[Sca-cooks] TURKEY GRAVY

[Tara Sersen Boroson]

Making gravy is one of my favorite parts of preparing Thanksgiving
dinner :)  Here's what I do, it's quite easy and doesn't take much
time/attention.

You can chop up the heart and liver, or leave them whole to fish out
later.  Some guests get freaky about giblet bits in the gravy, so I
usually leave them whole.  (Silly people.  They never complain in
diners, because they never bother to ask what the chunky stuff is.  But,
at home, they *have* to know because it's *so good*... and then get
queasy looks on their faces.)

Take the giblets and neck and brown them in a pan with a bit of oil or
butter or pan drippings.  Deglaze the pan with turkey/chicken stock or a
splash of wine.  Add enough stock or broth to cover the giblets and neck
by a half inch or so and throw in some sage and pepper.  Be judicious
with salt, especially if you're using commercial broth.  Leave it to
simmer for, well, however long you've got.  I usually shoot for about a
half hour or more.  When your bird comes out of the oven, seperate your
drippings and add them to the pot.  If this doesn't make enough gravy
(like, if you stuffed the turkey and that sucked up most of the
drippings,) add stock until you feel you have enough.  Stir some
arrowroot or flour into cold water (2 or 3 big heaping spoons full to a
small glass of water,) then slowly whisk half of it into the gravy.
Don't thicken all the way at first - add more after a few minutes if you
don't feel it's thick enough.  Taste and adjust sage, pepper and salt
accordingly.  Leave it simmering until ready to serve.  Fish out the
giblets and neck and feed them to the pooch.

Variations: Add a little thyme or parsley, use cubeb instead of pepper,
add some minced garlic at the sauteeing stage.   If you're using a
sausage stuffing you might add a bit of crumbled sausage to the gravy.
If you like mushroom gravy, chop mushrooms finely and sautee them with
the giblets until they give up their water.  Arrowroot and flour will
give very different textures and colors.  Flour lightens the color and
gives a texture like what you're used to from canned gravy.  Arrowroot
leaves the gravy darker, and the texture is a bit, hrm, how do I
describe it?  Gelatinous?  I prefer arrowroot, myself.

Total attention: Maybe 10 minutes.  15, if you chop the giblets, garlic
or mushrooms.

-Magdalena

Seton1355 at aol.com wrote:

> --
> [ Picked text/plain from multipart/alternative ]
> This is oop but I need to ask.
> I have to make a homemade turkey gravy for Thanksgiving.
> Anyways.........
> If I take the pan drippings and whisk in some Wondra flour, will that make
> gravy?
> Anybody got a good but simple recipe?
> Phillipa
> (who doesn't have time for T-day this year, but is having 9 guests anyway...)