Thanksgiving Turkey

Thanksgiving Turkey refers to the special festive turkey roast which is traditionally featured as the most important item of the party dinner menu-so much so that Thanksgiving Day is also fondly remembered as the Turkey Day, by many.

Cooking In the Traditional Way

Traditionally, the Thanksgiving Turkey is cooked by stuffing the bird and roasting it. Bread-based stuffing along with sage is used as the filling. Chopped celery, carrots and onions are the other ingredients that are used for the filling. The whole bird is roasted, though in the present times the deep-fried variety is also gaining popularity.

Serving

Traditionally, Americans have their Thanksgiving Turkey with Cranberry sauce or any other Cranberry accompaniment. However there are regional variations. For example, the Cuban-Americans pair up their turkey with roasted pork. The Europeans, Asians and Southerners have their turkey with a lot of side dishes like mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, cornbread etc.

Popular Recipes

The number of Thanksgiving Turkey recipes has grown rapidly in recent times. Traditionally, fattening ingredients like butter were used lavishly in the preparation, but the modern versions of roast-turkey are tuned towards healthier eating. Described below are some ways to prepare a healthy turkey  roast for Thanksgiving:

1. The turkey skin contains a lot of fat. One can avoid eating it by removing it from the turkey before consuming it.
2. Saturated fat, in the form of butter, can be avoided by roasting the turkey lightly so that it retains its moisture and does not need to be rubbed with butter before being roasted, to provide moisture.
3. The consumption of sodium, which is not good for heart health and elevates blood pressure in humans, can be minimized by not rubbing the turkey with common salt at the time of  preparation, but offering the salt at the serving table, so that the consumer uses the salt according to personal taste preferences.
4. The gravy used with the turkey can use the drippings from the roasting pan, rather than adding any butter specifically, which results in the consumption of less saturdated fat.

Trivia

According to a legend, in the 16th century, Queen Elizabeth of England celebrated a harvest festival with a goose meal. The Colonial English brought the tradition to America and had replaced the goose with turkey as wild turkey was the most abundant species of birds available then.