees F. for 30 minutes.
Anne Jaindl’s Turkey Barbecue
1 onion, chopped
4 stalks celery, chopped
1 clove garlic, crushed
1/2 cup catsup
1/4 cup vinegar
1 Tbsp. Worcestershire sauce
1 Tbsp. brown sugar
1 tsp. dry mustard
1 lb. cooked, cubed turkey (about 3-4 cups)
Combine all ingredients and simmer about 15 minutes.
Anne Jaindl’s Cranberry Turkey Stir-Fry
1 cup cranberry sauce
1/3 cup dry sherry
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup vinegar
2 Tbsps. cornstarch
2 Tbsps. cooking oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 cups carrots, sliced
2 cups zucchini, cut in strips
2 cups cooked turkey, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
4 cups bean sprouts
Combine cranberry sauce, sherry, water, soy sauce, vinegar, and cornstarch. Mix until smooth. Set aside. Stir-fry garlic in hot oil for 30 seconds. Add carrots: stir-fry for 3 minutes. Add zucchini and turkey and stir-fry 1 minute. Add cranberry mixture; cook until bubbly (about 2 minutes). Serve over sprouts. [Or pasta or rice.—Silence]
These recipes certainly help you think of good things to do with turkey, or even turkey and cranberry sauce. And speaking of cranberry sauce, if you have a lot of leftover sauce, you probably can’t face eating all of it with your turkey leftovers. So consider using some of it as a luscious topping for ice cream or sherbet. Vanilla, peach, and mango ice cream strike me as especially good choices, or you can bring out the orange in your cranberry sauce by using it as a topping for orange, lemon, or lime sherbet. (Bet it would taste great over pineapple sherbet, too.)
Which reminds me, you might consider trying cranberry sauce as a substitute for the usual pineapple in an upside-down cake. It could be delicious! If you enjoy a cherry or strawberry topping on your cheesecake, I’ll bet you’d enjoy a cranberry-sauce topping, too. It would also layer beautifully in a trifle. Or try this super-simple dessert: Slice a storebought angelfood cake into three sections crosswise. Whip a pint of heavy cream with sugar. Spread cranberry sauce over the top of each layer, followed by whipped cream, then gently put the layers together and serve.
Needless to say, if you bought an extra bag or two of fresh or frozen cranberries and didn’t end up using them, your options are almost unlimited. Cranberry bread or muffins would be fantastic. But how about cranberry chutney? Here are a couple of recipes from a classic cookbook in my collection, The Cranberry Connection, published in 1977 and written by Beatrice Ross Buszek of Cranberrie Cottage, Nova Scotia:
Cranberry Orange Muffins
1 3/4 cups sifted flour
2 1/2 tsp. baking powder
2 Tbsp. sugar
3/4 tsp. salt
1 well-beaten egg
3/4 cup milk
1/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup cooking oil
4 Tbsp. butter, melted
1/3 cup homemade cranberry-orange relish
To make the relish: Put 4 cups of fresh cranberries and 2 oranges, quartered, through a grinder. [Er, a food processor?—Silence] Stir in 1 1/2 cups sugar. Chill or freeze and use as needed. [You could also halve the recipe.—Silence]
To make the muffins: Sift together flour, 2 T sugar, baking powder and salt. Mix well. Combine egg, milk and oil. Add to dry mix and stir until moistened. Spoon half the batter into 12 2 1/2-inch greased muffin cups. Top each with 1 teaspoon cranberry-orange relish. Then fill with batter mix. Bake 25 minutes at 400 degrees F. While still warm, dips tops in melted butter, then in the 1/4 cup sugar.
Refrigerated Cranberry Chutney
4 cups cranberries
2 oranges
1 lemon
2 apples
1 cup raisins
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 tsp. powdered ginger
2 Tbsps. candied ginger [Crystallized ginger?—Silence]
2 Tbsps. grated onion
6 Tbsps. minced green bell pepper
Core apple and put fruit through chopper. [Food processor?—Silence] Add remaining ingredients. Mix well. Cover and refrigerate. Makes 3 pints.
Okay, now you’ve got the turkey and cranberries covered. What about the dressing? Well, if it’s that soft, gooey dressing that’s cooked inside the turkey, aka stuffing, you’re on your own. But if it’s the savory, crunchy dressing that’s cooked separately, and if you also have leftover mashed or whipped potatoes or mashed sweet potatoes, you’re in luck. Spread the potatoes in a buttered casserole dish or pie pan and top with a layer of dressing. Dot the top with butter and heat in the oven at 300 until hot through. Yum!!! (Naturally, you can always make a fresh batch of mashed potatoes if you don’t have potato leftovers. It’s worth it!)
What about those sweet potatoes? If you have leftover baked or mashed sweet potatoes, you might consider making Landis Store’s Sweet Potato Souffle. It’s the best! (Use our search bar at upper right to find my earlier post, “Thanksgiving: Those sweet potatoes” for the recipe.) Or how about adding them to baked goods, like Sweet Potato Biscuits or Sweet Potato Corn Cake (a type of cornbread)? Here are recipes for both from Bill Neal’s classic Southern cookbook, Biscuits, Spoonbread, and Sweet Potato Pie:
Sweet Potato Biscuits
2 cups all-purpose flour
heaping 1/2 tsp. salt
3 1/4 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. sugar, if desired
1/2 tsp. baking soda
5 Tbsps. cold shortening, butter, or a combination
7/8 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup mashed or pureed cold cooked sweet potato
Sift the dry ingredients together into a large bowl. Add the cold shortening and/or butter and work all through the flour with your fingertips. Every bit of flour should be combined with a bit of fat. Add the buttermilk and sweet potato and stir vigorously until the dough forms a ball. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Knead lightly for 10 strokes. Stop just as soon as the dough begins to look smooth. Pat the dough out to approximately an 8 x 8 x 1/2-inch-thick square. Cut into 2-inch rounds. Place on an ungreased sheet and bake in an oven preheated to 500 degrees F for 8 minutes, until lightly browned. Biscuits will be a lovely apricot color. Serve hot with lots of butter. [And slices of aged Cheddar or maple syrup or apricot jam!—Silence] Makes 12-14 biscuits.
Sweet Potato Corn Cake
2 cups cornmeal [White cornmeal is traditional.—Silence]
1 tsp. salt
1 1/8 cup water
2 Tbsps. butter
2/3 to 1 cup mashed sweet potato
1 1/4 cups buttermilk
1 egg
2/3 cup all-purpose flour
2 1/2 tsps. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Sift flour with baking powder and baking soda into a large bowl; add cornmeal and salt and mix thoroughly. Beat egg with buttermilk. Bring the water and butter to a boil. When the butter has melted and the water is boiling, pour over the cornmeal-flour mixture and stir thoroughly. Add the buttermilk mixture and sweet potatoes and stir again to blend. Bake in a buttered 9-inch tin in the preheated 375-degree oven for 30 minutes or until golden brown on top. This is delicious split and buttered with honey or molasses. Makes 6 servings.
Moving on, what if you have a can (or part of a can) of leftover pumpkin? (We’re talking about 100% pumpkin here, not pie filling.) I, of course, enthusiastically recommend my Curried Pumpkin Soup and Pumpkin Chili (search for my earlier posts, “Curried pumpkin soup” and “Silence’s Chili Surprise,” for the recipes). And I suspect you could substitute equal amounts of pumpkin for the sweet potato in the biscuit and corn cake recipes. But here are two other intriguing options, from Pumpkin Lovers Cookbook:
Pumpkin Spaghetti
1 cup canned 100% pumpkin
1 cup heavy cream
1 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/4 cup softened butter
12 oz. thin spaghetti
salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
Bring water to a boil and cook the pasta. When it’s nearly done, mix the pumpkin, cream, nutmeg, and 1/2 cup Parmesan in a small pan. Bring just to a simmer over low heat, stirring once or twice. Remove from heat. Drain spaghetti and pour into a large bowl. Add butter to spaghetti and toss ’til butter is melted. Pour pumpkin mixture over pasta. Toss. Serve with additional Parmesan, salt and pepper.
Pumpkin Custard
1 1/2 cups canned 100% pumpkin
2/3 cup brown sugar
3 beaten eggs
1 1/2 cups scalded milk
1 Tbsp. cornstarch
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. powdered ginger
1/4 tsp. each powdered cloves and nutmeg
Mix all ingredients thoroughly and pour into a buttered baking dish. Bake in a preheated 350 degree F. over for 45 minutes. Serves 4 to 6.
Sometimes you end up with leftovers you don’t expect. Our neighbors sent us home from one Thanksgiving dinner with an entire container of cooked corn, for example. I had made the Gourmet magazine recipe for corn pudding using John Cope’s Dried Sweet Corn and substituting half-and-half for the milk (we were out of milk, gasp), and it was delicious. (See my post “Thanksgiving, PA Dutch style: Dried corn” for the recipe.) Alas, no trace of this delicious corn pudding remained, so I decided to make another with the fresh corn. It was delicious. I could have also added some of the corn to my own standard cornbread recipe, or tossed some into sauteed sweet onions and mushrooms to serve over pasta or rice, or…
Anyway. Making the best use of leftovers, so you eat every last bite with as much delight as the first, is a wonderful way to stretch your food budget. And those tastes of Thanksgiving remind us to count our blessings and be grateful. Let us hear from you if you have favorite ways to use leftovers!
‘Til next time,
Silence
Poor Richard's Almanac 