Thanksgiving is Thursday, and if you’re hosting hopefully you have the meal pinned down — except for maybe the last-minute whipping cream for your pumpkin pie. There’s even a trick to that, according to Ina Garten, the Barefoot Contessa. If you whip cream ahead of time, it tends to deflate before you top a dessert with it. Ina’s solution is to add two tablespoons of creme fraiche in with the cold cream, sugars and vanilla extract. She then whips the mixture on high speed until soft peaks form. The creme fraiche “makes the cream stable so that it can be made ahead,” Ina said.
If you’re a lucky guest, bring a decadent treat that doesn’t require oven space – chocolates or wine, almonds or olives, red pepper jelly, morning buns for the day after or something practical like pristine new oven mitts and a new dish towel. Thanksgiving is rough on kitchen linens.
As good as Thanksgiving dinner is, nothing can match the splendor of Thanksgiving leftovers. Flavors have melded, emphasis on presentation is negligible, and creativity surges into the turkey sandwich arena. My favorite is sliced buttermilk bread, a smear of Best Foods Mayonnaise, thick chunks of turkey, dark and light mixed, a sprinkle of onion salt, a good spoonful of homemade cranberry/orange relish, a couple of crunchy leaves of romaine lettuce, and the top slice of bread, but I’ve seen innovative Thanksgiving Dagwoods with layers of stuffing, green bean casserole and mashed potatoes included as well as tangy components like red bell pepper ancho chili jam, salsa, dill pickles or chutney.
Lucky for you, possibly the best turkey soup maker in the western hemisphere resides in Chico and agreed to share her secrets to this satisfying, soul-pleasing, elegantly simple soup. Cory Davis made and served cauldrons of delicious turkey soup from her highly regarded restaurant, Cory’s on Third Street. Cory’s closed in 2003, after 14 years of serving up wonderful food and nothing has come close to replicating the restaurant’s 1-inch thick slices of home-baked bread, roasted turkeys, chocolate cake, oatmeal cake, pastries, cookies, cinnamon rolls, and a turkey soup that was clear, fresh-tasting, and absolutely restorative! There were no short-cuts at Cory’s — it was a lot of work, a lot of butter and other quality ingredients infused with the spirit of generosity, and you could taste it; the place was always packed.
Cory’s turkey soup: Cory had an unusual method for cooking her turkeys, six at a time, every day, for sandwiches and soup. She cooked the turkeys in 5-inch deep roasters and put 2-3 inches of water in the bottom of the pan. The turkeys were seasoned with parsley, garlic salt, pepper and butter and the pans were covered with foil before they went into the oven. The turkeys were almost steamed. When roasting was done, Cory’s staff would skim the fat off the seasoned broth left in the pan and a pure gelatin was left which formed the basis for her turkey stock.
To get the same effect at home, you could boil your turkey carcass in chicken broth, or a blend of chicken broth and water for a richer stock. After the carcass has boiled for an hour or two, pull it out of the pot, and strain the broth. At this point you have a lovely pure stock to build your soup with.
To this basic stock, Cory would add raw diced vegetables including a couple of diced sweet onions like Vidalia or Walla Walla, sliced button mushrooms, chopped celery, diced carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage and finely diced red potatoes. Chopped parsley and dried basil were added towards the end. “Choose the vegetables you like”, she says “fresh string beans are also good.” Next step is a couple of cans of diced tomatoes with their juice. At this point, the soup was brought back to a boil, seasoned with kosher salt, garlic salt and freshly ground pepper, then simmered “until the flavors mature and mingle, and the basil releases its oil”. The butter from the turkey skin may have to be skimmed off. “A young soup is when the vegetables are just tender,” and when the vegetables were al dente, or crisp-tender, Cory would add chopped turkey breast, dark meat, carcass pickings and fresh spinach.
Rotini noodles or wide egg noodles, cooked rice or cooked barley, were cooked separately and added at the last minute. This keeps the soup clear, not muddy from the released starch of the pasta or rice. A final seasoning of kosher salt and pepper to taste was added just before the soup was ladled into thick crockery bowls and served with slices of homemade bread. The essence of the soup was the wonderful fresh stock and all the flavors of the fresh vegetables. It was a memorable soup, and it was served every day but Sunday to an appreciative repeat clientele at Cory’s downtown restaurant.
Incidentally, Cory’s idea of a turkey sandwich was her turkey club: two slabs of homemade buttermilk bread, Best Foods mayonnaise, white turkey meat, sliced avocado, Monterey jack cheese, bacon, sliced tomatoes and country ham, in case you’re looking to change up your leftover turkey repertoire.
My chickens turned 6 months old on Veterans Day and surprised us with 1 perfect pullet egg. Since then, we’ve amassed a dozen as everyone kicked in their first small egg! I’ll be taking tiny devilled eggs to Molly and Eric’s house for Thanksgiving. I hope your day is filled with things and people to be thankful for, especially this amazing city with its Camelot fall leaves and perfect weather, Christmas Preview, the Run for Food, the generous spirit of Annie and John Bidwell and all who followed in their footsteps, Happy Thanksgiving!
