Special Thanksgiving Day With Paleo Style

Turkey

Here’s a really good brine recipe with detailed instructions from allrecipes.com. These instructions call for you to put the turkey in a bucket overnight in your fridge, but I know that I wouldn’t be able to fit a big bucket in my fridge. You can buy a brining bag at grocery stores, instead. Here are some instructions for doing it that way. Brining will make a moister, more flavorful turkey every time. After you brine it, you can cook it whichever way you like – roast it, BBQ it.. Just don’t deep fry it in vegetable oil!

Gravy

This recipe is from Jim Lytton, my boyfriend’s dad. Thanks, Jim!

innards and neck from turkey
4 cups water
4 cups (1 quart) chicken stock
drippings from turkey
5-6 large carrots
5 stalks celery
1 medium onion
2 large cloves garlic
same herb mix you used on turkey
salt to taste (optional)

Dice the carrots, onion, and celery and mince the garlic. Save the innards and the neck from the turkey. Combine the water, stock, vegetables, herbs of choice, innards and neck in a large pot and heat on medium high until it starts to boil. Turn it down to low for a couple of hours until it starts to thicken and the meat starts to fall off the neck. Remove the neck and cut off the meat from it – discard the cartilage and bone. Place the neck meat back in the pot and blend with a submergible blender until smooth. Alternatively, you can use a regular blender. When your turkey is done roasting, place the drippings (skim off the big fat globules) into the gravy mixture and incorporate with the blender until smooth. At the very end, add salt to taste.