Hello, friends! As promised, I continue the selection of the best recipes of meat dishes.

Today - turkey baked in the oven. Recently, tender, tasty and non-fat turkey meat wins more and more fans. Excellent, dietary poultry meat containing amino acids that produce the hormones of happiness and pleasure (endorphins). If you have a bad mood, eat turkey! Also its meat contains nicotinic acid, which regulates cholesterol in the blood.

The most valuable part of the bird is the breast. Pure protein, its composition is similar to human and therefore quickly absorbed, almost 99%. Calorie is 84 kcal per 100 grams.

Very interesting recipes for cooking turkey in different countries. In France, the bird is stuffed with truffles, porcini and rosemary, in Italy - with oranges, in England - with berries and mushrooms, In Norway - sea kale. In the US, Thanksgiving (the fourth Thursday of November) baked a turkey for homeless people.

Today you will learn: how to bake the turkey in the oven, the cooking time, with what and how to serve? All this we will analyze in this article. And at the very end it is important for me to hear your opinion.

How to cook a juicy turkey in the oven

Baked turkey, as well as one of the popular festive dishes.

The housewife enjoys great love with a turkey baked in foil or in a sleeve, stuffed with apples or oranges, or simply with potatoes. It can be baked and boiled, stewed and stuffed, whole or chopped into pieces. The dietary fillet and breast is very much appreciated. No less tasty are the lids, thigh and shin.

There are a lot of recipes for cooking, and everyone can choose something for themselves. I want to offer you some simple tips on how to cook a bird deliciously:

• Meat must be marinated in advance, it will give juiciness and additional flavor from spices. Pickling time from 1 to 12 hours.
• The roasting time depends on the weight of the bird and its age, at the rate of 20 minutes for every 500 gr. meat. To make a ruddy crust, before baking the turkey must be smeared with sour cream.
• Roasting temperature of 180-200 degrees gas in ovens with convection, the main thing is not to overdry meat.
• Turkey needs to be watered with separated juice, every 20-30 minutes, if it is cooked without foil and without a sleeve.
• Use spices and spices: basil, rosemary, cumin, turmeric, curry, saffron, garlic, pepper mixes.

  Baked whole turkey in the oven

As one of my familiar cooks said, if you bake a whole bird, it will be great, and if you stuff it with nuts and fruits, it will be a holiday. So, prepare a big, tasty, juicy, festive turkey in the oven.

The whole bird is very convenient to bake in a special baking sleeve or in foil. And you can just in the deep pan for the oven. It can be stuffed with oranges or apples.

Ingredients:

• turkey - 5-6 kg.
• walnuts - 500
• apple - 5 pcs.
• onions - 2 pcs.
• sour cream - 1/2 tbsp.
• pomegranate sauce - 200 gr.
• spice
• salt - 1/2 tbsp.
• sugar- 1/2 tbsp.

Recipe:

First you need to choose the right bird. We go to the market, and try to buy a fresh, homemade, steamy carcass. If not, then buy a chilled bird. Desirable medium size 5 ̶ 6 kilograms.

Homemade turkey, baked in the oven, it turns out very tasty, juicy and attractive in appearance. It is better to bake it whole.

The carcass should be meaty, the breast and legs should be thick. The skin should be light, without dark spots, with a yellowish tinge. Freshness check by pressing a finger on the carcass, if the dent quickly recovered, then the meat is fresh.

In order for us to get a juicy turkey, it must be marinated. To prepare the marinade, take the salt, sugar, spices. Dissolve in water. Take a large container, put the bird, and fill with sufficient amounts of brine. Leave on for 10-12 hours. Such a soak, retain all the flavor and juice of the meat during its preparation.

While our bird is marinating, it's time to cook the stuffing. Since we are preparing a dish for guests for the holiday, then we will choose the delicious filling. We will cook apples in a nut - pomegranate sauce.

Peel the walnuts and chop them with a rolling pin or a blender. Onions cut into small cubes, fry in sunflower oil until golden brown.

Take a sunny ripe apple, cut it into slices, and fry in boiling butter with sugar, add cinnamon, cloves, black pepper. This combination gives an unimaginable Persian flavor.

In a large bowl, put chopped nuts, fried onions, add pomegranate sauce and mix well.

It turned out nut - pomegranate minced, the consistency of it should be like meat. If thick, add pomegranate sauce.

Take a piece of nutmeal in your palm and lay a sauteed apple slice inside.

And fill this stuffing turkey.

Dissolve the rest of the mince with pomegranate sauce and sour cream, and coat the bird outside. Place in a deep pan for the oven, spread the whole potato around the turkey.

Preheat the oven beforehand. It takes about 2-3 hours to prepare this dish, at a temperature of 180 degrees.

Readiness can be checked with a sharp knife, make a small puncture, if a clear juice is released, then the meat is ready. It turned out such a beauty, crisp, ruddy, tasty, flowing with juice. Potatoes were soaked with juice, which stood out from the bird when baking.

Before serving, chop the finished bird into portions. Serve with white dry wine.

Turkey fillet with apples baked in foil

Take a note of the recipe for cooking low-calorie and dietary turkey fillet with fruit. Fruits give meat not only flavor and taste, but also make it more juicy and soft.

Ingredients:

• turkey fillet 4 servings
• bacon ̶ 4 slices
• green apple ̶ 1 pc.
• vegetable oil ̶ 3 tbsp. l
• butter ̶ 50 gr.
• tomato paste or ketchup ̶ 2 tbsp. l
• salt, pepper ̶ to taste

Cooking:

1. Bird fillet moderately repelled, it should not be very thin. Salt, pepper.
2. Heat the vegetable oil in a pan and fry the fillet on both sides until golden brown, and put it on the foil. Place bacon on top.
3. Apple cut into 4 parts and fry in butter.
4. Put on bacon, pour tomato paste on top, sprinkle with melted butter on which the apple was fried, and wrap everything in foil.
5. Bake in a hot oven. When the foil is inflated, cut it and immediately serve the dish on the table.

This is not the only way to cook a turkey with fruit, you can bake a turkey fillet with pineapples and cheese and with oranges, or with cranberry sauce.

Turkey with honey in baking sleeve

I think you will appreciate the advantages of cooking meat in a baking sleeve:  meat is cooked in its own juice, with or without the minimum addition of butter; In the end, the pan does not need to be washed, the oven remains clean.

Ingredients:

• turkey ̶ 3 kg
• honey ̶ 1/2 st.
• orange liquor ̶ 1/3 tbsp.
• lemon juice ̶ 1/3 tbsp.
• mustard 2 tsp
• ground red pepper ̶ 1/2 tsp
• lemon 1 pc
• onions ̶ 1 pc.
• salt ̶ to taste

Cooking:

1. Take a small turkey. Prick your skin with a sharp knife.
2. In a bowl, mix in salt, lemon juice and red pepper.
3. Carefully rub the bird inside and out with this mixture, leave it for 1 hour to soak.
4. In another bowl, mix honey, orange liqueur and mustard.
5. Spread this mixture on the bird and carefully place it in the baking bag. Tie the package with special clips. And send in the oven for 2 hours, at a temperature of 180 degrees.

Before serving, chop the finished bird into portions. Serve with honey sauce.

French-style turkey

This is an exquisite main dish that can be cooked for everyday lunch and gala dinner. Prepares fast and easy.

Ingredients:

• turkey fillet 1 kg.
• ̶ potato 8 pieces
• tomato 2 pcs.
• red onions ̶ 2 pcs.
• parmesan ̶ 200 gr.
• sour cream гр 100 gr.
• salt ̶ to taste
• vegetable oil ̶ 2 tbsp. l
• seasoning for poultry (thyme, rosemary, thyme, basil).

Cooking:

1. Cut the turkey fillet into small pieces, repel lightly on both sides. Pepper and salt meat, add your favorite seasonings. Heat the vegetable oil in a pan and fry the fillets lightly on both sides.
2. Peel the onions and cut into thin rings. Pour 1/2 cup of water into a bowl, add 1/2 tsp of salt and sugar, add vinegar. In this marinade, put the chopped onion for 15 minutes, then squeeze it gently.
3. Cut potatoes into 1 centimeter thick slices. Salt, pepper, if desired, you can add garlic squeezed through a press.
4. Cut the tomato into 1 centimeter thick slices.
5. Cheese grate on a coarse grater.
6. Take a baking sheet with high sides, brush with vegetable oil, and lay out layers: fried meat, pickled onions, potatoes, tomatoes. Grease everything a lot with sour cream, cover with baking paper on top.
7. Send to the oven for 30 minutes at 180 degrees.
8. Remove the dish, remove the paper, sprinkle with cheese and send back to the oven for 10 minutes. Once the cheese has melted and a beautiful appetizing crust is formed, the dish is ready.

Shin turkey stew with vegetables in the oven

The turkey drumstick in the oven, cooked according to this recipe, is a truly exquisite dish, with tender juicy meat and a crispy crust. The drumstick can also be cooked both in foil and in the baking sleeve.

Ingredients:

• turkey drumstick ̶ 2 pcs
• ̶ 6 pcs potatoes
• tomato 2 pcs.
• onions ̶ 2 pcs.
• zucchini ̶ 1 pc.
• bulgarian pepper ̶ 1 pc.
• carrots ̶ 1 pc.
• salt ̶ to taste
• black pepper ̶ 1/2 tsp
• butter ̶ 50 gr.
• olive oil ̶ 1 tbsp. l
• seasoning for poultry

Cooking:

Cook the marinade first. Put melted butter in a bowl and all your favorite spices for poultry. Mix everything.

Finely chop the onion into cubes and add to the seasonings.

Take a drumstick. In order for the marinade to soak the meat well, the skin should be gently pulled, try not to damage it. Trim the film and peel the skin from the lower leg.

Shred the meat on the leg, or make small cuts. Prepared marinade, rub the leg, pressing the marinade into the cuts.

Then pull the skin back onto the shin, and rub it on top.

Grease the remaining marinade on the meat, and leave to marinate for 1 hour.

The drumstick is ready for baking. It can be baked in this form. Garnish for such a leg is well suited mashed potatoes and sour cream sauce.

And today we are cooking shank with vegetables. Cut all the vegetables. Zucchini, potatoes and carrots cut into rings, onion ̶ half rings, tomato ̶ quarters. Salt, pepper, add olive oil.

Grease the baking dish with vegetable oil, put the turkey drumstick and send to the oven for 40 minutes at 180 degrees. As you bake, water the shin with the juice that stands out and turn it over.

When a small crust appears, remove the mold from the oven and place the prepared vegetables around the meat. Bake another 20 minutes, do not forget to pour juice.

Tasty, juicy turkey meat, fried to a golden crust, with baked vegetables is ready. Can be served with a glass of white wine. Enjoy your meal!

How to cook pork from turkey breast

Ingredients:

• meat ̶ 1 kg.
• spices for meat
• salt ч 2 tsp.
• garlic ̶ 4 cloves
• soy sauce ̶ 1 tbsp. l
• olive oil ̶ 1 tbsp. l
• water ̶ 1 l.
• sweet Pepper

Turkey Baked with Apples and Prunes

Ingredients:

• turkey ̶ 5 kg.
• apples ̶ 500 gr.
• prunes ̶ 500 gr.
• white wine ст 3 tbsp. l
• sour cream ̶ for lubrication
• salt ̶ to taste
• cinnamon ̶ 1 tsp.
• pepper ̶ 1/2 tsp.
• sugar 1 tbsp. l
• breadcrumbs ̶ 1 tbsp.

Cooking:

1. In a bowl, put your favorite spices and seasonings, add sour cream, mix everything. Rub the bird inside and out with this mixture.
2. Apples cut into medium cubes.
3. Rinse the prunes well in hot water, mash them a little.
4. Put sliced ​​apples, prunes, crackers, cinnamon, sugar in a separate bowl, add white wine and mix gently.
5. Stuff the turkey with this mixture. The hole can be stitched or stapled with wooden sticks.
6. Put back down on a baking sheet, brush with sour cream.
7. Brown the bird first in the oven at 200 degrees, then reduce the temperature to 180 degrees.
8. Fry until full readiness 2 ̶ 4 hours, depending on the size of the bird. From time to time watering the resulting juice.
9. Before serving, chop the finished bird into portions. As a side dish, use sour - sweet salads.

Baked Turkey Breast

Ingredients:

• turkey ̶ 1.5 kg.
• dezhon mustard ̶ 3 tbsp. l
• balsamic sauce ̶ 2 tbsp. l
• dried herbs ̶ 3 tbsp. l
• dry ground garlic ст 2 tbsp. l
• olive oil ̶ 3 tbsp. l
• paprika ̶ 1 tsp.
• fresh ground black pepper

Oven baked turkey with sweet potatoes and chestnuts

Why with chestnuts? In stores more and more products began to appear that are unconventional for Russian cuisine. I myself was interested. Bought, tried. Cooked, fried. Roasted chestnuts really liked. The taste is unusual. Chestnuts can be used as a side dish, replacing pasta and mashed potatoes. They are perfectly combined with mushrooms, sweet potatoes, carrots, white cabbage and Brussels sprouts. And then the idea came to stuff the turkey.

Ingredients:

• turkey 4 kg.
• chestnuts ̶ 500 gr.
• sweet potatoes ̶ 500 gr.
• butter
• salt pepper
• garlic ̶ 2 cloves
• leek

Cooking:

1. Leek and garlic finely chopped, fry in a skillet.
2. Then cook the chestnuts. Do not forget to make an X - shaped incision in advance.
3. This is done so that during cooking or frying they do not explode due to internal pressure.
4. To do this, put them in a saucepan and pour cold water on them, boil for 4 minutes after boiling water, then take out one by one and immediately peel off the peel and the inner film. Nuts can be roasted in the oven. Cover the baking sheet with parchment for baking, place the nuts and bake at 200 degrees. The peel will open and easy to peel. Part of the roasted chestnuts leave to decorate the dish.
5. Then cook mashed sweet potatoes. Cook as usual potatoes, puree, salt, pepper, add butter.
6. In a large bowl, gently mix the chestnut puree, mashed potatoes and roast.
7. Fill the turkey with this stuffing, fix the edges of the abdomen with chopsticks.
8. In the oven heated to 180 degrees, put a dish and bake for 2 hours. Every 20 minutes, water the turkey with prominent juice.
9. To find out if the bird is ready, pierce it in the thickest place, if a clear juice is released, the dish is ready.

Serve the dish hot or cold.

In this article I tried to collect and show the recipes for cooking turkey, which I use myself. If you find something interesting for yourself, I will be glad. If you have interesting recipes, share them in the comments.

Questions about how to cook soft and juicy turkey breast are natural when dealing with such lean meat. Although the turkey fillet is high in protein, it is completely free of fat, and therefore it is very hard to eat, especially if you cook it incorrectly. The secrets of preserving the bird's juiciness we will reveal in the following recipes.

How to make the turkey soft and juicy?

The most obvious option for giving juiciness to a dish is to add fat to its composition. Yes, this is not the most pleasant option for those who eat turkey during a diet, but as a dinner dish it will be perfect.

Ingredients:

• turkey fillet - 1.2 kg;
•   - 45 g;
• lemon - 1/3;
• garlic - 1/2 head;
• dry white wine - 180 ml;
• thyme sprigs - 4-5 pcs.

Cooking

Before you make the turkey fillet soft and juicy, it must be prepared. After rinsing the pulp, it is cleaned of possible films and lived, dried and proceeded to rubbing with oil. We will use not ordinary, but flavored oil (it can be prepared for future use and stored in a freezer). For him, the very soft butter rubbed with a pinch of salt, add lemon juice, garlic puree and thyme. The resulting mixture is spread on the dried fillet and spread it on a baking sheet. From above the bird is poured with wine, and after that it is baked at 200 degrees for half an hour.

Another guarantee of bird's juiciness is foil or baking sleeve. Together with the oil, this technology will help to keep the maximum of meat juice and keep the softness of the bird.

Ingredients:

Cooking

Dried turkey fillet, dry and then rub with a mixture of salt with paprika and spicy sauce. You can leave a piece of marinated for half an hour, and if you do not have time, then rub it with soft oil immediately and wrap a sheet of foil.

Cooking in the framework of this recipe occurs in stages: first, the meat quickly grabs the crust from the outside, keeping all the juice inside, and therefore the bird is put in an oven heated to 210 degrees. Since the meat is delicate, the temperature is immediately lowered to 180 and baked for another 45-55 minutes. Readiness is better to check with a thermometer (not higher than 73 degrees). The finished piece is freed from the foil, and then left at room temperature for 10 minutes before cutting.

How to cook a turkey, many housewives are interested in who are preparing a festive table. For many years it was one of the most popular dishes in western countries, especially in the USA. Recently, it is gaining popularity in Russia. In a special way, it is very important to cook and serve it, because the mood of the whole holiday will depend on it. After all, a turkey is usually prepared as the main decoration of a festive table.

The tradition of cooking turkey

Cooking historians have argued that women have been interested in how to cook a turkey for thousands of years. This is one of the most popular dishes for a festive table along with roast beef and pork. The tradition has gone since the times of the pagan rites of sacrifice.

In many aristocratic families they preferred to cook poultry for the holiday. But it was not a chicken like the poor, but a turkey or even a pheasant, partridge or swan. Today, turkey, goose and duck remain popular, except for the chicken, the rest of the birds are cooked very rarely.

Now and in our country, in stores and markets, you can find a variety of turkey carcasses weighing from one to five kilograms.

So how to cook a turkey is very difficult, it is better to carefully study the experience of culinary. For example, the recipes given in this article. Relatively recently it has become popular to marinate a turkey before cooking.

It is believed that culinary process was inspired by this process, which is used in the production of kosher products. It is necessary to remove all the blood, so it is thoroughly soaked in water. It is noted that kosher turkeys turn out to be softer and juicier than regular ones.

In this process, it is very important to cook the right and effective marinade, then you will know exactly how to cook a good turkey. For marinade on a turkey weighing about four to five kilograms, you should take:

• six liters of water;
• 125 grams of salt;
• three tablespoons of black pepper;
• one stick of cinnamon (it should be broken into several pieces);
• one tablespoon of cumin seeds;
• two dozen clove seeds;
• 90 grams of sugar;
• two onions, cut into large slices;
• four large slices of garlic, passed through the press;
• ground ginger root (about six centimeters long);
• one orange (cut it into a slice with the peel, squeeze the juice into the marinade, throw the slices themselves);
• three celery stalks (they are cut across into several pieces).

Turkey should be soaked in marinade for three to four days. The greater the weight of the bird, the longer it must lie in the mixture. All this time the bird must be in a cool room, you can even put it in the refrigerator. If you are marinating turkey breasts, it’s best to use a sleeve. The main thing - do not pay attention to the fact that there are a lot of components in this composition. If the hand does not have one or two ingredients, do not worry, the marinade will still get saturated. Let it stand in brine.

After picking the turkey out of the refrigerator or in a cool room, wait until it reaches room temperature, only after that rinse the bird in cool water, drain it with paper towels. Now it can be baked on a baking sheet. Many for this do not use neither extra fat, nor spices, nor special sleeves-packages, but simply put a little rosemary and sage. The bird itself can be greased with vegetable oil to make its skin turn red.

Cooking turkey drumstick

Very popular among meat lovers is turkey leg in lemon-soy marinade. To prepare this tasty and nutritious dish, take:

• two turkey legs;
• four tablespoons of soy sauce;
• one lemon;
• four tablespoons of vegetable oil;
• one teaspoon of black ground pepper.

Now we will tell you in detail how to make a turkey leg. Preliminary, it is recommended to marinate in soy sauce, mixed with juice, squeezed out of lemon, as well as black pepper and sunflower oil. Please note that if you prefer a sharper bird, you can increase the amount of spices by adding your favorite ones. For example, suitable red hot peppers.

Two legs of turkey, as a rule, weigh about one and a half kilograms. In the marinade, they should spend at least 30 minutes. In general, the more the better. Turn the tibia periodically to evenly marinate.

Then we lay the meat on the foil, we wrap the bird in it. We pinch the edges, creating a form with sides, into which we pour the marinade. Only after that we close the envelope and put it in the oven. Meat should be baked at 200 degrees for two hours. Now you know how to cook a turkey leg. On the side dish will be appropriate rice, which can be poured over the remaining broth.

Turkey thighs

To learn how to cook a turkey thigh, you need to learn a special recipe. For example, you can bake turkey thighs in foil. To do this you will need:

• 1.5 kilograms of hips;
• half onion;
• 5 grams of cumin;
• rosemary and olive oil is added to taste.

You remember how to make a tasty turkey? For this you need a marinade. For marinade on hips, take:

• half onion;
• three tablespoons of olive oil;
• two cloves of garlic;
• two teaspoons of Dijon mustard;
• one teaspoon of salt;
• paprika, cumin, black and red pepper - to taste.

Discovering the secret of how to cook a turkey thigh. Wash the turkey leg thoroughly and dry. Cut the onion into slices.

Blender put all the ingredients of the marinade and mix until smooth. This mass rub the thigh, trying to get it under the skin.

Take the folded foil in half, pour some olive oil on it, put the onion in the same place, and the turkey on top. The sides of the dish can be decorated with sprigs of rosemary and thyme, and then wrap the turkey in foil.

Put it in the oven on a baking sheet at a temperature of 200 degrees. Cook for about an hour and a half, occasionally pouring out the juice.

Check turkey readiness is very simple. It is enough to pierce the meat with a knife in the thickest part. Juice that starts to stand out should be clear.

About 40 minutes before readiness, open the foil so that a crispy crust forms on the bird. Here is one of the best ways to cook a turkey quickly and tasty.

In this article you will learn what to cook from turkey quickly and tasty. One of the amusing recipes is turkey fillet stewed with sour cream. For this recipe, take:

• one kilo of turkey;
• two tablespoons of sour cream with a fat content of at least 10%;
• two tablespoons of sauce;
• one onion;
• three cloves of garlic;
• salt, pepper - to taste.

Carefully chop the turkey fillet in small slices and simmer in a skillet for a quarter of an hour. Add the chopped onion to the fillet, continuing to stew for another five minutes, until it is soft enough. Chop the garlic finely and add to the skillet with meat and onion.

The final touch is sour cream and spices. It can be salt, pepper, soy sauce. Mix everything thoroughly, add boiled water, it is necessary to make the sauce quite liquid, continue to stew for another ten minutes until thick.

This is the best recipe when you suffer what to cook turkey fillets quickly. Absolutely any side dish will suit the dish.

Option with oven

If you have enough time that you can devote to cooking, it will be useful to learn how to cook turkey fillets in the oven.

To do this, take:

• one kilo of turkey meat;
• 50 ml of lemon juice;
• salt and pepper to taste;
• three cloves of garlic;
• 50 grams of soy sauce.

For a start, wash the meat well and thoroughly, since cooking turkey meat without observing this condition will not work.

Cook the marinade in parallel. To do this, mix soy sauce and spices. You can expand their list, focusing solely on your own taste. Add the chopped garlic and lemon juice to the marinade.

Now put the meat in a deep bowl and fill it with marinade. Leave it to lie in this form for at least several hours. It is recommended to turn the turkey from time to time so that it is well marinated on all sides.

Now we put the meat in the sleeve and send it to the preheated oven. The temperature should be about 200 degrees. The fillet should be baked for about forty minutes. Now from this article you have learned how to cook a turkey tasty and unusual.

Turkey breast

There is another popular option that cooked from turkey quickly and tasty. This is bird breast. It should be remembered that chicken and turkey breasts differ significantly from each other, therefore, when cooking, you must follow certain rules.

One of the main points is that the breast must necessarily be in the maximum amount of fluid. By the way, there are several ways to cook a turkey breast. This can be done in a slow cooker or oven.

Naturally, cooking in a slow cooker is easiest. It is only necessary to make sure that the piece is sufficiently moist, then it will turn out guaranteed to be tasty. Put a jar with your favorite broth and vegetables into the bowl of the multicooker, season with pepper and salt. Set the timer to a low temperature and two to three hours.

If you are concerned about how to cook turkey meat in the oven, be sure to pour broth over it periodically, and in order to preserve moisture, it is recommended to cover the baking dish or saucepan with a regular lid. Cooking is also best at low temperatures. So you will achieve maximum juiciness and tenderness of the dish.

Also, before sending the turkey breast to the oven, marinate for several hours. Ideally, get a special culinary thermometer to measure the temperature inside the product. For turkey breast the best performance - 160-165 degrees. If the temperature rises to 170, then the meat will become dry and tough. To measure the temperature of the meat, insert the tip of the thermometer into the thickest part of the breast. Best of all, if you manage to pierce through it.

In the shops today you can meet in the sale of minced poultry, which is dedicated to our article. If you are wondering, the answer to it will be found in this material.

There are many original recipes, such as meatballs in tomato sauce. Take six servings:

• one slice of white bread;
• 50 ml of milk;
• half a kilo of minced turkey;
• a bunch of fresh parsley;
• 200 g frozen spinach;
• a quarter cup of olive oil;
• one onion;
• two cloves of garlic;
• one carrot;
• 300 grams of tomato sauce;
• pepper and salt to taste.

So, a piece of bread soak thoroughly in milk, mix with mince. Add chopped parsley and pre-thawed spinach to the mixture. Salt and pepper. Form small and neat meatballs.

Cooks are advised to fry in olive oil for three minutes on each side. After that, remove them from the pan and leave to cool. On the remaining oil, fry the garlic and onions. Add the diced carrot. When the onions are reddened, pour in the tomato sauce, let it boil and begin to simmer the meatballs for a quarter of an hour.

Lazy cabbage rolls

You'd be surprised, but you can make even lazy cabbage rolls from minced turkey. For this you need:

• half a kilo of minced meat;
• one kilogram of cabbage;
• one carrot;
• 100 grams of round grain rice (you can take rice in a bag);
• one onion;
• one chicken egg;
• two tablespoons of tomato paste (you can replace it with ketchup);
• 300 grams of sour cream;
• 70 grams of hard cheese.

Mix the minced meat with rice, adding carrot, grated, and also slightly boiled cabbage and a little onion. Cabbage, if desired, can be crushed on a food processor.

Mix this mixture thoroughly, adding egg and spices to it. Formed small patties, put them on a baking sheet. Top them can be sprinkled with a mixture of garlic and grated cheese.

Mix sour cream with tomato paste, put one spoonful of this mass on each of the meatballs. Put the dish in the oven for 25 minutes.

Turkey liver

In this article you will find a recipe for how to cook turkey liver. A classic recipe with onions and sour cream.

For 700 grams of liver, you will need:

• three onions;
• three tablespoons of sour cream;
• salt and other spices - to taste;
• vegetable oil (it is required for frying).

Finely chop the onion and fry a little in the pan. Liver should be washed with running water and cut into small pieces. By the way, it is very convenient to do it. In the turkey liver there are no veins and films, which have to be additionally removed. As soon as the onions in the pan begin to turn yellow, we send a liver to it. Fry over high heat for about ten minutes to create a characteristic crust.

After that, reduce the fire so that it roasts until the end. Next, add spices, salt and sour cream. Stew another five minutes to full readiness and serve.

A special place on the holiday table always takes a meat dish. In most cases, this is done using pork or chicken. But in order to truly surprise your guests, it’s better to choose something unusual. In this article we will explain how to cook the whole turkey so that it is soft and juicy.

Turkey meat has a large number of useful vitamins. It is non-greasy and is often recommended as a diet food for patients with various diseases. Due to the high content of iron and minerals, it is used as the first complementary food for babies up to a year. Therefore, a dish of such meat will be not only tasty, but also useful.

To begin with, we will understand how to choose high-quality meat. Of course, you can not walk with a special device that measures the amount of nitrates and pesticides in the carcass.

  Let us consider the points on what you should pay attention to buy fresh turkey in the store or on the market:
   First of all, we look at the skin. It should be smooth and have a natural light shade. Please note that a slippery patina indicates a stale product, so you should not buy it, even if the price seems very attractive to you. Most likely this is a trick with a dubious discount in order to quickly implement the stale meat. This is especially important when cooking.

A fresh turkey carcass should be firm and very dense. Do not be lazy to put pressure on the meat, it should quickly return to its former shape.

In a freshly refreshed carcass, the scallop can be light pink, but the legs are gray and dry.

If you are going to cook even for a very impressive company you should not look for a big turkey. It is better to take a few small ones. Otherwise, you risk to buy old poultry and meat, no matter how hard you try to make it hard. The optimal size of the carcass is 5-10 kg. This may well be enough for a company of more than 10 people.

Do not buy a carcass on the "in reserve". To fresh meat retained all the useful properties take a turkey 2 days before the holiday. After thoroughly washing, drying and wrapping the bird in foil, you can hold it in the fridge until day X.

Cooking options for turkey are vast. Tender meat is suitable for frying, boiling, stewing. But on the festive table, the whole turkey will look more impressive. Poultry meat also goes well with almost all products: vegetables, fruits - you can choose a recipe depending on the preferences of the family.

One of the main secrets of cooking a tasty turkey is to give it juiciness. In itself, the meat, like any other bird, dryish. No wonder many nutritionists recommend it during a diet. But on the holiday table you can slightly pamper yourself with a juicy, moderately fat bird. This can be done in several ways. Stuff the turkey, periodically water it with fat during cooking. But the most interesting way to melt the butter, pump up a syringe and then poke the carcass in different places and inject the fat into the meat. In addition, it is worth taking care of their own fat, which is on the very meat. If you have a frozen turkey, you should never defrost it at room temperature. So the fat will go along with the water. It is better to leave the carcass in the refrigerator, so it will remain chilled, and with it keep all the juices.

1. A traditional recipe that will reveal the taste of meat, without weighing it with flavoring additives.

For this dish you will need:
   turkey carcass (about 5 kg);
   butter -175 g;
   1 onion;
   salt, pepper and rosemary (you can add other spices as you like)

Before cooking the carcass must be thoroughly rinsed, remove all feathers and dry. Grind the oil (you can use a grater) and mix with salt, pepper and. Carefully peel off the skin from the meat and put the mixture there. Next, clean the onion and make an incision crosswise. Put the onion in the abdomen.

On a greased baking tray, we shift our carcass and set in a preheated oven for 2-2.5 hours. Do not forget to check, because everything depends on the readiness of the dish. By the way, this readiness is very simple to determine: pierce the belly with a knife, if the juice is pinkish or red in color. So the dish is not ready yet. If the liquid is a clear color, then the dish is ready, and you can get it out of the oven, otherwise, the turkey will turn out to be overdried.

2. Stuffed turkey.

Any stuffed dish is cooked simply, and the whole turkey baked, and even stuffed with various fillings - effectively. The fillings can be different: fruit, vegetable, from different cereals, with the addition of mushrooms, etc.

But since in 2016 it is customary to eat more fresh exotic fruits, we offer you a recipe with just such a filling. For him, first is to pickle the carcass. Marinade is very simple 30g of olive or vegetable oil, spices (oregano, nutmeg, marjoram), 2 medium heads of garlic, salt and ground black pepper. Squeeze the garlic into the butter, add all the spices to the mixture, mix thoroughly and leave the marinade to rest for 15 minutes. Then pour it carefully with a spoon onto the previously washed and dried carcass. So that every millimeter of turkey could marinate, rub the marinade directly with your hands, not only outside, but inside.

We place the carcass into the sleeve, send it in the refrigerator for at least 12 hours.

We start to prepare the filling. You will need:
   a jar of canned pineapples;
   4 cloves of garlic;
   1 lemon;
   3-4 apples;
   2-3 pears;
   100g cheese;
   50 grams of mayonnaise;
   2 sprigs of fresh basil;
   spices as in marinade with nutmeg, salt and pepper to taste.

Basil we cut, we clean garlic, but we leave the cloves whole. Fruits cut into small pieces. We put the ingredients in one cup, add mayonnaise, salt, pepper and spices, mix well. We rub, we add to our stuffing.

To make it easier, we fill the belly of a turkey with the ready stuffing. Pin up with toothpicks or sew the abdomen so that the filling remains inside. Carefully wrap the carcass in foil, and send to bake in a preheated oven to 2000 for about 30 minutes.

After that, reduce the stove to 1800 and leave to bake until tender. When the juice from the abdomen is transparent, then open the foil and set the timer for another 30 minutes. An important point: every 5 minutes should be taken out of the oven and watered with selected juice.

The problem of all housewives, how to cook delicious, tender meat was solved in a flash, as soon as they came up with a universal remedy - a sleeve. Therefore, how to cook the whole turkey, so that it is soft and juicy in the sleeve, a question that does not require much effort.

Poultry meat perfectly combines, and we offer you a recipe for turkey with this dry fruit.

This recipe assumes the following set of ingredients:
   turkey small about 4 kg;
   seasoning for meat, salt and pepper;
   apples (golden is better) - 1 kg;
   prunes without stones 200g;
   butter - 50g;
   vegetable oil - 3 tbsp.

Traditionally, before preparing properly prepare the carcass. So that the meat does not turn out to be unpalatable, we will rub the carcass with spices mixed with salt and pepper and diluted with vegetable oil. To make the turkey sweat in its own juice, better wrap it in cling film and leave it in the refrigerator overnight. So the meat is saturated with all the flavors, and due to the food film does not absorb the unnecessary flavors of food stored in the refrigerator.

Prunes pour boiling water and leave to steam. Apples can be peeled, and you can leave. Mine and cut into cubes. Pick up the belly of the pickled carcass with apples, then sew up with food floss or simply pin up with toothpicks.

On the carcass make cuts throughout the size of the number of prunes. Salt and pepper the “pockets” we pack in them one prune and a piece of butter. We put everything in the package and send it to the oven. It is necessary to warm it up to 2000, thus baking for 90 minutes. After that, the turkey must be removed, cut the sleeve. On the baking sheet should stand out the juice they definitely need to pour the carcass and do it until periodically until the "bird" is reddened completely. Carefully lay the turkey on a flat dish, garnish with orange and lemon slices, sprigs of rosemary and basil. All guests will be delighted with such culinary delights.

The turkey, without which not a single Christmas table and Thanksgiving Day can be done in America, is becoming popular with us, but not all housewives know how to cook this meat so that it turns out tasty, soft and juicy. Since this product is considered light, low-calorie and hypoallergenic, it should definitely be included in the diet, especially when it comes to baby and health food. The fact is that turkey contains less of all cholesterol in comparison with other types of animal products, and from one portion of a bird it is possible to get 60% of a daily dose of vitamins and microelements. Although turkey meat is not the easiest in the cooking process, there are several tricks that will help turn it into a favorite dish of the home menu.

Choosing a good turkey

If you are going at home and hoping to get a tasty dish, you should choose only fresh young meat of good quality. Make sure that the skin of the bird is light and smooth (not slippery), and the meat is dense and elastic.

The belly of a fresh turkey is usually wet and shiny, the carcass and scallop are light pink, the legs are smooth and gray, the eyes are convex and transparent, without cloudy spots. The most tasty meat is Turkey, which is 16 weeks old and weighs 5–10 kg. You should not chase after large carcasses weighing 35 kg - as a rule, these are “old” birds, whose meat remains hard and dry even after several hours of cooking.

Ways to cook turkey

Stew in chunks, boil, fry in a frying pan, bake in the oven, on a skewer, in foil - stuffed or without filling. You can make minced meat for patties, pies, meatballs or make a pate, boiled pork, roll, schnitzel, goulash, stew and ase.

Fruits, mushrooms, chestnuts, liver, dried fruits, nuts, rice, potatoes and other vegetables are popular fillings for turkey. Turkey is very tasty in fruit glaze or under various sauces, often this bird is stewed in wine or champagne.

Turkey has one unusual feature - the white flesh of the bird easily “adapts” to the taste of other types of meat, and if you mix the turkey with chicken, beef or pork, it will be difficult to guess that there is turkey in the dish.

The secrets of cooking turkey

• Buy a turkey no earlier than two days before cooking - while the carcass of a fresh bird should be thoroughly rinsed under water, wiped dry from the inside and outside, cover with foil and refrigerate. Frozen turkey needs to be slowly thawed, either indoors or in cold water, which needs to be changed periodically. Remember that a bird weighing 9 kg can be defrosted for two days.
• Never cook a cold turkey, as only meat at room temperature will be soft and juicy. An hour before cooking, take the bird out of the fridge.
• Before baking the turkey is better to marinate, so that it turns out to be more tender and tasty. Water, wine, champagne, cognac with sugar, honey, spices, herbs, lemon and garlic are used as marinade. The turkey should be in the marinade for up to three days.
• Instead of marinating, you can rub the carcass outside and inside with a mixture of garlic, salt, olive oil and rosemary, leaving it to soak for several hours.
• Fill the turkey with stuffing (not very tight) and sew the hole.
• How to cook a turkey in the oven to make the meat juicy? Place the bird breast down on a baking sheet, in a sleeve or in foil, set the temperature to 170-190 degrees and bake, pouring the carcass with the juice.
• Roasting time is calculated by the weight of the meat (including the filling) - add 18 minutes for every 450 grams.

The turkey baked on a fire was a favorite dish of Indian tribes, therefore, in fact, it received such a name. Learning how to cook a turkey is easy if you practice more often. In addition, this bird is combined with all products, has a high nutritional value and inexpensive price. And most importantly - it is quite possible to feed 10-15 people with it, which means you can not worry about the festive menu. However, it is not necessary to wait for Christmas to enjoy delicious meat - cook it at least every week, try different recipes, toppings, sauces and turn on your own fantasy!