10 December 2012

A 5 lb. turkey

I was just looking at a Yahoo web page where somebody asked why it was impossible to get a 5 lb. turkey in the U.S. And it does seem to be impossible. The only option is to buy a rolled roast, not a whole bird.

The elusive 5 lb. turkey can be found in France.

Well, here in France, it's not impossible. I cooked a 2.4 kg whole turkey yesterday (it was a late Thanskgiving for us). That's a 5¼ lb. turkey. It was on special at SuperU at 3.95 euros/kg, so the turkey cost under 10 euros.

A turkey perfect for two people who like turkey leftovers

The thing about buying turkeys here in France is that you only find whole ones at the supermarket around Christmastime. The rest of the year, you can easily find turkey parts — breast filets, leg/thigh sections, wings, even rolled roasts, etc. — but not whole birds for roasting. Those you have to order in advance from a butcher.

Turkey and a pan of stuffing — or dressing, if you prefer

Anyway, we enjoyed our late Thanksgiving turkey. Now we have leftovers, but not tons, because it was a small bird. Turkey sandwiches, turkey salad, and turkey soup are in our future. You probably are just barely over your turkey feast in the U.S., but ours is just starting.



To go with the 5 lb. roasted turkey, I made pan of bread stuffing with dried apricots, dried cranberries, toasted walnuts, lardons, onions, and celery. And we roasted one of our garden-grown acorn-type squashes in the oven along with the turkey and stuffing to have alongside.

8 comments:

  1. The turkey season is almost upon us here in the UK. The biggest one I ever cooked was 12lb. It was an error on the part of the butcher who got our order for a 7lb turkey wrong - but we were in no position to argue about it late on Christmas Eve. It gave us leftovers for months !!

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  2. Jean, in the U.S. it's hard to find a turkey that weighs less than 10 lbs.

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  3. Wow, delicious looking :) Your 5lb-er looks, in the photo, the same size as our 18 lb-er (for which we paid 87¢ / pound).

    Do you make cranberry sauce?

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  4. That bread stuffing looks so delicious. Jerry found turkeys here in Sevilla. I don't know how big they were (not 5 pounds and not 20 pounds), but they cost €35 euros. So, no turkey this year.

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  5. i looked for 2 small turkeys at thanksgiving to cook instead of a large one since there would be more legs & they would cook faster, but couldnt find

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  6. 5 lb turkey , lucky you. It is very very rare in Montréal . The smallest I got was a 3.5 kg butterball one and it was frozen - 3 weeks before Christmas last yr. This yr we may make the rounds at Marché Jean Talon to see if we can get a small one for New Year. Y wants to try it on the BBQ - slow roasting over charcoal.

    We got a good dump of the white stuff overnight , then it turned into freezing rain since 7 a.m. Winter has arrived :-)

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  7. That stuffing looks wonderful, as does everything else on the menu.

    Every year, we order a 10-pound turkey, and every year, the butcher gives us a 12-pounder.

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