The Bitten Word

Thanksgiving 2009: Roast Spatchcocked Turkey

Martha Stewart Living (November 2009)

We have a love/hate relationship with Thanksgiving turkey. On the one hand, a golden-skinned roast turkey is the classic centerpiece of the Thanksgiving dinner. Done right, the meat is tender and juicy, the skin perfectly crisp.

But getting the bird on the table can be so much work! Do you brine it ahead of time or not? If you do brine, should you do a wet brine or a dry brine? Should you rub the skin with butter? Should you stuff the bird or cook the stuffing separately? Should you baste it while it's roasting?

And then, on the day of the big dinner, the bird sits there, taking up the majority of your oven space for three hours while the clock ticks closer to dinnertime.

Well, forget all that!

Reader, we'd like to have a word with you. Just one word, actually. This word is your key to a Thanksgiving turkey that takes just 70 minutes (!) from start to finish. No brining, no stuffing, no nothing.

That word is "spatchcocking."

Thanksgiving Guide 2009: What the Food Magazines Are Recommending

172 Recipes From 9 Leading Food Magazines

 

Thanksgiving is food magazines' time to shine. In years past, many of the food mags we read have used their November issues to really push the limits with innovative spins on Thanksgiving faves.

Sure, there are usually plenty of approachable standbys. But the classics usually sit alongside some really envelope-pushing ideas: Throw a Thanksgiving clambake! How about a Pacific Rim-fusion dinner? Truffle-laden turkey! Indian-spiced sweet potato gnocchi!! Vegan French-Vietnamese gluten-free stuffing!!!

Not so this year. From the looks of this year's crop of Thanksgiving food mags, 2009 is all about simplicity and basic, standard dishes. It's the Great Recession, and everybody just wants a big ol' piece of pumpkin pie.

Just look at what the magazines call out from the newsstands:

Martha Stewart Living: "Thanksgiving, simple and sensational"

Fine Cooking: "All the classics made easy"

Food Network: "Easy Thanksgiving"

Bon Appétit: "Thanksgiving made easy"

Everyday Food: "A Thanksgiving menu that's easy to make"

We have nine November issues in front of us, and nearly all of them are focused on "traditional" menus that are very straightforward.

The food magazines may have stuck to the classics this year, but that doesn't mean the options are limited. In the nine magazines we have, there are, in fact, 172 Thanksgiving recipes.

All those options can leave you more than a little stressed out. It's all too easy to get wrapped up in the idea that Thanksgiving has to be perfect and if you don't select the right stuffing recipe, your mother-in-law will break into tears at the table.

But fear not!  We've cataloged all 172 options below so that you, dear reader, can browse this year's recipes and make some selections for yourself. Over the next three weeks, we're going to be cooking and writing as many recipes as we can fit in. We'll post our photos and let you know how they turn out.

And as you're gearing up for the holiday, if you have questions, post them here and we'll do our best to answer them.

Okay, ready for the recipes?

Lamb Chops with Mustard-Herb Crust

Everyday Food (November 2009)

 

Sometimes we love poring over a complicated recipe and sourcing exotic, hard-to-fine spices or special cuts of meat. Sometimes we really enjoy spending a lazy afternoon in the kitchen, slowly cajoling ingredients to join in a triumphant symphony of flavors.

Other times, we just wanna eat.

Enter these Lamb Chops with Mustard-Herb Crust. Simple, pleasing and lightning-fast -- it took us longer to pull together a simple green salad than to cook these chops.

Steak au Poivre with Balsamic Reduction

Martha Stewart Living (October 2009)

On summer evenings, you're very likely to find us out on the patio, keeping watch while a big, juicy steak sizzles on the grill. We keep it extremely simple: salt and pepper, maybe a little Dale's.

But it's fall now. It's getting dark earlier and our grill's been cool for a while. It's time for a more grown-up steak, something a little fancier, more refined.

Hello, steak au poivre!

Cashew Chicken

Everyday Food (October 2009)

Just yesterday, one of Zach's co-workers asked, "Have you guys cooked anything recently that you really loved?"

Zach's mind flashed on a disappointing risotto, so-so cookies and good but not mind-blowing roast beef. No, we realized. We hadn't fallen in love with any of our recent dishes.

That was, until we made this Cashew Chicken last night.

Guys? We can say it: We loved this chicken!

Roast Beef and Celery Root with Watercress Salad

Everyday Food (September 2009)

We're not exactly sure why, but we don't make a lot of beef roasts.

Lord knows we love roasting a pork tenderloin (Exhibit A, B, C and D). And it's the exact same process: Sear all sides in a stovetop skillet, then finish in the oven. For some reason, though, roast beef just never seems to occur to us.

Well, that's going to change. With this solid, basic roast beef recipe -- and these lovely roasted vegetables -- we've got a new go-to recipe that's extremely delicious, but so easy it's almost mindless. That's a combination we can get behind!

Moroccan-Style Stuffed Acorn Squashes

Martha Stewart Living (October 2009)

As we mentioned earlier, we just returned a long weekend in Vermont with Zach's family. It was gorgeous -- with the foliage at peak color, we spent our days exploring impossibly cute villages and marveling at the explosions of crimson and gold that blanketed the mountains and valleys. Seriously, the entire state is like one big Sears Portrait Studio backdrop.

It really got us in the mood for fall -- and especially fall cooking!

These Moroccan-Style Stuffed Acorn Squash are a gorgeous little swath of Autumn. They're warm and inviting, and the cinnamon, nutmeg and golden raisins really capture the flavors of the season.

Braised Chicken with Gewürztraminer and Grapes

Fine Cooking (October 2009)

Food nerds that we are, we were excited to see a feature about cooking with grapes in the October issue of Fine Cooking. Though grapes are by no means a new fruit to us, they are definitely an ingredient that we pass over time and time again while shopping. 

It's not that we don't like them, but when we buy them, we typically relegate them to the realm of snacks. And if we're not buying them for snacks, we're getting them for the role of sidekick, where they play second fiddle on a cheese tray at a party.

What excited us about this magazine feature is that the grape recipes are extremely varied.  Sure, there are expected grape uses, like a frisee and grape salad. But there are also recipes that take grapes far into the savory side of cooking.

There are, for instance, duck breasts with saba and grapes, as well as seared scallops with green grapes and lemon relish. For dessert, there's a beautiful custard tart with wine-poached grapes that we're dying to try. 

And finally, there's this recipe, that incorporates grapes into a white wine-braised chicken.

Poached Salmon with Corn and White Wine–Butter Sauce

Food & Wine (September 2009)

We're not big poachers. As a cooking method, it's just never on our radar.  In fact, we've only ever poached something three times -- two different egg dishes and some rhubarb for a dessert.

But this Poached Salmon with Corn and White Wine-Butter Sauce might just bring poaching into regular rotation around The Bitten Word house. It's quick and easy, and it wraps the salmon in light, lovely flavors.

Pork Chops with Bacon and Cabbage

Everyday Food (September 2009)

There's starting to be a nip in the air, and we're starting to look forward to more cool weather cooking. 

In fact, we spent a good chunk of Sunday in the kitchen, making potato leek soup with an excess of potatoes we've gotten from our CSA over the past few weeks. We'll defrost it this winter for a nice, warm treat on a cold day. 

Making soup has got us thinking of other cool weather dishes, like our favorite braised short ribs and risottos that use fall flavors. 

We got our first taste of real fall cooking this week with these pork chops from Everyday Food. Seared and then baked with bacon, cabbage and a simple roux, they're the epitome of autumnal deliciousness.