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entertaining u newspaper: your weekly guide to entertainment
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Marie Osmond (interview)
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by erin thursby
scopes1925@msn.com
The exhausted cook looked forward to setting her meat thermometer aside for another year, or at least until ravenous relatives started showing up for Christmas. Still, as she settled down for the third leftover turkey sandwich she had eaten since Thanksgiving, she couldn’t help but despondently think: Is this all there is?
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Leftovers don’t have to drive you into a deep depression. They can actually be more interesting and creative than the actual Thanksgiving meal. When you’re cooking for a lot of people, you have to please a lot of palates, but if you’re crafting a leftover meal for yourself, you have free license to go out on a culinary limb.
All of these recipes are made for one. If you want to make them in larger quantities simply multiply the amounts in the ingredients by the number of people. I’ve also made most of them as simple and stress-free as possible because nobody really wants to cook after Thanksgiving.
Italian Style Turkey leftover ideas are fairly easy to make. For Italian Thanksgiving Leftover Meatballs, just shred turkey, add an equal amount of leftover stuffing and roll into ½ inch size meatballs. Heat skillet with olive oil and fry up your turkey balls so they stand up to a little tomato sauce. Serve with tomato sauce or pesto. For something a little more labor intensive, try fixing an Italian Turkey Pepper Stew (see end of article for recipe).
Thai cooking is also a favorite of mine, and it can be surprisingly savory with turkey. To add a bit of Thai spice to your turkey, make up a Thai Peanut sauce to go on it. Just take about ¼ cup peanut butter, a tablespoon of soy sauce, a teaspoon of some kind of hot sauce, a teaspoon of minced garlic, a teaspoon of brown sugar, ½ tablespoon of lime juice, a teaspoon of freshly ground pepper and blend in a blender. Add water, soy sauce or lime juice to tweak the taste and consistency of the blend. Remember that the taste is going to be a bit dramatic, so try it with some turkey. This is not even close to an authentic sauce, but it is easy to make if you’re unlikely to have Thai ingredients in your cupboard.
You can spice up turkey with nearly any ethnic sauce recipe, especially those that go well with chicken. If you’ve found a great recipe with cooked shredded chicken in it, you can probably substitute turkey, no problem. You can easily go Japanese with your turkey by seasoning strips with Teriyaki before serving it over rice. Here’s a few of the more complicated twists on Thanksgiving leftovers I’ve come up with:
½ bell pepper sliced
½ onion sliced
¼ cup pitted and sliced black olives
1 teaspoon olive oil
¼ cup white wine
½ tablespoon of minced basil
½ cup shredded leftover turkey
1. Drop the oil onto a skillet at about medium heat. Toss in your sliced peppers, onion and black olives. Turn heat up to medium high. Sauté for five minutes at that heat. Throw in the basil and pour in the white wine (dry is best).
2. Bring the mixture almost to a boil, then cover and turn down to simmer for 10 minutes.
3. Add the turkey. Mix well. Leave the lid off and simmer.
4. After about 7 minutes, the mixture should be almost evaporated. Either serve as is or cook it for a few minutes more to eliminate the liquid. Enjoy!
1 onion chopped
1 tablespoon butter
teaspoon sugar
¼ cup white wine
¼ cup heavy cream sauce
as much or as little left over cranberry sauce as you would like, to taste.
½ cup turkey
1. Sauté chopped onion and sugar in butter until the onions are golden.
2. Add wine, allow to simmer until the wine is reduced to about half the amount.
3. Add heavy cream sauce, allow to heat, and then add a tablespoon of cranberry. Simmer until heated throughout.
4. Toss in turkey. Lower heat. Stir. Add more cranberry if you would like. Pepper and serve.
(a loose recipe)
green curry paste
1 can coconut milk
chopped carrots
chopped onions
any other veggies you would like
canned sliced bamboo
Leftover turkey
1. Buy a pre-made Thai curry paste. Follow the instructions on making the curry sauce. Make sure you read the back before you leave the store to see if you need additional ingredients.
2. Make your curry, add veggies in whatever configuration you’d like, just make sure the liquid is enough to saturate your veggies and turkey. Simmer turkey and veggies for about 7 minutes. Stir and serve.
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