Turkey Stock

You didn't throw that turkey carcass in the trash. Did you?

I hope not, because now would be the time to be making some excellent turkey stock.

I don't spend too much time agonizing over this. One thing I think is especially important is to break up the turkey bones. I take them outside with a big cleaver and a hammer and crack them in two. Break up the rib cage, breast bone, etc., even more.

Throw all the bones in a big stock pot with a couple of large carrots cut into pieces, an onion sliced in half (skin on), two or three stalks of celery cut into pieces, a fist-full of parsley sprigs, a couple of bay leaves and a few peppercorns. Cover everything with a couple gallons of water. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to a gentle simmer and cook for a few hours, or until the stock is quite aromatic and any meat left on the turkey bones is falling off.

Use the stock to make a delicious soup and freeze rest for later.

French Onion Soup

The moment finally arrived yesterday to turn the extraordinary beef stock we made last week into an extraordinary French onion soup.

This was a team effort. I made the beef stock. My wife, with her usual expert attention to detail, finished the soup. As her reference, she used The New Best Recipe, from the editors at Cook's Illustrated magazine. A small controversy arose, as the good editors at Cook's Illustrated felt compelled to give a recipe substituting a mix of store-bought chicken stock, beef stock and red wine for an authentic beef stock.

My wife happens to believe that if this gets harried cooks to attempt a French onion soup, all the better. My personal opinion is, I don't really have an opinion. It just seems to me that the time it takes to gather up the ingredients for a faux-stock could just as easily be spent gathering up the ingredients for a real stock. Really, there is not that much extra effort involved and a homemade beef stock will send you into orbit, it is that good.

Once you've settled the matter of a stock, the soup is fairly simple. Slice five red onions thinly and saute them with two tablespoons butter and 1/2 teaspoon salt in a heavy pot at least 30 minutes, stirring frequently, or until the onions are extremely soft, reduced and syrupy. Add 6 cups stock and 1/4-cup red wine, plus 2 sprigs parsley, 1 sprig thyme, 1 bay leaf.

Scrape the onions from the bottom of the pot. Bring the soup to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for about 20 minutes. Stir in 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar and season with salt and freshly ground black pepper as needed.

To finish the soup in the traditional French style, ladle it into six deep ceramic bowls and place two slices of baguette, cut on an angle, on top of each. Over the bread, distribute Greyere and Asiago cheese, approximately 4 1/2 ounces Gruyere and 3 ounces Asiago total.

My wife was able to use our cheese slicer--the kind with a taught wire on the handle--to make very thin slices out of the Gruyere. She grated the Asiago. But however you manage it will be fine, since the cheese melts in the oven. My wife simply dislikes those presentations where the cheese is melted in big globs on the edge of the soup bowl, and cheese is running down the sides (remember, you do have to clean the bowls afterwards).

Now place the soup bowls on a baking sheet and put them under the broiler until the cheese is melted, browned and even charred a little in picturesque fashion. Carefully place the hot bowls on an underliner to bring to the table and serve with your favorite red wine.

The soup is a meal in itself. When you think about it, between the bread, the cheese, the onions and the beef, virtually all the major food groups are represented. But we went ahead and served a salad afterwards with a variety of winter greens, dried cranberries, a leftover lump of Feta cheese and a honey-mustard vinaigrette. We had a bunch of bananas going bad, so my wife made our favorite banana bread with chocolate nibs for dessert, served with a dollop of vanilla ice cream.

This was a simple meal, but a perfect Sunday supper. I urge you: should any beef scraps fall into your hand--or bones--make beef stock. You will not regret it.

Beef Stock

I don't know that I have ever designed a trip to the grocery with the idea of making a beef stock. This seems to be one of those things that happens serendipitously around the kitchen, as when you make beef Bourgignone for a crowd and end up with a couple of pounds of trimmings from two large chuck roasts.

The trimmings went into a storage bag and sat in the refrigerator while I planned my next move. Finally, inspiration struck, and I was off to Whole Foods for beef bones, a big slice of shank and enough aromatics to fill my stock pot.

A classic meat stock calls for veal bones, but you know what? I didn't have any veal bones. Fortunately, my reference in this venture, La Varenne Pratique, includes an all-beef stock option.

You will need to get a couple of sheet pans dirty. We have several of the commercial variety that just fit in our oven. On one sheet pan, spread out your meat trimmings. Don't worry about any fat that may be on the meat. It will render in the oven. On another sheet pan, distribute 3 pounds beef soup bones or, as in my case, marrow bones, plus a 1-pound slice of beef shank. Place the sheet pans in a 425-degree oven and bake until browned. Turn all the meat pieces and bones and return to the oven to brown some more.

The browned meat and bones can go directly into your stock pot. Drain the fat off your sheet pans.

On one of the sheet pans, place two onions, quartered, with the skins on, and four medium carrots, quartered. Place these in the oven until the vegetables begin to brown or even char a little. Now they can go into the stock pot as well. Ladle some water onto the two sheet pans and scrape up all the brown bits. This may take a few minutes, but eventually your water will look just like beef stock and the sheet pan with be almost clean. Pour this into the stock pot.

Now to the pot add 2 medium leeks, trimmed of the dark green parts, cleaned and quartered. (To clean leeks, I slice them in half lengthwise from a point near the root end so that the two lengths are still held together and run them under cold water to remove any sand and grit.) Also add several sprigs fresh thyme, a fistful of parsley sprigs, two bay leaves, a dozen black peppercorn and 2 cloves garlic, crushed but unpeeled.

Cover everything with cold water to a depth of one or two inches. Over everything place a heavy object such as a ceramic plate to hold the vegetables under the liquid. I use one of those folding, stainless steamer baskets, inverted over the vegetables.

Bring the pot to a boil, then reduce heat to a simmer, so that bubbles occasionally break the surface. Be careful not to let the pot boil too fast: boiling results in a cloudy stock. You may need to skim the surface occasionally. Let the pot simmer for a good four hours, then remove it from the heat.

Once the stock has cooled enough to handle, you can use a slotted spoon to remove as much of the solids from the pot as possible. Strain the liquid at least twice through a fine-meshed strainer to remove any particles. Refrigerate the stock overnight. The fat will rise to the surface and form a crust that is easily removed with a slotted spoon. You may want to strain the stock again at this point to remove small particles of fat. Allow the stock to rest. Any remaining fat can be removed by carefully laying a paper towel on the surface to soak it up.

Taste your stock. Most likely, it will be so full of flavor you'll want to eat it on the spot. Although I was tempted to plunge my entire face into our stock--it was that good--I've managed some self control. The buzz around the kitchen is that we will be turning this into French onion soup. Stay tuned.

Turkey Stock

In our house it was customary the day after Thanksgiving to divide the carcass and start a huge pot of turkey stock. The house would fill with the unmistakable aroma of turkey on the stove, a signal to one and all that we would soon be embarking on a week-long mission to consume as much turkey soup and leftover turkey as possible. Thus did we give proof to the adage that when something is in season, you eat it until it's gone.


It seems axiomatic that when the Thanksgiving feast is over, something of a turkey penury begins. My wife, for instance, loves the holiday--loves all the preparations and the family gathering and the protocols of the meal--but hates leftover turkey. I can remember an infinite number of turkey sandwiches--is there anything more delectable than the combintation of turkey, mayo and cranberry sauce?--as well as the slogging through of the first turkey-a-la-king, followed by the seemingly interminable nights of leftover turkey-a-la-king.


Personally, I love turkey sandwiches and turkey-a-la-king, preferably with cremini mushrooms. And for all those cooks who dread the onslaught of leftovers, there is this thought: freeze it.


We will not have nearly so many leftovers as a 31-pound bird might produce, because everyone who joined us for Thanksgiving dinner had a package of leftovers thrust at them before they could exit the house. Still, the carcass I saved in the cooler is a pretty large one and will make a generous quantity of stock.


Use this for turkey soup, of course, but also to enhance that turkey-a-la-king sauce, to put some spark into a turkey chili, perhaps, and for soups with beans and hearty greens. Perhaps you have some favorite uses for turkey stock? By all means, send them along.


The process is almost identical as for a chicken stock. The main point is to break up the bones to extract as much flavor and collagen as possible. A good stock should be quite gelatinous once it is refrigerated. I use a heavy cleaver to crack the carcass into numerous pieces. In fact, I need two pots for this operation.


At the bottom of a large pot, place an onion sliced in half, two carrots broken into pieces, two celery stalks broken into pieces, a fistfull of leafy parsley stems, several sprigs of thyme, two bay leaves and a dozen pepper corns. Cover these with pieces of the carcase, leg bones, wing bones, etc. Cover with cool water and place a heavy object on top to hold everything down. I use a stainless, collapsible steaming basket, but a ceramic plate also works to hold all of the solid contents under the surface of the water while it cooks.



Bring the liquid almost to a boil, then reduce the heat to a simmer where bubbles are occasionally breaking the surface. You do want to cook the stock, but boiling and roiling will make the stock cloudy. Continue cooking for three hours or more, until the stock is quite flavorful. Remove the pot from the heat.



Allow the stock to cool a bit and collect itself. Then use a slotted spoon or (my favorite) a Chinese spider to remove all the solid contents from the pot. Pour the stock through a fine sieve to remove all the remaining particles. Clean out the cookpot and return the stock to it. Refrigerate overnight. The following day, the fat will have risen to the top of the stock and congealed. You can easily remove it with a spoon and save it for future use (frying potatoes, perhaps?).


The stock is ready to use, or--more likely--divide into containers for the freezer.