Turkey Vegetable Soup, a wonderfully comforting and nutritious use of the broth made from the carcass of a roasted holiday turkey. (c) Robin Grose
Robin: Please don’t discard the carcass left over after carving a roasted turkey; it is extremely valuable! Cooking the turkey’s “skeleton” will yield a rich, delicious broth that can be turned into soup or any one of a number of other yummy delights.
Turkeys are native to all of North America, from Canada through Mexico, and were important in many pre-Columbian Native American cultures, where all parts of the animal were put to good use. Nowadays we can get turkey cold cuts at the deli and roast either a turkey breast or the whole bird for a special occasion, but we don’t often think about what to do with the inedible parts of the animal. The making of turkey broth is easy and painless and, once you’ve done it one time, will probably become part of your post-turkey-roast routine.
Note: Use this very same process to get delicious broth from your rotisserie chicken carcass, taking full advantage of that bird, too. Use the chicken or turkey broth in any recipe calling for poultry broth—but keep in mind that turkey will produce a much richer, more intensely-flavor broth than chicken.
Turkey Broth
A delicious way to use a part of the bird that is usually under-appreciated: its skeleton!
Ingredients
- 1 fresh or frozen turkey prepared for roasting
- 1 medium-sized onion roughly chopped
- 3 ribs of celery with plenty of leaves roughly chopped
Instructions
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Roast (or grill or deep fry) your turkey, carve, and enjoy it with your usual fixin’s. When the big meal is over, take all the meat off the bones and refrigerate or freeze it for another use.
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Break up the carcass (bones, cartilage, and little pieces of meat and skin clinging to the bones) as needed for it to fit into a large stock pot filled ¾ full with water. Add the onion and celery and place the pot on the stove over medium-high heat. Once it reaches the boiling point, turn the heat down to low so that the water will continue to boil gently.
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Cover and cook for one and a half to two hours, checking periodically to make sure that the bones are still covered by the broth. If you need to add more water, heat it to boiling before pouring into the pot.
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Once it’s done cooking, remove the lid and take the pot off the burner. Let it sit for at least an hour, until it has cooled down enough to be manageable. Pour the broth through a strainer. NOW you can discard those bones, along with the onion and celery.
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Refrigerate the broth for several hours or overnight. A certain amount of fat will rise to the top; remove that fat before using the broth. Discard it, or experiment by using it like you would use rendered pork lard (such as in the making of tamales).
The refrigerated turkey broth itself will be thick and gelatinous, due to its high content of collagen. Don’t let this put you off; it’s very nutritious! It will become liquid again and look like a normal broth once it is reheated.
Use some of your broth right away to make soup, then freeze the rest for later use in any recipe that calls for poultry (chicken or turkey) broth.
To make Turkey Vegetable Soup:
Place the desired amount of strained turkey broth into a soup pot. Add chopped fresh or frozen sturdy vegetables such as carrots, peas, green beans, corn kernels, etc., plus chopped tomatoes, if desired (canned are fine), and boil gently until veggies are barely cooked. Add any more tender chopped vegetables—potatoes, cabbage, summer squash, spinach or Swiss chard—and continue to boil gently until all ingredients are cooked. Add the desired amount of cooked, chopped turkey meat. Salt to taste.
Ladle your Turkey Vegetable Soup into bowls. Top with some chopped cilantro or parsley to add a fresh element. Squeeze the juice of a fresh key lime half into each bowl before eating.
Another delicacy made with leftover roast turkey: Gala Turkey Salad
More delicious homemade soups:
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