My Lunch Can Beat Up Your Lunch!

Bento Recipe: Thanksgiving aftermath stew

 
   
 

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Here's a good recipe you can start on Thanksgiving, when you make the stock, and finish when you feel like it.

What you'll need:

    turkey soup stock, refrigerated & fat-skimmed
    water, the amount of which depends on how thick you make your soup stock
    2 stalks of celery
    1 carrot
    1 potato
    2 scallions
    a half-dozen mushrooms
    the shreds of turkey meat you always end up with after the big slabs are eaten
    salt and pepper

Start by making the stock on Thanksgiving:

    After you've gotten all the meat you can off the turkey, get a large pot, break the carcass up (breaking the large bones if possible), and cover with 12-16 cups of water. Add in two stalks of celery, a carrot, and an onion, all sliced up so they'll give up their flavor to the broth. First bring it to a boil, then turn down the heat and simmer it lightly for hours and hours, skimming every so often. The longer you simmer it, the more concentrated the stock will be. I boiled mine down so I got about 5 cups of nice thick stock. When you're done, strain it through a fine mesh sieve so you end up with just the liquid, and discard the turkey and vegetable parts. Refrigerate it and it'll congeal like the drippings did, and you'll be able to skim the fat from the top.

And when it's time to make the stew:

Peel the carrot and cut it into thin coins. Cut the celery into thin pieces. Peel and cut the potato into bite-sized chunks. Gather up the shreds of turkey meat that, if you're like me, you inevitably end up with because you wanted to get as much as you could off the bird before making stock. You should have at least a cup of turkey. (You can cut up bigger pieces, of course, if you somehow managed to avoid getting a ton of shredded meat, or have used it up in turkey salad or something else.)

Put the stock in a large pot. If you made it as thick as I did, add in another 2-3 cups of water. If you made it thinner, use less water. Turn the heat up to medium and mix with a wire whisk. When it's more or less blended, add the vegetables and meat, turn up the heat, and simmer, stirring occasionally. Add in however much salt and pepper (or any other seasoning you fancy) you like. It's done when you can stick a fork all the way into a piece of potato. (It's overdone of the potato is mushy!)

This keeps in the fridge for a few days, but I don't recommend freezing it, as that does unflattering things to the texture of the potato.